Republican SEALs Oppose Obama, Film at 11
Two groups of former special operations soldiers are opposing Obama. Their military bonafides are not their most interesting credentials.
Two days ago, I pointed to a group of former special operations and intelligence officers are criticizing President Obama for politicizing the bin Laden raid and generally playing fast and lose with our nation’s secrets. I noted that, while some of their charges were “overwrought,” OPSEC’s “effort appears to be much better intentioned and honorably executed that that of the Swift Boaters” who smeared John Kerry in 2004.
Josh Rogin points to similar effort by another group, calling itself Special Operations Speaks, which is not only apparently as nutty as the Swifties but has some significant overlap.
But the founder of SOS, a similar group with the same mission and the same tactics, says he has no problem admitting that he is against Obama’s politics, personality, and believes that America’s current president is lying about his origins.
“I have to admit that I’m a Birther,” said SOS founder Larry Bailey, a retired 27-year veteran of the Navy SEALs, in an interview. “If there were a jury of 12 good men and women and the evidence were placed before them, there would be absolutely no question Barack Obama was not born where he said he was and is not who he says he is.”
Bailey, who is part of the leadership of SOS’s effort to mobilize thousands to take to the streets to denounce Obama’s treatment of the military through an SOS project called Operation Street Corner, doesn’t only believe that the president is a foreigner. He also believes that he is not actually the son of Barack Obama, Sr. Bailey trumpeted the conspiracy theory that the president is actually the love child of Ann Dunham and writer Frank Marshall Davis.
“In his books, Obama said his mentor was a fellow named Frank Marshall Davis. Frank Marshall Davis was a member of Communist Party USA, he wrote for the communist party’s Hawaii newsletter, he was a close friend of Obama’s mother, and there’s a strong case that Frank Marshall Davis rather than Barack Obama, Sr. was Barack Obama, Jr.’s father and that Barack Obama, Sr. was just an administrative father of convenience,” Bailey said.
Bailey isn’t shy about his dislike of Obama personally and admits freely that his extensive efforts to mobilize special operations veterans and their supporters around the country is rooted in his personal dislike of the president and his desire to see him replaced.
“Barack Obama’s a born red-diaper baby. He’s a socialist. His beliefs are the very antithesis of my beliefs. As far as I am concerned he is one of the most unlikeable and unprepared politicians we’ve ever had,” Bailey said. “I don’t like him because he believes that America is responsible for most of the problems in the world and he wants to cut her down to size.”
Bailey is also a veteran of efforts to portray Democrats as anti-military during previous presidential election cycles. He was involved in the 2004 effort called Vietnam Vets for the Truth, an organization that was separate from but worked with Swift Boat Veterans for the Truth to attack John Kerry’s military record. Together they organized a “Kerry Lied” rally on Capitol Hill that had 5,000 attendees.
Now, that fact that both groups have former Navy SEALs in their mix and both are going against President Obama shouldn’t lead to guilt by association.
But Steve Hynd did more digging and provides rather compelling evidence that OPSEC isn’t simply a group of concerned security professionals.
The president of OPSEC is identified by Hosenball as “Scott Taylor, is a former Navy SEAL who in 2010 ran unsuccessfully for the Republican nomination for a congressional seat in Virginia.” What Hosenball neglects to mention, however, is that every other person he names as a member of this OPSEC group is a Republican activist and apparatchik.
Ben Smith, the ex-SEAL named above, is nowadays better known for his activist work with the Tea Party Express and Move America Forward , the pressure group set up by California Republican public relations firm Russo Marsh & Rogers. Fred Rustmann, “a former undercover case officer for the CIA who is a spokesman for the group” is the same Fred Rustman who appeared in a co-ordinated campaign on Fox News and in the conservative press claiming to be Valerie Plame’s case officer and saying that she openly acknowledged her status as a CIA agent, blowing her own cover. Larry Johnson dealt with Rustman’s claims in his testimony to Congress. Finally, Hosenball mentions “Chad Kolton, a former spokesman for the office of Director of National Intelligence during the George W. Bush administration who now represents OPSEC”. A moment’s work with Google reveals that Kolton “led the public affairs department” at DNI during the Bush administration and now is a founding partner in the D.C.-based firm of HDMK, a PR firm founded by four Republican “communications veterans”.
Surely Hosenball must have noticed, veteran reporter that he is, that every single person named as part of this group in his story was a long-standing Republican PR operative.
The Hosenball Steve refers to is intrepid Reuters reporter Mark Hosenball, whose story I relied on without doing any further vetting. While I think OPSEC’s charages are, at best, overblown, they didn’t strike me as wild because similar but less incendiary sentiments have been expressed by such sterling characters as Bob Gates and Mike Mullen. But the fact that the group’s key spokesmen are all Republican operatives certainly changes the lens through which their charges should be viewed.
Thus far, it appears that OPSEC is just a Republican shill group whereas SOS are downright crazy. But there’s not much value in either’s contribution to the discussion.
So, the American Nazi Party is slightly more nutty than the Ku Klux Klan? So what”
The right now has two scummy military groups smearing Obama instead of just one. OPSEC and SOS are two sides of the same scummy coin, James, and both are probably funded by the same scummy people. One just happens to be more noxious than the other.
You posted this for a compare and contrast? I compared and found both groups equally disgusting.
Cue Jenos to explain why JJ hates the troops and isn’t half the warrior that he is.
I think they are making noise partly because Obama is seen as having more foreign policy experience than the GOP ticket. Getting Bin Laden was a “big effin deal”, and one they can attack without reminding everyone of George W Bush and Iraq.
Thanks, James, for following up your first post on OPSEC.
Kudos Dr. Joyner, for the new post.
Of course, everyone in the know can tell you that of course Obama wasn’t really born in Hawaii. In fact, he was born on Mars, and is really a Martian disguised as a human. This became obvious as soon as NASA started the mission to Mars.
So they are attacking Obama for “politicizing” the Osama killing as they politicize the Osama killing.
It reminds me of the old chevy chase weekend update line in 1980:
“Jon Anderson just gave his 2000th interview complaining to the press about how little press he is getting.”
Thats John Anderson indy candidate for Prez, not Jon Anderson former lead singer of Yes.
I’d like to give him credit for his honesty but, I can’t.
He admits he’s an idiot because, these days, there is no downside to that.
I bet if you do even more digging on these clowns that there will be one or more cases of “Stolen Valor”. Also, they will be probably getting Govt paid retirement and medical care to go with their Tea Party allegiances.
Ya know? I try and try and try, but I just can’t see my Uncle Alex doing this. At most I see a shy quiet smile turning away and saying not a god-d*mned word.
But then, he never thought he was anything special.
How many people (men and women) responding to this thread have even been in the military?
So Bailey simultaneously believes that Obama is (a) a foreigner who is (b) the son of two American citizens. How does that work, exactly?
@ jan
Have you ever been in the military?
@ Rafer Janders
It works just great in the alternate reality that is the American far right.
@jan:
How many people (men and women) responding to this thread have even been in the military?
I don’t know. How many?
James, good work on following up.
Jan,
Only military personell can criticize military personnel?
Does that work for every category?
“Sir? Excuse me, sir? Are you a Lutheran? Then i thank you to kindly shut up. Only lutherans may criticize my idiocy.”
Jeez you really are dense sometimes.
@jan:
That raises an obvious question:
How many people have read this article and think that it has something to with military service, and not with sleazy, greaseball partisan politics?
@jan: I have: 20 years
Does being married to a former marine whose son in law is in the Army reserves count? Both are stalwart Obama supporters, btw.
Thanks Dr. Joyner for the followup
“How many people (men and women) responding to this thread have even been in the military?”
James has. 12 years for me.
Steve
6 years for me and what these people are doing is disgraceful.
@Neil Hudelson:
It’s actually worse than that, because the implict suggestion gets back to the idea that not only do people who have never served have no right to criticize, but they also should support everything militarily related.
@jan:
I think you’ve got a good response to your irrelevant question. But I’d still love to read why you think it matters.
So, if you don’t mind…
Kudos, Dr. Joyner, for providing a megaphone and amplifier for this fringe group and their insane beliefs. Your next post will be about 9-11 trutherism, I assume?
Also, I note not a single outright condemnation of this group and their outrageous, poisonous beliefs. You’ve condemned Joe Biden for his vile influence on American politics, so where’s the outright, explicit, no holds barred denunciation of these birthers who are wrapping themselves up in the American flag and hiding behind their military service?
Or we will continue to hear crickets from you in regards to dirty Republican tactics, and just merely provided with block text quotes and links?
@anjin-san:
“Have you ever been in the military? “
No, I haven’t been in the military, My husband, though, was in the Navy, Godson was a Marine in Iraq. I worked in a nursing capacity at the VA briefly.
@Neil Hudelson:
“Only military personell can criticize military personnel?”
I don’t believe I ever said that, did I? Isn’t that just you making a sarcastic assumption?
@PogueMahone:
“I think you’ve got a good response to your irrelevant question. But I’d still love to read why you think it matters.”
I was curious about the demographics behind the opinions here, that’s all, and appreciate the responses given.
That’s nice. My uncle is an ex-Marine, fought at Frozen Chosin. My dad dropped out of college to enlist in the Army during the Korean war, when we were taking horrible casualties.
Are you somehow more special than me? Am I not entitled to question the actions and motives of veterans who choose to become involved in politics?
@anjin-san:
“Are you somehow more special than me? Am I not entitled to question the actions and motives of veterans who choose to become involved in politics? “
Tell me, anjin, where in my two above posts did you derive all that from?
Sorry, sweetie, but people who are peddling slime don’t get to hide behind their uniforms to cleanse the filth they are spewing…
Oh, year after year of having conservatives questioning my patriotism in particular and that of Democrats in general. And your response was telling. I did not ask about your family, I asked about you. Hate to break it to you, but you don’t get any extra patriot cred because you have relatives that have served.
And your “interested in demographics” line? That sounds about as credible as everything you say, that is, not at all.
@anjin-san:
I’ll tell you my rational behind my answer to you.
If I had answered a simple ‘no,’ then I felt you would probably harangue me for asking such a question when I had no involvement with the military. So, I gave a short disclosure about my immediate associations with people in the service.
Hoocoodanode? Oh, wait, me:
And to make things more clear:
Money quote from your original post, when you treated this seriously:
Does anyone honestly not understand why I /headdesk and resort to profanity whenJames keeps falling for this same shit OVER AND OVER AND OVER AGAIN? It was transparently obvious what this band of retorgrade morons was all about from the moment you started the video, but for some reason, James bought it at first. I do however give him a lot of credit for this follow up post. 99% of other Republican leaning sites would have simply ignored the inconvenient follow-up, but Joyner has the integrity to follow through.
But what just makes me want to bang my head against the wall is when will he stop treating scummy people as if they have honorable intentions?
/primalscream
@jan: I have Jan – 1968 to 1972, do you remember what was going on during that time period? What we have here is a bunch of right wing operatives that happened to be in the military.
@John Cole: Because, John, you have to stay calm and rational or they win. If you engage in the same BS as they do, you lose. I believe that. And as far as I can see, Obama believes that. Think steady, think rational, and think long term.
@jan:
I have, and you should just shut your mouth about anything military.
@John Cole: The thing is, there are lots of military and intelligence types who not only feel this way but have the same overwrought reaction. Many of these people live in a very black and white world, so this type of outrage coming from a group of former special operators wouldn’t surprise me. Again, Obama’s SECDEF and JCS Chairman were saying much the same thing, albeit in a more rational way.
I presumed that most of them were Republicans, since most career military folks are, but that doesn’t make their criticisms invalid. That most of the key spokesmen are professional Republican operatives, though, changes the equation. It doesn’t necessarily make them dishonorable or even malign in their intent—they may seriously believe everything they’re saying here as the gospel truth—but it changes the way we should react to their messaging.
And, yes, I do try to operate from the premise that @Scott suggests. Absent information to the contrary, I try to take people at face value and address their arguments on their merits rather than assuming they’re illegitimate actors acting as part of some big conspiracy.
@Lit3Bolt: I’m not sure what you’re looking for here. In the original posting, I assessed the validity of the claims being made and called them overwrought and unlikely to have any impact on the campaign. In this follow-up, I point to information that they’re Republican operatives and state that their claims should be discounted accordingly. And I call the birther-led SOS group “nasty” and “crazy.”
As for Biden, I cite one recent example of his lowering the discourse. Even in that context, I largely dismiss the original comment as Biden getting “carried away” in front of a revved up crowd but call him out for not correcting himself afterwards. And, yes, I hold the vice president to a higher standard than some nutbag group of people nobody has ever heard of precisely because of his high station and commensurate impact.
I like Biden, despite my frequent exasperation with him. I think that, by and large, he’s a straight shooter who articulates his vision with much more candor than is common in Washington and that we could use a lot more of that. And I’m therefore willing to write off a lot of “Biden being Biden” because gaffes are the price we pay for going off script and think we ought encourage our leaders to do that. But I think it’s fair to call him out when he goes too far won’t walk it back.
A few early morning thoughts on the above post.
James Joyner, a PhD in Political Science can’t do the minimal research needed to correctly identify the OPSEC/SOS political hit job. James is a sophist who uses his stature as a “reasonable Republican” (unwarranted after the past 10 years of continued Republican support) to provide cover and/or publicization for the cruel and hateful ideas promoted by his party.
A group of commenters with a low bar for competence congratulates James for doing a followup post on something that should have never been written in the first place. Why congratulate someone for doing something they should have done correctly the first time. Also I don’t give a damm if Red State wouldn’t have done a followup post, Red State at least doesn’t pretend to be a “reasonable Republican” site.
John Cole continues to “personally respect” James even though James has proven to be a sophist for the Republican party. I “personally” cannot respect anyone who continuously lies and obfuscates in order to promote policies that directly harm me and my fellow Americans.
On the pantheon of those whom I fear; I fear the outspoken the least as they will tell you of their hatred. I fear the bigot next as they will not tell you of their hatred. I fear the sophist the most of all as they will tell of their hatred in soft spoken words that may convince you to hate yourself.
James is a sophist.
@The Q: they both got little press back then!
The good news is that this story isn’t getting the kind of play these groups would wish. We’re not talking about “politicizing the Bin Laden raid,” we’re talking about the political motivations of OPSEC and SOS. Not a good sign for their messaging….
So why the primal screaming and the rage directed at James for writing about it? As a Republican-supporting former military man, both of these groups would hope he would be receptive to this message and –I don’t know– it kind of seems like he’s not.
Score one for the good guys.
Who knew lefties loved executing unarmed prisoners so much?
@bandit: Was that a throwaway like these stupid ads? How about letting us in on the details of these prisoner executions
@Herb:
1) You would think a PhD in Political Science would do a little research before publishing the crap that James did in his original post.
2) After having my patriotism, loyalty and intelligence questioned while James and his party lied us into a war of choice and the greatest recession since the Great Depression I’ve lost all tolerance and patience for lying bullshit.
Example
==========
No, score one for research. Once the facts surrounding OPSEC/SOS became widely known James couldn’t have kept the little of whats left of his reputation if he didn’t repudiate his original post. The good guys would have gotten it right the first time.
@bandit:
Well yeah. Who knew that righties loved Qaddafi and Bin Laden so much?
There, ‘both sides do it,’ okay?
@Herb:
Understand, by how quickly these groups hit job is falling apart this was an easy one to figure out from the beginning. The information was out there and all it took was a little research.
So that begs the question of James, was he:
Stupidly naive
or
A lying bullshitter who puts a reasonable face on the cruel and heartless policies of his party
.
I know which one I believe.
@Loviatar:
If you can’t even tolerate people like James and Doug, you have become a something like a Michelle Bachmann, only with different software.
Seriously. ix-nay on the ad-hominem-ay against people who have a different opinion. Or at least cut back.
@jan: The answer to your question Sam is none of them have been in the military. They just don’t get it!!
@Dazedandconfused:
When I start “curing” gays, accusing Congressmen and other Americans of being traitors then you can equate me to the Michelle Bachmanns of the world. Until then STFU with the false equivalency.
===========
With you sunny attitudes towards Republicans I can assume you didn’t lose a family member or friend in a war of choice, or you didn’t see them return irrevocably changed. I’m also guessing you’re still employed and haven’t seen your “retirement plan” whether a pension or 401k evaporate in the last 10 years. But hey its all good, I mean the Republicans have understood their mistakes and are working diligently with the Democrats to fix the problems they caused over the previous 10 years. Riiiiight.
More power to you on your tolerance and acceptance of your lot in life, me on the other hand I’ll continue to hold my contempt and anger for those who’ve put the country in the precarious position it in today. James is still part of that group, no matter how “reasonable” he seems he is the PROBLEM.
@d-gal:
Oh, I definitely get it. This has nothing to do with military service, and everything to do with sleazy, grease ball partisan politics.
Although I asked a question yesterday, I offered no opinion because I knew so little about the OPSEC group or how they were framing their rebuke of President Obama’s handling of supposed leaked information. So, I searched around and found an extensive video put out by them, presented in a Power Line article.
As it played, I recalled various pieces of news media examining or criticizing the very points these men were making: the immediate release of OBL’s death, leaving them little time to forge through intel they had gathered leading to the apprehension of other terrorists; the politicization of the event and the “I mentality” of Obama in ostensibly taking credit for the kill; inviting Hollywood people (within days) into the ‘war room,’ accessing sensitive information in order to make a movie; the blatant identification of the Seal Team (which was soon followed by a large contingency of their team being taken out in a downed helicopter (coincidence?): the overt talk about a ‘kill list;’ leaks leading to ground operatives losing their anonymity; leaking a US connection to the Stutnex Virus stalling Iran’s nuclear program. Diane Feinstein talked publicly about her concerns over these rampant leaks, until she was ‘Cory Bookered.’ In fact most dems who speak out sharply or stand up to the WH, suddenly become silenced or contrite. It’s not an open party of self-correction, that’s for sure!
Anyway, whether these men are republicans or belong to any other party, there is a non-partisan fraternity among military veterans, where peripheral family-like relationships are formed. They stand by each other, circle the wagons in the defense of each other, much like police and fire figher first-responders do, when someone is in jeopardy or dies. IMO, if there is any ‘politicizing’ going on, it is on the sidelines of those who bluster away at their computers or twitter feeds (one such feed calling these men ‘gutless’). Debating the credibility or content of their protest is one thing. But, calling these veterans inflammatory names, like you do most people who have another POV, clouds your own character more than their’s.
Also, when Valerie Plame’s identity (AKA Plamegate), as an undercover CIA operative, was revealed through a leak in the Bush era, what was your reaction to that? Or, did you treat her protests/indignation as just someone who was doing nothing more than trying to embarrass the Bush administration?
As opposed to the other major political party where moderates who have the temerity to call for any tax increases to help balance the budget are branded as heretics…
Perhaps who could explain how the Plame leak is just like what happened with bin Laden…I mean, after all, you wouldn’t want us to just assume that your full of $hit, as you so often are with many of the other comments you make…
@jan:
Apparently you missed this part of the story.
Can you really not understand why most of us dismiss your posts as the ravings of an ideologue untethered to reality?
More words spoken by a candidate for President of the United States politicizing a military mission to win an election.
@jan:
You guys … there you go again.
So Bush, donning a flight suit, tanding beneath a Chairman Mao sized banner that read “Mission Accomplished” had nothing to do with “I” or “taking credit”? Honestly, conservatives are amazing in their chutzpah and hypocrisy.
Simple questions: (1) When Carter’s ordered mission to free the hostages in Iran failed, did people blame Carter or the military rescue team? That’s right, people blamed the president. (2) If Obama’s ordered mission to kill Bin Laden had failed would you have blamed the SEAL Team or Obama? Presidents get credit or blame for these things because, they are the Commander in Chief.
@mattb: “It’s actually worse than that, because the implict suggestion gets back to the idea that not only do people who have never served have no right to criticize, but they also should support everything militarily related. ”
Which, of course, never stops the right from sh*tting on veterans who criticize the GOP.