Obama Has Missed over Half His Second-Term Daily Intel Briefings

[Sdiver]

I'm surprised, shocked even, that that number is so high .... I'm talking about the 40% number. I'd have thought it was lower than that.

Obama Has Missed over Half His Second-Term Daily Intel Briefings

A new Government Accountability Institute (GAI) report reveals that President Barack Obama has attended only 42.1% of his daily intelligence briefings (known officially as the Presidential Daily Brief, or PDB) in the 2,079 days of his presidency through September 29, 2014.

The GAI report also included a breakdown of Obama’s PDB attendance record between terms; he attended 42.4% of his PDBs in his first term and 41.3% in his second.

The GAI’s alarming findings come on the heels of Obama’s 60 Minutes comments on Sunday, wherein the president laid the blame for the Islamic State’s (ISIS) rapid rise squarely at the feet of his Director of National Intelligence James Clapper.

“I think our head of the intelligence community, Jim Clapper, has acknowledged that I think they underestimated what had been taking place in Syria,” said Obama.

According to Daily Beast reporter Eli Lake, members of the Defense establishment were “flabbergasted” by Obama’s attempt to shift blame.

“Either the president doesn’t read the intelligence he’s getting or he’s bullshitting,” a former senior Pentagon official “who worked closely on the threat posed by Sunni jihadists in Syria and Iraq” told the Daily Beast.

On Monday, others in the intelligence community similarly blasted Obama and said he’s shown longstanding disinterest in receiving live, in-person PDBs that allow the Commander-in-Chief the chance for critical followup, feedback, questions, and the challenging of flawed intelligence assumptions.

“It's pretty well-known that the president hasn’t taken in-person intelligence briefings with any regularity since the early days of 2009,” an Obama national security staffer told the Daily Mail on Monday. “He gets them in writing.”

The Obama security staffer said the president’s PDBs have contained detailed threat warnings about the Islamic State dating back to before the 2012 presidential election.

“Unless someone very senior has been shredding the president's daily briefings and telling him that the dog ate them, highly accurate predictions about ISIL have been showing up in the Oval Office since before the 2012 election,” the Obama security staffer told the Daily Mail.

This is not the first time questions have been raised about Obama’s lack of engagement and interest in receiving in-person daily intelligence briefings. On September 10, 2012, the GAI released a similar report showing that Obama had attended less than half (43.8%) of his daily intelligence briefings up to that point. When Washington Post columnist Marc Thiessen mentioned the GAI’s findings in his column, then-White House Press Secretary Jay Carney dubbed the findings “hilarious.” The very next day, U.S. Libyan Ambassador Chris Stevens and three American staff members were murdered in Benghazi. As Breitbart News reported at the time, the White House’s very own presidential calendar revealed Obama had not received his daily intel briefing in the five consecutive days leading up to the Benghazi attacks.

Ultimately, as ABC News reported, the White House did not directly dispute the GAI’s numbers but instead said Obama prefers to read his PDB on his iPad instead of receiving the all-important live, in-person briefings.

Now, with ISIS controlling over 35,000 square miles of territory in its widening caliphate in Iraq and Syria, and with Obama pointing fingers at his own Director of National Intelligence James Clapper for the rise of ISIS, the question remains whether a 42% attendance record on daily intelligence briefings is good enough for most Americans.

http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Peace/2...ntel-Briefings

[tonyz]

"I don't need a smidgen of PDBs...I killed Bin Laden, bitches." BHO

[ddoering]

Well, if only you could scif a golf course he would have gotten them. I guess the White House G-2 is on their ass on this one........

[LarryW]

Why should POTUS go to the intelligence briefings? He hasn't the capacity to understand what's being said, and besides the Whore of Babylon will tell him what he really needs to know about all that funny stuff.

[The Reaper]

Maybe he should go.

At this point, I don't think he could appear to be much less intelligent or informed.

Of course, then people might expect real leadership.

At least, 50% of them might.

TR

[cbtengr]

How can he be so indifferent to the really important things? He is far too involved in the minutia that goes on in this country, by choice the big picture eludes him.

[The Reaper]

He has plenty of time to hit the fundraising circuit though.

TR

[Box]

There should be no surprises over this...
...none at all.

"What part of the presidency does Obama like? He doesn't like dealing with other politicians -- that means his own cabinet, that means members of the congress, either party. He doesn't particularly like the press.... He likes to write the speeches, likes to rewrite what Favreau and the others wrote for the first draft," Matthews said.

"So what part does he like? He likes going on the road, campaigning, visiting businesses like he does every couple days somewhere in Ohio or somewhere," Matthews continued. "But what part does he like? He doesn't like lobbying for the bills he cares about. He doesn't like selling to the press. He doesn't like giving orders or giving somebody the power to give orders. He doesn't seem to like being an executive.”

Even good ole' Tingles offered a glimpse into what liberals really think about the president.
...so why should anyone be surprised that a hack politician that was only elected because of political novelty and limosine liberal guilt seems to be floundering?

[The Reaper]

He isn't driving the train.

Valerie Jarrett and Moochelle are.

TR

[LarryW]

Originally Posted by DocIllinois

I just had a vision of "Michelle 2020," à la Hillary.


Oh, man. Need to unthink that one. Where's the Macallan?

Too late, Doc. Sorry. Macallan's gone. So's the Jack, the Jim Beam, and even the Ten-High. Nothing left but a few bottles of Ripple and that's not doing any good!!

[spherojon]

Originally Posted by tonyz

"I don't need a smidgen of PDBs...I killed Bin Laden, bitches." BHO

More like "What difference – at this point, what difference does it make?"

[Team Sergeant]

Seriously, you actually think Zero can understand them? (No seriously)

Why waste socialist time and effort on something you don't understand?

Beside jimmy carter Zero will go down in history as the most incompetent individual ever to sit in the White House.

[LarryW]

Originally Posted by Team Sergeant

Seriously, you actually think Zero can understand them? (No seriously)

Why waste socialist time and effort on something you don't understand?

Beside jimmy carter Zero will go down in history as the most incompetent individual ever to sit in the White House.

Given his track record you gotta wonder if years from now anyone will be interested in reading our history. Who'll be around to care?

[Box]

I like that his initial is "0"
...it makes snippets like "JimmyCarter 2.0" seem like it was meant to be.

Oh, and Jimmy Carter said he could have crushed Iran...
...wow

I just wanted to add that. It seemed like Carter 2.O missing over half of his intel briefs fit in nicely with JEC claiming he could have crushed Iran...
...35 years after Iran fucked him in his ass, in public, on the global stage and essentially "got him fired"

Iran pretty much went to the manager at Burger King and said "Hey that fucking kid with the big teeth fucked up my order and then disrespected me"

Putin, Assad, ISIS, the Muslim brotherhood, Karzai, Jarret, and pretty much everyone else that runs a country treats 2.O in a similar fashion.

[Badger52]

Originally Posted by The Reaper

He isn't driving the train.

Valerie Jarrett and Moochelle are.

TR

Winner.

And I believe Carter has long been deposed, even if he will sit at this one's right hand (but a little lower so he can only see that pompous chin stickin' out).