John Brennan

Code Pink Gets Reuters Coverage — For a Protest Group of 20
By Tom Blumer | January 11, 2015 | 10:02 AM EST

The ability of tiny numbers of far-left fringe group demonstrators to get undue press attention virtually any time they want continues to be intensely annoying.

In mid-2007, Barack Obama made closing the prison at Guantanmo Bay a core promise of his 2008 campaign. That was 7-1/2 years ago. Obama has been in office six years. Gitmo is still open. So naturally, the aggrieved professional protesters at Code Pink organized a demonstration against Gitmo remaining active on yesterday's 13th anniversary of the prison's opening — at former Vice President Dick Cheney's house. They got far more ink and bandwidth than they deserved from the press, including Reuters — i.e., far more than nothing.

NBC's Mitchell Uses Presser to Recite 'Torture' Tactics to CIA Chief
By Kyle Drennen | December 11, 2014 | 4:39 PM EST

During a Thursday press conference, NBC chief foreign affairs correspondent Andrea Mitchell seized the opportunity to lecture CIA Director John Brennan as she rattled over the "torture" techniques detailed in the recently released report by Senate Democrats: "...waterboarding, near drowning, slamming people against the wall, hanging them in stress positions, confining them in small boxes or coffins, threatening them with drills, waving guns around their head as they are blindfolded..."

Obama Akin to Nixon, Bush, 'They're War Criminals,' Vents Cornel West
By Jack Coleman | February 14, 2013 | 9:00 AM EST

That's right -- not just Nixon ... Nixon and Bush. Can vilification from the left get much worse than that?

Cornel West continues to demonstrate why parents might want to think better of sending their children to Princeton, where West purportedly teaches when he isn't gushing over hip-hop and engaging in arcane rants over the airwaves. (audio clips after page break)

Vulgar: Bashir Says Rubio In Senate Hearing Sought To Show He Had 'Very Strong Testicles'
By Mark Finkelstein | February 8, 2013 | 5:22 PM EST

Martin Bashir once again demonstrates that he represents the bottom of the admittedly deep MSNBC barrel . . .


On his MSNBC show this afternoon, Bashir suggested to a female guest that by his questioning at the Senate confirmation hearing of John Brennan, Senator Marco Rubio sought to demonstrate that he had "very strong testicles."  Bashir elicited nervous laughter and a duck of the head from guest Karen Finney.  View the video after the jump.

Capehart Warns On Drone Strikes: Remember, A Republican Could Become President!
By Mark Finkelstein | February 8, 2013 | 9:56 AM EST

Sure, you might be cool with Barack Obama calling up a drone strike on an American citizen.  But don't forget: a Republican [shudder!] could become President!

That was the Washington Post editorialist Jonathan Capehart's warning to Donny Deutsch when the ad-man-turned-pundit proclaimed he had no problem with the president, under desperate circumstances, ordering a drone strike against an American.  View the video after the jump.

Brennan Won't Confirm Panetta’s Claim Enhanced Interrogations Led U.S. To Bin Laden
By Noel Sheppard | February 7, 2013 | 6:09 PM EST

Outgoing Defense Secretary Leon Panetta made news last Sunday when he once again claimed that enhanced interrogation techniques aka torture led to the United States assassinating Osama bin Laden.

During his confirmation hearing Thursday, CIA Director nominee John Brennan appeared to dodge a question from Senate Intelligence Committee Vice Chairman Saxby Chambliss (R-Ga.) about this claiming he didn’t have enough information to comment on whether Panetta was right or wrong.

CNN Avoids CIA Nominee Brennan's Christmas Day Bombing Fiasco
By Matt Hadro | January 7, 2013 | 6:19 PM EST

When news broke that counterterrorism adviser John Brennan would be President Obama's nominee to head the CIA, CNN was mum about Brennan's admitted failure concerning the attempted Christmas Day bombing in 2009. As NewsBusters reported earlier, none of the major networks (ABC, CBS, NBC) mentioned Brennan's "I let him [Obama] down" press conference following the intelligence breakdown at the attack.

CNN highlighted Brennan's strengths along with his controversies on Monday, but those were mostly liberal gripes about his record on enhanced interrogation and drone strikes. "Brennan has been criticized for his connection to the so-called enhanced interrogation techniques under the Bush administration, more recently, for his support of the controversial drone program in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Yemen and elsewhere," reported Wolf Blitzer.

Networks Ignore CIA Nominee Brennan 'Let the President Down' During Christmas Day Bombing Attempt
By Kyle Drennen | January 7, 2013 | 12:14 PM EST

Exactly three years ago, on January 7, 2010, during a press conference regarding the 2009 attempted bombing of an airliner over Detroit on Christmas Day, White House counterterrorism adviser John Brennan declared to reporters: "I told the President today I let him down." That admission of responsibility for a major intelligence failure was completely absent from Monday's network morning show coverage of President Obama nominating Brennan to be CIA director.

While NBC, CBS, and ABC focused much of their attention on the President's nomination of former Senator Chuck Hagel to be secretary of defense and the likely confirmation fight that would result, Brennan's nomination was only a brief side note.

WashPost Buries Benghazi Emails Story on A9, Plastered Front Page with Puffy Piece on Obama Counterrorism Advisor
By Ken Shepherd | October 25, 2012 | 3:31 PM EDT

This morning the Washington Post website announced that the paper had decided to endorse President Barack Obama for reelection. That endorsement should hit the print edition tomorrow. But make no mistake, endorsing the president is not the only cover the paper is granting the president. Witness the Post's treatment of the latest, damning development in the Benghazi fiasco.

Post editors buried a news story on the Benghazi State Department emails on page A9, assigning it a rather boring headline -- "E-mails show State named militant group on night of Libya attack" -- and a staff writer, Anne Gearan, who previously wrote a piece consumed with concern about Hillary Clinton's tarnished legacy post-Benghazi. By contrast, Post editors placed on the front page a 74-paragraph profile of Obama's counterterrorism advisor John Brennan, headlined "Brennan reshaped anti-terror strategy: CIA veteran emerges at core of effort to cement process for lethal action."

Kristol Crushes
By Mark Finkelstein | January 3, 2010 | 10:18 AM EST

Bill Kristol has set forth a stinging indictment of the Obama admin's handling of the war on terror. His two-minute monologue on today's Fox News Sunday delineated a devastating bill of particulars:

  • It was a mistake to treat Abdul Mutallab as a criminal defendant rather than as an enemy combatant: "Mr. Brennan [Obama's top counter-terrorism adviser who appeared earlier] said to you that we're very worried that there're other Abdul Mutallabs out there. This Abdul Mutallab was there for four months.  He might know who the others are.  He might know their names. Will you let him lawyer up?"
  • As to Brennan's claim that there was no "smoking gun" regarding Abdul Mutallab: "He is the smoking gun," going on to detail all the red flags surrounding him. "Frankly, for Mr. Brennan to say, well, no smoking gun, that itself shows a kind of not-serious-about-the-war mentality."
The Weekly Standard editor wasn't through . . .
CBS ‘Early Show’: CIA Uses ‘Spanish Inquisition’ Torture Tactic
By Kyle Drennen | November 2, 2007 | 1:48 PM EDT

On Firday’s CBS "Early Show," co-host Harry Smith began a segment on the controversy over Attorney General nominee, Michael Mukasey’s stance on water boarding with a report from Capitol Hill Correspondent Chip Reid, who exclaimed that:

Water boarding is a highly controversial interrogation technique that simulates drowning...It's been used by interrogators since the Spanish Inquisition. Reportedly, it's been used by the CIA in real life, too, on a small number of Al Qaeda suspects.

In addition to this exaggerated characterization, Reid also made it seem as though the issue of water boarding was a sudden, shocking controversy, rather than an instance of a consensus nominee, well-liked by Democrats and Republicans, being attacked by those who once welcomed him:

Michael Mukasey looked like he was sailing along to easy confirmation as attorney general, until he ran aground on the issue of water boarding...If he is defeated, water boarding will be the issue that made the difference, something no one could have predicted when the hearings began.