M2RB: Keith Urban
Oh, you stupid, stupid boy...
Petraeus’s judgment and Clapper’s obtuseness testify to America’s problems.
By Mark Steyn
Let
us turn from the post-Thanksgiving scenes of inflamed mobs clubbing
each other to the ground for a discounted television set to the
comparatively placid boulevards of the Middle East. In Cairo, no sooner
had Hillary Clinton’s plane cleared Egyptian air space than Mohamed
Morsi issued one-man constitutional amendments declaring himself and his
Muslim Brotherhood buddies free from judicial oversight and announced
that his predecessor, Hosni Mubarak, would be retried for all the stuff
he was acquitted of in the previous trial. Morsi now wields total
control over parliament, the judiciary, and the military to a degree
Mubarak in his jail cell can only marvel at. Old CIA wisdom: He may be
an SOB but he’s our SOB. New post–Arab Spring CIA wisdom: He may be an
SOB but at least he’s not our SOB.
But don’t worry. As America’s director of national intelligence,
James Clapper, assured the House Intelligence Committee at the time of
Mubarak’s fall, the Muslim Brotherhood is a “largely secular”
organization. The name’s just for show, same as the Episcopal Church.
Which brings us to Intelligence Director Clapper’s fellow
intelligence director, General Petraeus. Don’t ask me why there’s a
director of national intelligence and a director of central
intelligence. Something to do with 9/11, after which the government
decided it could use more intelligence. Instead it wound up with more
directors of intelligence, which is the way it usually goes in
Washington. Anyway, I blow hot and cold on the Petraeus sex scandal.
Initially, it seemed the best shot at getting a largely uninterested
public to take notice of the national humiliation and subsequent
cover-up over the deaths of American diplomats and the sacking of our
consulate in Benghazi. On the other hand, everyone involved in this
sorry excuse for a sex scandal seems to have been too busy e-mailing
each other to have had any sex. The FBI was initially reported to have
printed out 20,000–30,000 pages of e-mails and other communications
between General Allen, U.S. commander in Afghanistan, and Jill Kelley of
Tampa, one-half of a pair of identical twins dressed like understudies
for the CentCom mess-hall production of Keeping Up with the Kardashians.
Thirty thousand pages! The complete works of Shakespeare come to about
three and a half thousand pages, but American officials can’t even have a
sex scandal without getting bogged down in the paperwork.
For the cost of running those FBI documents off the photocopier, you
could fly some broad to the Bahamas and have a real sex scandal.
Instead, we’ll “investigate” it for a year or three, as we’re doing with
Benghazi itself. At her press conference the other day, soon-to-be
Secretary of State Susan Rice explained that she would be misspeaking if
she were to explain why she misspoke about Benghazi until something
called the “Accountability Review Board” has finished “conducting
investigations” into “all aspects” of the investigations being
conducted, which should be completed by roughly midway through Joe
Biden’s second term.
Pending that “definitive accounting,” one or two aspects stand out.
Paula Broadwell had access to General Petraeus because she was
supposedly writing his biography. As it turns out, she can’t write, so
her publisher was obliged to hire a ghostwriter from the Washington Post.
Some years ago, at a low point in my career, I was asked to ghostwrite a
book for a supermodel. That’s usually the type of “writer” who requires
a ghost: models, singers, athletes, celebrities. When a first-time
biographer requires a ghostwriter, that person is not a biographer but
something else. Yet she had classified documents at her home — and yes,
as the president suggested, they’re probably not that
classified, not the real top-secret stuff. But in a speech at the
University of Denver Mrs. Broadwell appeared to reveal accidentally that
she is privy to operational knowledge of illegal CIA interrogation
chambers in Benghazi.
Now let us move from General Petraeus’s mistress to General Allen’s
non-mistress, Tampa socialite and identical twin Jill Kelley. Mrs.
Kelley had clearance for all parts of the MacDill Air Base and was given
some kind of commemorative certificate as “honorary ambassador” to
CentCom, on the basis of which, in a recent 9-1-1 call, she claimed the
right to “diplomatic protection.” Yeah, that’s what Chris Stevens
thought in Benghazi. As appears to be well known, the Kelleys have
financial problems and their luxury home faces foreclosure. For a while
they ran a charity, the Doctor Kelley Cancer Foundation, which makes
terminal cancer patients’ final wishes come true. In 2007, they took in
$157,284 in donations, and ran up expenses of $81,927 on dining,
entertainment, and travel. So, if you’ve got cancer and your dying wish
is for Jill Kelley to party, this is the charity for you.
In other words, neither of these women pass the smell test. Which is a
problem insofar as Petraeus, as CIA director, is supposed to be head of
the national smell test, and General Allen, as Petraeus’s successor in
Kabul, is supposed to be head of the smell test in Afghanistan. In the
Gaza “peace agreement” signed last week, they flew in Hillary Clinton to
give the impression that she had something to do with it, whereas in
reality she was entirely peripheral to the deal. But Jill Kelley is
apparently essential to anything that matters in CentCom: When Pastor
Terry Jones was threatening to burn a Koran, General Allen asked Mrs.
Kelley to mediate. When radio personality Bubba the Love Sponge was
threatening to “deep-fat fry” a Koran, General Allen recommended the
mayor of Tampa ask Mrs. Kelley to intervene. The U.S. government is
responsible for 43 percent of the planet’s military spending, and
apparently all that gets you is that, when the feces hits the fan, the
four-star brass start e-mailing Jill Kelley of Tampa. If only she’d been
hosting a champagne reception at the Sigonella air base in southern
Italy, maybe we could have parachuted her into Benghazi to defuse the
situation. Jill is the woman Hillary can only dream of being — at the
confluence of all the great geostrategic currents of the age. Why didn’t
we fly Jill Kelley to broker the Gaza deal? Instead of a patsy peddling
risible talking points like Susan Rice, why can’t we have Jill Kelley
as secretary of state?
As far as I can tell, our enemies in Afghanistan don’t go in for
Soviet-style honey traps. Which is just as well, considering the ease
with which, say, a pretend biographer can wind up sitting next to the
U.S. commander on his personal Gulfstream. In different ways, Director
Petraeus’s judgment and Director Clapper’s obtuseness testify to the
problems of America’s vast, sprawling, over-bureaucratized intelligence
community. If Director Petraeus can’t see the obvious under his nose in
his interventions in the Kelley twins’ various difficulties, why would
you expect Director Clapper to have any greater grasp of what’s
happening in Cairo or Damascus?
Having consolidated his grip in Egypt, Morsi is now looking beyond.
His “peace deal” legitimizes the Muslim Brotherhood’s affiliate in Gaza,
and increases the likelihood of the Brothers advancing to power in
Syria and elsewhere. As on that night in Benghazi when the most lavishly
funded military/intelligence operation on the planet watched for eight
hours as a mob devoured America’s emissaries, America in a broader sense
is a spectator in its own fate. As for Afghanistan, it seems a fitting
comment on America’s longest unwon war that the last two U.S. commanders
exit in a Benny Hill finale, trousers round their ankles, pursued to
speeded-up chase music by bunny-boiling mistresses, stalker socialites,
identical twins, and Bubba the Love Sponge.
Stupid Boy - Keith Urban
Well, she was precious like a flower
She grew wild, wild but innocent
A perfect prayer in a desperate hour
She was everything beautiful and different
Stupid boy, you can't fence that in
Stupid boy, it's like holding back the wind
She laid her heart and soul right in your hands
And you stole her every dream and you crushed her plans
She never even knew she had a choice and that's what happens
When the only voice she hears is telling her she can't
Stupid boy, stupid boy
Oh
So what made you think you could take a life
And just push it push it around
I guess to build yourself up so high
You had to take her and break her down
She laid her heart and soul right in your hands
And you stole her every dream and you crushed her plans
She never even knew she had a choice and that's what happens
When the only voice she hears is telling her she can't
You stupid boy
Oh, you always had to be right but now you've lost
The only thing that ever made you feel alive
Yeah, yeah
Well, she laid her heart and soul right in your hands
And you stole her every dream and you crushed her plans
Yes, you did
She never even knew she had a choice and that's what happens
When the only voice she hears is telling her she can't
You stupid boy, oh, I'm the same old
Same old stupid boy
It took awhile for her to figure out she could run
But when she did, she was long gone, long gone
Ah, she's gone, she's long gone.
Yes, she's gone
Nobody's ever gonna love me like she loved me
And she loved me, she loved me
God please, just let her know
I'm sorry, I'm sorry
I'm sorry, I'm sorry
Baby, yeah, I'm down on my knees
She's never coming back to me
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