GOP rolls over for Obama and recommends Brennan for CIA post

All of the Democrats and most of the Republicans sitting on the U.S. Senate Select Committee on Intelligence Tuesday gave the nomination of John Brennan as leader of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) the go-ahead, which now sends the nomination to the full Senate for a vote.

The Senate committee voted 12 to 3 to recommend the nominee. Only three Republicans voted down the nomination, which angered many conservatives who are suspicious of Brennan's loyalties, according to former intelligence officer and police investigator Sid Franes. "Once again we have [Sen. John] McCain and others talking tough but folding like cheap cameras when facing the Democrats. Remember when the GOP had the White House and both houses of Congress? The Democrats managed to block Bush's nominees and the Republicans proposed legislation," noted Franes. The three senators voting against Brennan, all Republicans, were Sens. Jim Risch (Idaho), Saxby Chambliss (Ga.) and Tom Coburn (Okla.). Chambliss is the committee's vice chairman and he is expected to explain his "no" vote on the Senate floor.

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Brennan served as the counterterrorism advisor to President Barack Obama at the White House, and ran the secret program using drones to search for terror suspects in countries such as Pakistan, Yemen and Afghanistan and kill them, according to his resume. Brennan's handling of the drone program has been a roadblock during his nomination process, and senators in both parties repeatedly asked the Obama White House to shed more light on the top secret program. Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., the committee chairwomen, claimed on Tuesday that officials at the White House agreed to provide all legal opinions justifying the use of armed drone strikes. When President Barack Obama officially nominated Brennan for the director of the Central Intelligence Agency position, counterterrorism officials at all levels of government said they hoped the Senate confirmation hearings and debates would give Americans a clear understanding of what makes Brennan tick. Instead, the White House version of Brennan's qualifications were pushed by the Democrats and allowed to go unchallenged by some feckless Republicans, according to former intelligence officer and criminal investigator Sid Franes. “People in the White House say [he] is legendary in the White House for working hard,” said Obama when announcing the nomination, adding that he wasn’t sure if Brennan had slept in four years. Brennan, who served a quarter-century with the CIA, has served as Obama’s top counterterrorism aide since 2009. If confirmed, he will fill the post left vacant by David Petraeus, who resigned in November during an extramarital-affair scandal. “In John Brennan the men and women of the CIA will have the leadership of our nation’s most skilled intelligence professionals,” said Obama. “”That unique combination of smarts and strength that he claims comes from growing up in New Jersey.” However, some experts claim Brennan is not a good choice for being the new CIA chief. “Mr. Brennan is, at best, willfully blind to the threat posed to homeland and national security of the United States by those who adhere to Shariah law,” said Tom Trento, director of Florida Security Council, who has been critical of Brennan’s service in the Obama White House. Some of the nation’s top intelligence, military, national security and law enforcement experts once loudly called for John Brennan to resign from his post or for President Barack Obama to fire Brennan. During a press conference in September 2010 at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C., respected experts, including officials from the Florida Security Council, told reporters that because of Brennan’s adherence to the politically-correct orthodoxy that permeates the Obama administration, the U.S. government is being prevented from identifying, understanding and countering radical Muslims and their threat of imposing Shariah law. Frank Gaffney, a former Assistant Secretary of Defense during the Reagan administration, and others claim that Shariah is a supremacist, totalitarian legal doctrine that leads to terrorism, torture, abuse of women and young girls, and other horrors. A major piece of evidence that points to the dangers associated with Brennan’s failure to perform his primary function — to know the enemy and its threat doctrine — came to light when analysts at the Florida Security Council discovered that a known Hamas operative and unindicted co-conspirator in the largest terrorism financing trial in U.S. history (Holy Land Foundation), Sheik Kifah Mustapha,participated in a six-week-long, government-sponsored “Citizens Academy” hosted by the FBI as part of its outreach to the Muslim community. During the six-week FBI program, Mustapha – a man tied to an officially designated terrorist organization – was escorted into the top secret National Counterterrorism Center and other secure government facilities, including the FBI National Academy located on the Quantico U.S. Marine Base in Virginia. Terrorism expert Steve Emerson, director of the Investigative Project on Terrorism, exposed Mustapha’s appointment in Illinois to a post as a State Police chaplain. However, according to Illinois officials, the appointment was revoked in spite of the protests of the Council on American-Islamic Relations. “Deputy National Security Advisor John Brennan must resign his post immediately,” said Mr. Gaffney, whose Center for Security Policy released a report entitled, Shariah: The Threat to America.

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