Posted by Tina
On January 18, 2013 the State Department issued a firm statement: “The United States does not negotiate with terrorists.” This firm statement came in response to a reporters question about the Blind Sheikh:
In an Algerian gas field named Ain Amenas on Wednesday, a group of Islamist militants known only as the “Masked Brigade,” took hostage over 30 individuals from the US and elsewhere who work at the facility.
According to reports, the militants have offered to release two American hostages in exchange for the U.S. releasing the Blind Sheikh from federal prison, as well as Aafia Siddiqui, a Pakistani neuroscientist who is serving a life sentence for the attempted murder of U.S. soldiers in Afghanistan.
Nuland, pressed by a reporter who asked — “The terrorists are asking for the release of Omar Abdel-Rahman and Aafia Siddiqui from the US prisons. Do you have any reaction to that?” – simply repeated her stand.
“I’ll say it again — the United States does not negotiate with terrorists,” she said.
No doubt about it, Nuland was emphatic! It’s against US policy to negotiate with terrorists!
This is the crux of the argument against the Iran deal conceived of and carried out by Hillary Clinton, John Kerry and Barack Obama. And yet this administration moved forward with the deal.
The story behind the secret meetings held to make this offensive deal continues to ring alarm bells.
People walk off a plane carrying three Iranian-Americans, who left Tehran under a prisoner swap, after it landed at Cointrin airport in Geneva, Switzerland January 17, 2016. REUTERS/Denis Balibouse
You can read more about this alarming revelation in the Daily Mail and the Wall Street Journal which discloses how the money was “laundered”:
Mr. Kerry and the State and Treasury departments sought the cooperation of the Swiss and Dutch governments. Ultimately, the Obama administration transferred the equivalent of $400 million to their central banks. It was then converted into other currencies, stacked onto the wooden pallets and sent to Iran on board a cargo plane.
On the morning of Jan. 17, Iran released the four Americans: Three of them boarded a Swiss Air Force jet and flew off to Geneva, with the fourth returning to the U.S. on his own. In return, the U.S. freed seven Iranian citizens and dropped extradition requests for 14 others.
U.S. and European officials wouldn’t disclose exactly when the plane carrying the $400 million landed in Iran. But a report by an Iranian news site close to the Revolutionary Guard, the Tasnim agency, said the cash arrived in Tehran’s Mehrabad airport on the same day the Americans departed.
Revolutionary Guard commanders boasted at the time that the Americans had succumbed to Iranian pressure. “Taking this much money back was in return for the release of the American spies,” said Gen. Mohammad Reza Naghdi, commander of the Guard’s Basij militia, on state media.
This administration has made America look the fool…again! In the process it has created a much more dangerous world. How many boneheaded foreign policy actions will it take before the American people realize the players in this administration are dangerous and that includes Hillary Clinton!
And by the way, Iran has taken more American hostages since this cash transfer of cash:
Among the Americans currently being held are an energy executive named Siamak Namazi and his 80-year old father, Baqer, according to U.S. and Iranian officials. Iran’s judiciary spokesman last month confirmed Tehran had arrested the third American, believed to be a San Diego resident named Reza “Robin” Shahini.
Friends and family of the Namazis believe the Iranians are seeking to increase their leverage to force another prisoner exchange or cash payment in the final six months of the Obama administration. Mr. Kerry and other U.S. officials have been raising their case with Iranian diplomats, U.S. officials say.
Iranian officials have demanded in recent weeks the U.S. return $2 billion in Iranian funds that were frozen in New York in 2009. The Supreme Court recently ruled that the money should be given to victims of Iranian-sponsored terror attacks.
Members of Congress are seeking to pass legislation preventing the Obama administration from making any further cash payments to Iran.
The House may do the responsible thing and pass legislation but it won’t matter. Even if it passes in the Senate, Obama will just veto it. Or, he might sign it to help Hillary, making a big speech, but that too won’t matter. Laws don’t apply to Obama or Hillary…this bunch does whatever the he77 they want. If Hillary is crowned queen of progressive land in this once great nation called America, she will not abide by our laws when they get in the way of her personal agenda.
Josh Earnest just made the ridiculous statement that this money was not part of the Iran deal but was a “seperate negotiation.”
Who gives a rip…the US DID, IN FACT, NEGOTIATE WITH A TERRORIST SPONSORING NATION!
Notice in the next few days how this story tracks (compared to the Iran Contra story) in the unethical left-wing media.
This story broke late last night. I referred to it in comments but didn’t have the energy to post it. Pie called our attention to it this morning in comments…thanks Pie.
You sure the cash is not part of those assets that got unfroze in the nuclear deal?
You sure the story hasn’t been tweaked by your sources to get your knickers into a twist? … which is much too easy to do.
Even better, what if the hostage release was part of the original deal and kept quiet so retain vociferous parties could save face?
You always think the worst … at the bidding of entities that do not have your best interests at heart. Why do you do that?
“You always think the worst…blah blah blah…”
Libby must I remind you of way you looked at everything GWB did? Must I remind you of the disrespectful attitude you displayed no matter what? Must I remind you of the way your panties nearly strangled you?
Nothing that happened during the Bush administration compares to the failures and dishonest and dishonorable things that have gone on in the last eight years. My arguments mean little compared to the results of eight years under Obama and company made manifest in our nation and across the world. The record is damning all by itself.
There is obviously nothing that your fellow travelers do that gives you even a moments pause…that’s pretty pathetic Libby.
Tina nothing during GW adin?
We broke International law.
GW stole the election.
GW cut taxes while starting 2 wars.
Deregulated the markets that raped the US Economy.
Reagan, Clinton, Both Bushes all contributed to how we got here and Obama certainly has as well.
Everything is Republican and Democrat for you. That is why they get away with this crap. It’s like you to refuse to remember history cause ya got to be better than everybody else.
Libby turning a blind eye is just another example of how corrupt and nuts progressives are. If Hillary Clinton, John Kerry and Barack Obama do it, money for hostages is a good thing.
Following their successful extortion of the idiotic Obama administration, Iran has taken more hostages. Funny how that works.
Funny how the fact that was their money escapes you Pie
$hrilLIARy must not have known about the $hipment, otherwise there would’ve been plans to hijack it . . . . ..
:-D…yer killin’ me!
Related Topic …
Is Islam Violent? Forget the Koran, Let’s Talk About Islam’s PROVEN Historical Record
History suffices. Consider the facts, which have been attested to by both Muslim and non-Muslim primary historic sources.
A mere decade after the birth of Islam in the 7th century, the jihad burst out of Arabia. In just a few decades, Muslims had permanently conquered what was then two-thirds of the Christian world. The heart of the Muslim world today — nations like Egypt, Syria, all of North Africa, Turkey and more later — had been, in the 7th century, the heart of Christendom.
Thereafter, it was a continuous war on Christian Europe.
Related, Islamic State magazine makes nutty claims:
First he’s a prophet and then he’s a slave? How does that make sense?
Ya know, these guys are politically incorrect…do you suppose it bothers our liberal friends?
Nah…
“First he’s a prophet and then he’s a slave? How does that make sense?”
They mean “Jesus” as in “he whose coming was foretold” relegating our Jesus to ordinary prophet status.
Why do you take any of this seriously? Nobody else does.
Tina, if there ever comes to be such a thing as an Islamist block warden at the corner, I will be at the barricades with you. But only the most raging of paranoids believes this to be even remotely likely.
Libby please knock off the BS accusations.
I am not paranoid, I am interested.
The Jews waited until there were “block wardens” and look what happened. History does not look kindly on those who shrugged when the Nazi’s similarly rose to power.
I found it curious that Jesus is thought of as a prophet (revered to some degree) and at the same time a slave. It’s particularly curious since their prophet of origin, the warrior, didn’t even exist walk the earth until some 570 years after Jesus death. Islam was introduced in 610 A.D.
“History does not look kindly on those who shrugged when the Nazi’s similarly rose to power.”
And it won’t look kindly on Trump voters, for the same reason.
The Pussy Generation
From Esquire Magazine interviewing Clint Eastwood and his son Scott.
ESQ: Your characters have become touchstones in the culture, whether it’s Reagan invoking “Make my day” or now Trump … I swear he’s even practiced your scowl.
CE: Maybe. But he’s onto something, because secretly everybody’s getting tired of political correctness, kissing up. That’s the kiss-ass generation we’re in right now. We’re really in a pussy generation. Everybody’s walking on eggshells. We see people accusing people of being racist and all kinds of stuff. When I grew up, those things weren’t called racist. And then when I did Gran Torino, even my associate said, “This is a really good script, but it’s politically incorrect.” And I said, “Good. Let me read it tonight.” The next morning, I came in and I threw it on his desk and I said, “We’re starting this immediately.”
Clint and Scott Eastwood: No Holds Barred in Their First Interview Together
Hmm, sounds like Clint is familiar with the progressive pussies who frequent the Post Scripts comments section.
Gran Torino was a sickening, literally, foray into one testosterone-laden white-boy’s fantasy land.
Ick.
And Clint is a sage only to his fellows. The rest of us wince.
“Gran Torino was a sickening, literally, foray into one testosterone-laden white-boy’s fantasy land.”
Wrong on several counts.
1. Testoterone-laden-MEN! And not all of them are white.
2. Your comment reeks of the worst of the feminist movement which dismisses the calm, rational, approach to bullies that real men, raised by responsible fathers, seem to understand!
3. Our nation is PC because it’s been shaped and shamed (in schools, media, the law, and entertainment) like children under three by women who never grew up themselves.
4. What the world needs now more than ever is strong, responsible male influence.
5. Men and women were designed to complement each other. Where there is dysfunction you can bet this balance is out of balance. The world right now is grossly out of ballance!
6. The last thing we need right now is an ambitious, self-interested, cheating, lying, feminist in leadership in America.
WSJ, “Justice Department Officials Raised Objections on U.S. Cash Payment to Iran
Some officials worried about message being sent but were overruled”
You know the fact that they had to “wash” the money in foreign currency should tell everyone that this deal is an unethical illegal error of extreme magnitude…and they knew it and did it anyway.
Again, why do you care what it looks like? The Iranians haven’t been given anything that was not theirs to begin with, and we got our people back.
And, if they misbehave again, we’ll freeze ‘me again. I swear, you all make noise for the sake of making noise, and don’t think about this stuff at all … like your candidate … but I don’t really mind all that much about Meg, et al., reaping what they have sown.
Hee Hee.
Update 5 hours old CNN: Washington (CNN)The Obama administration secretly arranged a plane delivery of $400 million in cash on the same day Iran released four American prisoners and formally implemented the nuclear deal, US officials confirmed Wednesday.
President Barack Obama approved the $400 million transfer, which he had announced in January as part of the Iran nuclear deal. The money was flown into Iran on wooden pallets stacked with Swiss francs, euros and other currencies as the first installment of a $1.7 billion settlement resolving claims at an international tribunal at The Hague over a failed arms deal under the time of the Shah.
A fifth American man was released by Iran separately.
Details of the cash delivery drew fresh condemnation of the Iran deal from Republicans. They charged that the administration had empowered a major sponsor of terrorism because the nuclear agreement enables Tehran to re-enter the international economy and gives it access long-frozen funds.
In addition, they said the cash delivery amounted to a ransom payment that violates long-standing US practice not to pay for hostages. As such, they argued, it encourages Iran to hold onto its remaining Americans prisoners until they can get more money for them.
“Paying ransom to kidnappers puts Americans even more at risk,” said Illinois Republican Sen. Mark Kirk. “While Americans were relieved by Iran’s overdue release of illegally imprisoned American hostages, the White House’s policy of appeasement has led Iran to illegally seize more American hostages, including Siamak Namazi, his father Baquer Namazi and Reza Shahini.”
Again, why do you care what it looks like? The Iranians haven’t been given anything that was not theirs to begin with, and we got our people back.
And, if they misbehave again, we’ll freeze ‘me again. I swear, you all make noise for the sake of making noise, and don’t think about this stuff at all … like your candidate … but I don’t really mind all that much about Meg, et al., reaping what they have sown.
Hee Hee.
Progressive Libby thinks paying ransom for hostages is funny.
Nothing more be said.
Again, why do you care what it looks like? The Iranians haven’t been given anything that was not theirs to begin with, and we got our people back.
And, if they misbehave again, we’ll freeze ‘me again. I swear, you all make noise for the sake of making noise, and don’t think about this stuff at all … like your candidate … but I don’t really mind all that much about Meg, et al., reaping what they have sown.
Hee Hee.
The world thinks we paid ransom…the optics are just not “presidential.”
Again, why do you care what it looks like? The Iranians haven’t been given anything that was not theirs to begin with, and we got our people back.
And, if they misbehave again, we’ll freeze ‘me again. I swear, you all make noise for the sake of making noise, and don’t think about this stuff at all … like your candidate … but I don’t really mind all that much about Meg, et al., reaping what they have sown.
Hee Hee.
SURPRISE SURPRISE! Obama lies again.
I listened to Obama’s press conference today. As usual Obama was long winded and boring and lied.
US Iranian Hostage Abedini Says Iran Held Plane on Tarmac Until Ransom Plane Arrived
I’m disgusted that the press conference was even necessary. I mean, what is wrong with you people? That was rhetorical. I know what’s wrong … you are allergic to fact, and obscenely prejudiced.
Again, why do you care what it looks like? The Iranians haven’t been given anything that was not theirs to begin with, and we got our people back.
And, if they misbehave again, we’ll freeze ‘me again. I swear, you all make noise for the sake of making noise, and don’t think about this stuff at all … like your candidate … but I don’t really mind all that much about Meg, et al., reaping what they have sown.
Hee Hee.
Addenda to the above — I am glad someone noticed this.
Obama Spends 7 Minutes Dodging On Whether Iran Will Use $400 Million To Fund Terrorism
“If you can’t dazzle them with brilliance, baffle them with bullshit.” ― W.C. Fields
Again, why do you care what it looks like? The Iranians haven’t been given anything that was not theirs to begin with, and we got our people back.
And, if they misbehave again, we’ll freeze ‘me again. I swear, you all make noise for the sake of making noise, and don’t think about this stuff at all … like your candidate … but I don’t really mind all that much about Meg, et al., reaping what they have sown.
Hee Hee.
Libby, shut the answering machine off. Your friend Inchoate is waiting for you to take him out! While leaders point to the moon, Liberals point to the finger aimed at the moon!
Daily mail
Looks like Obama continues to mislead about the Iran deal:
Israel:
Libby always, “Tee Hee’s” when she knows her side looks very bad. This must be really, really, really, really…really bad.
You need to fact check. This is not some big new secret that they have uncovered. Money was absolutely NOT a ransom payment
Go back to January and the money the courts said we had to release to Iran. We froze that money. We were ordered to give it back. So then they leveraged that order to get them back.
Now there are always shady things included in international politics but ya follow the media lies like sheeple.
The money was given to the Iranians because it was THEIR money. America made a deal back in 1979 with Iran which would give them weapons in exchange for $400 Million. But shortly after we made the deal in 1979 Iran took 52 American hostages from the Tehran US Embassy. The US cut off all diplomatic negotiations with Iran and we froze their assets. And part of those assets included the money that they had already given to us….even though we never delivered the fighter jets that Iran paid for.
Dewey is right; the $400 million was announced at the time. The so-called “liberal media” was fooled by right-wing media into reporting this non-story.
Trump of course lied and said he saw video of the plan dropping off money in Iran, then admitted it was Switzerland. It’s ok, not like presidents need to know the difference between different countries or anything.
In related news, the Harvard Republicans, for the first time since 1888, refuse to endorse the Republican candidate, citing his fascist views and disgusting behavior. But I’m sure they too are just stupid victims of the liberal media?
RE: Harvard Republicans
You’d have to ask them. But if Harvard is like most other institutions of high learning today, the students wouldn’t know fascist from a frankfurter. Education, even pricey education, isn;t what it used to be.
Just read their statements. they take the same elitist point of view taken by some over at national Review and the Weekly Standard but I’ll tell you what…they are no WFB’s who said, “I would rather be governed by the first 2000 people in the Manhattan phone book than the entire faculty of Harvard.”
That would be Trump voters. And WFB said that before all of the PC nonsense going on now.
It was “announced” in January…so what?
The fact remains the plane with the hostages was delayed, a hostage has said it was, and the transfer occurred at the same time in the middle of the night with the money delivered in washed currency, in an unmarked plane. Why not a wire transfer? Maybe the much more clever Iranians negotiated it to be delivered that way because they wanted to use the video as a propaganda tool. That is, in fact, what they are doing.
Iran continues to be a state sponsor of terror. We froze their assets for good reason, to save lives.
Money is fungible. I’m sure Iran assured the administration that it would use this money for infrastructure or some dang thing. But it will go to fund terrorism and no matter what Obama, Kerry, and Hillary say or think, Iran’s “deal” will be used again and again to feature America as the dumb weak horse…the fools in their terror game. The signal they send is clear, it is lucrative to kidnap Americans and fun too!
Andrew McCarthy, National Review, “Obama’s Cash Payment to Iran Was More Than a Ransom — It Broke Criminal Law”:
The “presidential” president has stepped in it…or just thinks himself above the law…”what are they gonna do to me?”