Archive for the ‘David Petraeus’ Category

Fox’s chair Roger Ailes told Petraeus he’d quit to manage his prez campaign (AUDIO)

Tuesday, December 4, 2012 by:jgarofoli@sfchronicle.com (Joe Garofoli)
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Fox News likes to call itself “fair and balanced.” Key words: “call itself.”

The latest blunder for the cable news ratings leader is rooted in the new revelation that founder and chair Roger Ailes sent an emissary — Fox’s national security analyst K.T. McFarland — to offer General David Petraeus political advice and tell The General that he’d be willing to quit Fox to run his presidential campaign.

For realz. Comes from Bob “Watergate” Woodward in the Washington Post. And for those about to whine that this is mere conjecture from the liberal media, here’s a link to the audio of the conversation between McFarland playing bag man for Ailes to Petraeus.

Ah, yes. General Petraeus. You may remember him for the spectacular sex scandal that crashed his career a few weeks back. That Roger sure can pick ‘em.

Listen to the audio recording of the conversation because it is full of gems — starting with how McFarland tells the General that “everybody at Fox loves you.” Just because they’re “fair and balanced” perhaps.

Fox loves Dave so much that they want to know if there’s any suggestions he has, you know, when they’re covering the news in a “fair and balanced” way. Dave says he’s a bit worried about the “slant” he’s seeing at Fox. They’re sounding a little “skeptical”…you know, like journalists.

“The editorial policy of Fox had shifted,” Dave said. “It was almost as if, because they’re going after Obama, they had to go after Obama’s war as well.”

“Papers and news outlets have editorial policies,” the General said. “They know sort of how their bosses feel about things . . . and it causes a certain shading.”

Hmmm. Like say — hypothetically speaking of course — if the chair and founder of a network that bills itself as “fair and balanced” told a General that his network was COVERING that he’d quit to run his campaign for president. Would it be any wonder if the employees at that network “loved” that person.

And nice job by McFarland, who is supposed to “analyze” national security affairs for Fox. If she fawned over Petraeus any more than she did in this conversation, she could be his biographer.

Roger’s response to Woodward?

“It was more of a joke, a wiseass way I have,” he said. “I thought the Republican field [in the primaries] needed to be shaken up and Petraeus might be a good candidate.”

Nothing breeds credibility more than the I-was-just-joking defense from the leader of the network. As they say on Fox, “We report. You decide.”

Frank, Hutchison spar over FBI handling of Petraeus investigation

Monday, November 26, 2012 by:kyle.campbell@chron.com (Kyle Campbell)
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“You can take the dog out of the fight, but you can’t take the fight out of the dog.”

Texas Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison and Massachusetts Rep. Barney Frank proved the expression true when they went at each other like pit bulls on CNN’s State of the Union program Sunday morning.

Though both lawmakers are leaving Washington at the end of the year following long, decorated careers, they proved that they aren’t willing to go quietly into the night when discussing the FBI’s investigation of CIA Director Gen. David Petraeus and the subsequent scandal that ensued.

Frank and Hutchison joined fellow soon-to-be retirees Arizona Sen. Jon Kyl and Connecticut Sen. Joe Lieberman on the weekly program hosted by CNN correspondent Candy Crowley.

The exchange started with the following statement from Hutchison about the FBI’s probe into Petraeus’s personal emails:

“I’m very worried about this. I’m very worried. Um, and I want to know a whole lot more about what the first e-mails really were and, um, did it really trigger a — an FBI investigation of the CIA director and at a low level? And it wasn’t raised to a higher level? I mean if anybody is investigating the director of the CIA, the president of the United States should know immediately. And I feel like, A., we don’t know enough, and, B., I have great concerns about a lot of the surroundings …”

Frank pressed Hutchison for more specifics, asking if she was implying that the FBI was in fact covering up something else.

Hutchison replied that she simply had “great concerns,” which Frank chalked up to weaseling away from the question.

To get the full impact of the exchange, please watch the video above.

Dianne Feinstein defends Susan Rice, says Iraq intel bad too

Friday, November 16, 2012 by:Carolyn Lochhead
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Sen. Dianne Feinstein, the California Democrat who chairs the Intelligence Committee, defended U.N. Ambassador Susan Rice Friday, saying “We have seen wrong intelligence before, and it all surrounded our going into Iraq, and a lot of people were killed based on bad intelligence. And I don’t think that’s fair game. I think mistakes get made– you don’t pillory the person.”

Feinstein spoke to reporters after a closed hearing with testimony by Gen. David Petraeus, who submitted his resignation from the Central Intelligence Agency after it was revealed he had an extramarital affair. Rice has been under heavy attack from Republicans led by Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz. and Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., claiming she misled the public in comments to Sunday news talk shows in December about the terrorist attacks that killed U.S. ambassador to Libya Christopher Stephens and three other Americans.

President Obama angrily defended Rice in a news conference earlier this week. Rice is considered a top contender to replace Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. McCain and Graham have made clear they would object to the nomination. The issue flared up in the presidential race, with Republican nominee Mitt Romney accusing Obama in a debate of misrepresenting the attacks and deliberately downplaying the idea that terrorism was involved.

Feinstein said based on what she has learned, “What Susan Rice did was use talking points originally put out by the CIA, signed off by the intelligence community, and those talking points, as I understand it, were requested by the House Committee, and all the intelligence community signed off on them.”

“The way it keeps going, it’s almost as if the intent is to assassinate her character, and I really object to that,” Feinstein said. She said the talking points “subsequently became available to anybody I guess who asked for talking points, which the ambassador did.”

McCain was also at the briefing but did not address the Rice controversy. He praised Petraeus for providing thorough testimony and conceded that there had been “clearly a failure of intelligence.”

Feinstein said the original talking points given to Rice said: “The currently available information suggests that the demonstrations in Benghazi were spontaneously inspired by the protests at the United States Embassy in Cairo and evolved into a direct assault against the United States diplomatic post in Benghazi and subsequently its annex. There are indications that extremists participated in the violent demonstrations.”

Again from the talking points: “This assessment may change as additional information is collected and analyzed and as currently available information continues to be evaluated.”

Feinstein said, “That’s clearly what happened.”

Feinstein said Petraeus “was both eager and willing to give us his views on this and his experience on it. And that’s very much appreciated, particularly because of the situation.” Referring to the closed briefing, she said “We didn’t want to make it any more difficult for him, and you know, you people aren’t always the easiest.”

Asked about security lapses at the Libyan consulate, Feinstein said she has her own views on that but will hold off until the final committee report.

Feinstein is scheduled to appear on NBC’s Meet the Press Sunday at 10:30 EST.

Analysis: Obama does his best to avoid Petraeus morass

Wednesday, November 14, 2012 by:richard.dunham@chron.com (Richard Dunham)
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He didn’t take the bait.

You knew that President Obama, at his first press conference since the David Petraeus sex story broke (and since the election, if you forgot that event), was going to be asked about the mutating investigation/affair/scandal involving David Petraeus, the FBI, the CIA, the Pentagon, Gen. John Allen, a biographer and a pair of Florida socialites/social climbers.

He was.

Twice.

His answers boiled down to this: Gen. Petraeus is a good man who made a bad decision. And I assume that everyone is following protocol in investigating the facts of the affair. (Or is it affairs?)

Reporters wanted to know “what did the president know and why didn’t he know it.”

Obama wasn’t biting.

The president said he has seen “no evidence” that any classified information was compromised that had a “negative impact on our national security,” Obama said, choosing every word carefully.

He said the FBI “has its own protocols” and seemed to imply that he knows of no evidence that the protocols were not followed.

“I am withholding judgment,” he said. “We don’t have all the information yet.”

He tried to turn the tables on his questioners, saying that reporters would have asked him “why were you interfering in a criminal investigation” if he had been notified of the Petraeus probe.

“We’re not supposed to meddle in a criminal investigation,” he argued.

Obama repeatedly shifted the focus to Petraeus’ contributions to American national security, from Iraq to Afghanistan to the CIA.

“General Petraeus had an extraordinary career,” he said. “We are safer because of the work that David Petraeus has done.”

Obama said he hopes that the affair that ended his CIA tenure would be “a single side note” in an “extraordinary career.”

We’ll see.

Confused about the Petraeus scandal? Here is a flowchart from Gawker that explains all

Tuesday, November 13, 2012 by:jana.kasperka@chron.com (Jana Kasperkevic)
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Earlier Friday, CIA Director David Petraeus announced that he is resigning from the agency due to having engaged in an extramarital affair. His resignation set off a media storm that uncovered a scandal worthy of its own soap opera.

“After being married for over 37 years, I showed extremely poor judgment by engaging in an extramarital affair. Such behavior is unacceptable, both as a husband and as the leader of an organization such as ours. This afternoon, the President graciously accepted my resignation,” Petraeus wrote in a letter sent to CIA employees to announce his resignation.

Since Friday, it has been revealed that Petraeus engaged in the affair with Paula Broadwell, his biographer. The scandal has also extended past their relationship to include Jill Kelley and Gen. John Allen.

The entire affair is so complicated that in order to help us keep track of all the main players, Gawker has created this genius flowchart:

(Jim Cooke/Gawker)

To get a more detailed description of everyone’s role, you can read Gawker’s breakdown here.

Dianne Feinstein: Obama should have been informed sooner about Petraeus scandal (VIDEO)

Monday, November 12, 2012 by:jgarofoli@sfchronicle.com (Joe Garofoli)
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CA Sen. Dianne Feinstein continues to tell everyone she can that she is TICKED that she wasn’t informed sooner about that the FBI was investigating now ex-CIA director David Petraeus’ alleged affair with his biographer Paula Broadwell.

Hell hath no fury like a ticked DiFi. She just told MSNBC’s Andrea Mitchell that President Obama should have “absolutely” been told earlier about what was up.

And she wants to see a troop report on a Petraeus’ trip to Benghazi that seems to have disappeared. And she’s prepared to subpoena it if necessary.

“I believe that Director Petraeus made a trip to [Libya] shortly before this became public,” Feinstein said. “I believe that there is a trip report. We have to asked to see the trip report. One person tells me has read it. And then we try to get it, and they tell me it hasn’t been done. That’s unacceptable. We are entitled to this trip report, and if we have to go to the floor of the Senate on a subpoena, we will do just that.”

Feinstein said she doesn’t think there is a link between the affair and what occurred in Benghazi. But she’s not sure, because there is still a lot to learn about this. “The skin of the onion is getting peeled off. We don’t know what we may find.”

Here’s the full DiFi on MSNBC:

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