Bush/Cheney outed Valerie Plame for their own nefarious agenda and now Rep. Darrell Issa has jeopardized lives through his own irresponsible tactics.
Senator John Kerry was correct in criticizing Issa's actions.
John Kerry: Darrell Issa's Release Of Raw Libya Cables 'Irresponsible And Inexcusable'
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Senator John Kerry (D-Mass.) criticized House Oversight Committee Chairman Darrell Issa (R- Calif.) for releasing 166 pages of "sensitive but unclassified" State Department cables that contained the names of Libyans working within the United States.
"This is irresponsible and inexcusable, and perhaps worst of all it was entirely avoidable," Kerry said.
"It is profoundly against America's interests in a difficult region."
The Obama administration has also criticized Issa for leaking the documents, which relate to the September attack on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi that killed Ambassador Christopher Stevens and four others.
Administration officials told Foreign Policy magazine the leak, along with Issa's failure to redact the names of Libyan civilians and local leaders mentioned in the cables, could have "unintended consequences."
"This does damage to the individuals because they are named, danger to security cooperation because these are militias and groups that we work with and that is now well known, and danger to the investigation, because these people could help us down the road," an administration official said.
In a letter to President Barack Obama, Issa, along with Rep. Jason Chaffetz (R-Utah), said the cables were released because "the American people deserve nothing less than a full explanation" about the Benghazi attack.
"The American people deserve nothing less than a full explanation from this administration about these events, including why the repeated warnings about a worsening security situation appear to have been ignored by this administration," Issa and Chaffetz wrote. "Americans also deserve a complete explanation about your administration's decision to accelerate a normalized presence in Libya at what now appears to be at the cost of endangering American lives.
Washington, DC – Senator John Kerry (D-Mass.), Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, issued the following statement in response to the release of documents, concerning the recent events in Libya, by the House Oversight Committee.
"The wholesale release of State Department documents by the House Oversight Committee has exposed Libyan nationals working with the United States to possible danger. This is irresponsible and inexcusable, and perhaps worst of all it was entirely avoidable. It is profoundly against America's interests in a difficult region.
Oversight and investigation is the job of Congress. I know how to run a real investigation. It's a responsibility I take personally as someone who spent years in the Senate leading difficult, sensitive, and comprehensive investigations on everything from BCCI and illegal money laundering to the fate of American soldiers missing in Vietnam. I don't say casually that this release of sensitive materials was a moment of real incompetence and irresponsibility.
The Foreign Relations Committee is committed to getting all the facts about what happened, and we’ve been in regular contact with the Administration to do so. The Committee has sent two letters asking questions, including one signed by all committee members, and we will have another committee briefing as soon as we reconvene. The House committee seems to adopting a very different set of investigative techniques. It's bad enough that it's becoming a political sideshow presumably driven by the calendar of Monday's upcoming presidential debate, but even worse is that in their rush to make news they've exposed Libyans who were working side by side with America."
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/10/20/john-kerry-darrell-issa-_n_1992826.html?1350764638&ncid=edlinkusaolp00000009
Posted on facebook [accuracy not checked]:
By Debbie Schlussel
I’m a proud conservative Republican from Michigan, but I’m appealing to Californians of all political stripes not to support the recall of Gov. Gray Davis.
Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Vista)–funder of the recall effort and the only announced candidate to replace Davis–might be the contemporary, real-life version of Frank Sinatra’s “Manchurian Candidate.” Instead of communists, Issa’s allies are radical Islamists and supporters of terrorism against Americans, Israelis, Christians and Jews.
In a short political career, Issa’s statements and actions consistently defend terrorists, terrorist groups and terrorist sponsor states.
Saudi Arabia’s longtime lobbyist, James Gallagher, contributed to Issa’s campaign in November 2002, and Issa tried to overturn key classified evidence portions of President Bill Clinton’s 1995 counter-terrorism bill. Issa is also credited with “declawing” the Patriot Act.
Then, there’s Issa’s dance with Hezbollah, an organization that is on the State Department’s terrorist list and one of the largest components of Al Qaeda. In the 1980s, Hezbollah–which means “Party of Allah”–murdered more than 260 U.S. Marines while they slept in Beirut and tortured to death Col. Richard Higgins (in 1990) and CIA attache William Buckley.
Hezbollah endorses “the use of hostages,” “suicide in jihad operations” and “the duty of all Muslims to engage in Islamic jihad if it ensures the ultimate goal [of] inflicting losses on the enemy.”
Less than a month after Sept. 11, Issa visited Syrian President Bashar Assad, praising Hezbollah and lauding Assad’s policies (Syria is on the State Department’s terrorist list).
The Tehran Times and IRNA (Islamic Republic News Agency, the official Iranian news agency) quoted Issa’s statements to Assad in Damascus: “Hezbollah acts legitimately and has never been involved in terrorist activities…. Hezbollah and any other Lebanese group has the right to resist the occupation of its territory…. Hezbollah’s humanitarian and governmental actions were legal…. Such behavior would be customary in any country.”
Issa denies the statements, but as a recent Los Angeles Times cover story demonstrates he has a record of stretching the truth–about his military record, his criminal history, his business affairs and his political positions.
In November 2001, for instance, Issa told syndicated columnist Debra Saunders he was vehemently against Arabs suing the airlines and government over profiling. At the same time, he told the rest of the press of his plans to introduce legislation to make it easier for Arabs to collect monetary damages for airline and government profiling. And Issa’s other statements and actions corroborate their veracity:
Less than a month after Sept. 11, in an Oct. 9, 2001, interview with the Beirut Daily Star’s Ibrahim, during a trip to Lebanon, Issa said, “It is Lebanon which will determine whether the party’s [Hezbollah's] activities constitute terrorism or resistance … If [Hezbollah] wants the world to understand that its activities are legitimate, they should say it…. Resistance is a legitimate right recognized [by the U.N.]…. I have a great deal of sympathy for the work that Hezbollah tries to do.” He expressed hope that Hezbollah would “reform” and become a “government” like the P.L.O.
Assad’s state-run SANA (official Syrian news agency) covered Issa’s November 2001 meeting with Assad, quoting Issa as saying: “Hezbollah or any other party has the right to resist occupation. ”Occupation? Israel withdrew from Southern Lebanon at least a year before, and the U.S. withdrew over a decade earlier.
Issa’s January 2003 actions regarding Israelis captured by Hezbollah asserted the terrorist group’s moral equivalence with Israel. According to The Guardian of London, per Hezbollah’s demand, Issa asked Israel to allow the Red Cross to see captured Hezbollah terrorists in exchange for interceding with Hezbollah to allow the Red Cross to see four Israeli prisoners held by the group.
On Oct. 31, 2001, the London Arabic newspaper, Al-Hayat, reported, “U.S. Congressman of Lebanese origin Darrell Issa, during his recent visit to Beirut in the mid of October,” conveyed a proposal to Hezbollah leadership to remove Hezbollah from the State Department’s terrorist list and “normalize U.S. relations with” the group. Hezbollah refused the offer.
On May 31, 2003, Issa publicly made a similar proposal to legitimize Hezbollah by giving Lebanon $500 million of taxpayer money to disarm the group and turn it into a political party.