President Obama’s pick as the next Secretary of Defense is the wrong one. Heritage’s defense and foreign policy experts have examined the record of Chuck Hagel, the Republican former Senator from Nebraska, and concluded he simply does not have the experience and skills for the job. What’s more, his vision …
The Senate’s failure last week to advance the nomination of former Senator Chuck Hagel to Secretary of Defense was the right result, but for the wrong reason. Some Senators voted against Hagel as a way of pressuring the Obama Administration to answer many troubling and still outstanding questions about the …
A multitude of questions loom over former Senator Chuck Hagel’s (R–NE) nomination process. It is now up to the Obama Administration to ensure that Senators get the answers comprehensively and not in drips and drabs. For one thing, Hagel’s performance during his confirmation hearing in the Senate Armed Services Committee …
In his State of the Union address, President Obama showed a stunning lack of reality on terrorism and the Arab Spring. The President’s statement saluting “the courage and sacrifice of those who serve in dangerous places at great personal risk” unfortunately rings hollow when one considers the Administration’s treatment of the …
Senators Lindsey Graham (R-SC) and Jim Inhofe (R-OK) issued blunt warnings to the White House on Sunday: Give us real answers on Benghazi, or the nominations for Secretary of Defense and director of the Central Intelligence Agency will be on hold. Committee Chairman Carl Levin (D-MI) has nonetheless scheduled the …
Today’s hearing in the Senate Armed Services Committee about the September 11 terrorist attack in Benghazi, Libya, was bizarrely divided. One line of questions drew a devastating picture of an Administration shamefully unprepared to defend its beleaguered personnel in Libya. The bemused facial expressions of Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta …
Today at 10 a.m., Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta and General Martin Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, will be grilled by Senators on the Benghazi terrorist attack. The Senate Armed Services Committee has to do a better job and dig deeper than the Foreign Relations Committee (SFRC) …
Last week, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s congressional testimony (here and here) failed to deliver new information regarding the September 11, 2012, attack on the U.S. mission in Benghazi, Libya. If anything, the hearings before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and the House Foreign Affairs Committee more or less offered …
There is no other way to say it: “60 Minutes” blew it. Steve Kroft’s interview with President Obama and outgoing Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, broadcast Sunday night, was mushy, sentimental, and oh so easy-going. As for news… it elicited practically no information about Hillary Clinton’s record as Secretary of …
The good news for the Obama Administration is that its next Secretary of State, Senator John Kerry (D–MA), had the smoothest of sailing during yesterday’s Senate confirmation hearing. Indeed, the nominees for Secretary of Defense, Chuck Hagel, and Director of the CIA, John Brennan, should be so lucky. The only …
