House Intelligence Committee Chairman Rep. Mike Rogers (R-MI) on Sunday warned that the U.S. decision to negotiate for the release of Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl could give Al Qaeda the wrong idea that the U.S. is willing to negotiate with them for hostages.
"So many of us are concerned about what really is a break with U.S. policy of not negotiating with terrorists," he said on CNN's State of the Union, according to The Hill.
"We have now set a price," Rogers continued. “If you negotiate here, you’ve sent a message to every Al Qaeda group in the world – by the way, some who are holding U.S. hostages today – that there is some value now in that hostage in a way that they didn’t have before. That is dangerous.”
The House Intelligence Committee. Luckily there's only two words wrong out of four there.
OPERATION HOMECOMING returned 591 POWs: 325 Air Force personnel, 77 Army, 138 Navy, 26 Marines and 25 civilians. Those who were not freed at Hanoi–POWs held in South Vietnam by the Viet Cong, mostly Army and civilians–left from Loc Ninh, the scene of the North Vietnam-South Vietnam prisoner exchange. A total of 660 American military POWs survived the war.
Though I suppose the Viet Cong weren't "terrorists" or something.
A.
Hey, Congressman Rogers! Has it occurred to you that if we released all the detainees from Guantanamo, terrorists would have no incentive to take more Americans hostage.
Whaddya say?
Well, if “some…are holding U.S. hostages today” is true, then negotiations would appear to be immaterial. And…duh: if they are sworn enemies, then they’ll engage in ANY activity to oppose the US, regardless of circumstances, and regardless of response by us.
But beyond the childish wingnut (guess “childish wingnut is redundant, but)…anyway, morons gotta be morons, but it does piss me off when the Fourth Estate can’t or won’t call them out on their bullshit.
Well, shit.
Put McCain back on the plane to Vietnam, then. They can hold onto him forever.
I’d forgotten about this one. Of course, North Vietnam was at least identifiable. Al Q is entirely nebulous so how do you know when your’e negotiating with them or not ?
Seeing the ridiculous assertions made against the president on this as well as seizing the opportunity of the newly released EPA rules on coal-fired power plants, I want to start a petition on Whitehouse.gov :
Dear President Obama,
I would greatly appreciate your making a statement that breathing is good. Especially if Mrs. Obama could make a statement while being filmed) to school children that you need to breathe. The effect of the combination would be incredible.
Your Friend