Families of Navy SEALs killed in 2011 attack say government is to blame

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  File: A US Army CH-47D Chinook helicopter in flight.AP

WASHINGTON –  The families of Navy SEAL Team 6 members killed in a disastrous August 2011 helicopter crash in Afghanistan blamed the government for the tragedy, during an emotional press conference in Washington Thursday. 

The family members, speaking at the National Press Club, tried to reopen the book on the crash, in which 30 Americans were killed, most of them belonging to the same unit as those who carried out the raid on Usama bin Laden earlier that year. The helicopter was shot down by insurgents. 

During the event organized by a group called Freedom Watch, family members and former military personnel claimed President Obama turned the SEALs group into a Taliban target after the administration revealed they had conducted the bin Laden raid. 

Doug Hamburger, whose son Patrick was killed, called the incident an “ambush” that could have been prevented. 

“We’re very concerned that the administration had disclosed that the Navy SEALs had carried out a successful attack on bin Laden’s compound resulting in his death. And you know, never before in the history of our county (had) a sitting president released that type of information to the public, especially when he was talking about special forces. Their names and their missions had never been revealed before. And we really feel that this put our guys in an unnecessary risk,” Hamburger said.

Many military experts at the time, including some of Obama’s top military advisers, had questioned the White House’s public praise of SEAL Team 6 and said it put members in danger. 

Three months after bin Laden’s death, members of the SEAL Team 6 force -- though apparently not the same ones who carried out the bin Laden raid -- were on board the CH-47 Chinook transport helicopter, along with its Army National Guard aircrew, several support personnel and seven Afghan commandos. In all, 38 people died that night after the chopper was shot down by a Taliban-owned rocket-propelled grenade –or RPG – over the Wardak Province on Aug. 6, 2011. 

Charles Strange, whose son Michael, 25, died in the attack said Obama personally promised him a thorough investigation of what happened but has failed to deliver.

Strange also blamed top military brass for sending the troops into a situation they were allegedly ill-equipped and unprepared to handle. The team was responding to an Army Ranger unit that was engaged in a firefight with the Taliban and needed backup. 

Asked for comment, Pentagon spokesman Lt. Col. James Gregory said: "We share in the grief of all of the families who lost their loved ones." 

While not commenting directly on the allegations, he called those who were lost "warriors" who represented "the diversity and talent of America and its military." 

An official report was released in October 2011 but family members say it did little to fill in the details and left more questions than answers.

Karen Vaughn says she wants to know why her son Aaron and his team were not using special operations aircraft which have defenses in place to help allow helicopters to go deep behind enemy lines. The night her son Aaron died, he was in a helicopter that was built in the 1960s and last retrofitted in 1985.

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Feds blame combination of parasite, virus, bacteria, pesticides for strange bee disappearance

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  May 2, 2013: A bee looks for a pollen laden flower in Kennewick, Wash. A new U.S. report blames a combination of problems for a mysterious and dramatic disappearance of honeybees across the country since 2006.AP Photo/The Tri-City Herald, Richard Dickin

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  Jeffery Pettis, a top bee scientist at the Agriculture Department's Bee Research Laboratory, talks about his work with honeybees, in Beltsville, Md in 2007.AP Photo/Haraz N. Ghanbari

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  A new federal report blames a combination of problems for a mysterious and dramatic disappearance of U.S. honeybees since 2006. The factors cited include a parasitic mite, multiple viruses, bacteria, poor nutrition and pesticides. Experts say having so many causes makes it harder to do something about what's called colony collapse disorder. The disorder has caused as much as one-third of the nation's bees to just disappear over the winter each year since 2006.AP Photo/Haraz N. Ghanbari

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A new federal report blames a combination of problems for a mysterious and dramatic disappearance of U.S. honeybees since 2006.

The intertwined factors cited include a parasitic mite, multiple viruses, bacteria, poor nutrition, genetics, habitat loss and pesticides.

The multiple causes make it harder to do something about what's called colony collapse disorder, experts say. The disorder has caused as much as one-third of the nation's bees to just disappear each winter since 2006.

Bees, especially honeybees, are needed to pollinate crops.

The federal report, issued Thursday by the Agriculture Department and the Environmental Protection Agency, said the biggest culprit is the parasitic mite varroa destructor, calling it "the single most detrimental pest of honeybees."

The problem has also hit bee colonies in Europe, where regulators are considering a ban on a type of pesticides known as neonicotinoids that some environmental groups blame for the bee collapse. The U.S. report cites pesticides, but near the bottom of the list of factors. And federal officials and researchers advising them said the science doesn't justify a ban of the pesticides yet.

May Berenbaum, a top bee researcher from the University of Illinois, said in an interview that she was "extremely dubious" that banning the pesticide would have any effect on bee health. She participated in a large conference of scientists that the government brought together last year to figure out what's going on, and the new report is the result of that conference.

Berenbaum said more than 100 different chemicals - not just the pesticides that may be banned in Europe - have been found in bee colonies. Scientists find it hard to calculate how they react in different dosages and at different combinations, she said.

Some of these chemicals harm the immune systems of bees or amplify viruses, said Penn State University bee expert Diana Cox-Foster.

At a news conference Thursday, Sonny Ramaswamy, a top USDA official, said the scientific consensus is that there are multiple factors "and you can't parse any one out to be the smoking gun."

USDA bee researcher Jeff Pettis also cited modern farming practices that often leave little forage area for bees.

Dave Gaulson of the University of Stirling in Scotland, who conducted a study last year that implicated the chemical, said he can't disagree with the overall conclusions of the U.S. government report. However, he said it could have emphasized pesticides more.

The environmental group, Pesticide Action Network North America blasted the federal government for not following Europe's lead in looking at a ban of certain pesticides.

Pollinators, like honeybees, are crucial to the U.S. food supply. About $30 billion a year in agriculture depends on their health, said Ramaswamy.

Besides making honey, honeybees pollinate more than 90 flowering crops. Among them are a variety of fruits and vegetables: apples, nuts, avocados, soybeans, asparagus, broccoli, citrus fruit and cranberries. About one-third of the human diet comes from insect-pollinated plants, and the honeybee is responsible for 80 percent of that pollination.

"It affects virtually every American whether they realize it or not," said EPA acting administrator Bob Perciasepe.

Zac Browning, a fourth-generation commercial beekeeper who has hives in Idaho, North Dakota and California, said the nation is "on the brink" of not having enough bees to pollinate its crops.

University of Maryland entomologist David Inouye, who was not part of the federal report, said he agrees that there are multiple causes.

"It's not a simple situation. If it were one factor we would have identified it by now," he said.

Inouye, president-elect of the Ecological Society of America, said the problems in Europe and United States may be slightly different. In America, bee hives are trucked from farm to farm to pollinate large tracts of land and that may help spread the parasites and disease, as well as add stress to the colonies, while in Europe they stay put so those issues may not be as big a factor.

At the news conference, Berenbaum said there's no single solution to the U.S. bee problem: "We're not really well equipped or even used to fighting on multiple fronts.

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Media blame America for Boston bombings, ignore ties to radical Islam

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• • 

    Did feds 'drop the ball' on Boston bombing suspect?

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    Celebrities using Boston bombings to push for gun control

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    Did failure to share intel contribute to Boston attack?

Comedian George Carlin famously joked about the seven words you couldn’t say on air. Add two more – “Islam” and “Muslim” – but only if you use them in a negative context. 

In the week following the terror attack on the Boston Marathon, lefties and their media clones have been desperate to point out the attack had nothing to do with those two scary words.

After all, journalists and pundits have had time to reflect on the bombing – from the safety of their posh offices and not Boston’s crowded hospitals. The brothers were just poor and misunderstood. It can’t be their fault.

The Brothers Tsarnaev have set media tongues a-wagging looking for someone to blame other than Muslims – like Americans.  

Famed newsman Tom Brokaw took up the blame America crusade on Sunday's NBC “Meet the Press,” discussing “motivation” like he was in an entry-level acting class.

Today in American we have a media so obsessed with feeling good about themselves, that America can’t have a conversation about the dangers of radical Islam.

According to Brokaw, we’re to blame. “I think we also have to examine the use of drones that the United States is involved in and – and there are a lot of civilians who are innocently killed in a drone attack in Pakistan, in Afghanistan, and in Iraq.” 

Why? American “presumptuousness,” a crime which now merits the death penalty in certain Islamic circles.

The Washington post claimed on Tuesday that “Boston Marathon bombing suspects elude labels.” Oh? How about radical Islamic terrorists? Radical Muslim terrorists? 

According to AP, “U.S. officials said Tuesday, adding another piece to the body of evidence they say suggests the two brothers were motivated by an anti-American, radical version of Islam.”

The media felt they knew better. 

At MSNBC, they must be hanging gymnastics medals after the contortions it put its staff through.

When MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow asked a Georgetown professor about “some radicalized YouTube clips” on the older brother’s YouTube page, she received a classic response. 

Prof. Charles King told her: “Well, and keep in mind that on his, on the elder brother's, Tamerlan's YouTube channel, there are an equal number of rap videos.” When Georgetown professors start commenting on the content of rap videos, it’s fair to say they’re clueless. Or tragically unhip.

Another MSNBC host continued that smokescreen theme, comparing the bombers to famous murderers. 

On Tuesday, Alex Wagner said if the brothers had acted alone, “it ends debate regarding whether to try him as an enemy combatant,” wrote Mediaite. “With no ties to foreign terrorist networks, there would be little difference between him and so-called homegrown and lone wolf terrorists including Timothy McVeigh and Ted Kaczynski.” Only neither of those was motivated by a global belief system linked to hundreds or thousands of terror attacks.

Perhaps, instead of being PC, they might address the issue of radical Islam, especially since two Muslim men were just arrested for a Canadian terror plot. 

The media are doing law-abiding American Muslims no favors by refusing to acknowledge a problem – radical Islam – that threatens them as well. But note the term, “radical Islam.” 

It is not being overly PC to admit that millions of American Muslims don’t go blowing up their neighbors. Since I have Muslim neighbors, I appreciate that fact.

On Monday, Politico’s Josh Gerstein claimed that “the Boston Marathon bombing suspects’ geopolitical leanings are still largely a mystery.” 

He clearly didn’t watch a week filled with news where we learned the older of the Tsarnaev brothers had visited Russia’s terrorist-filled Dagestan. And that Russia had asked the U.S. to investigate his ties to radical Islam. Oopsie.

One of The Atlantic’s “reporters” even did her best to minimize the skill of the terrorists to downplay the attack. “The more we learn of Boston bombers the more they seem like bumblers. And there's the rub: any idiot can terrorize, doesn't require genius,” tweeted Garance Franke-Ruta Tuesday. 

Boston health authorities say 264 people were treated at local hospitals, along three killed. 

Evil? Yes! Bumblers? Hardly.

Then there were those who couldn’t let that old crisis go to waste. So they used a terror attack on Americans to promote...gun control. New Yorker editor David Remnick told the “Charlie Rose” show that guns were part of the problem. 

“We see yet another act which might have been a Hell of a lot more difficult to pull off with effective gun control.” Remnick is a Pulitzer Prize winner. Unsurprisingly, he didn’t get it in logic.

Even my friend, lefty radio host Thom Hartmann used the bombing to attack “all forms of religious fundamentalism that lead to violence.” Thom, like most liberals, isn’t especially tolerant of religion and said this was “a good opportunity for us to have a conversation about modernity versus Bronze Age gods.” Nothing says open-mindedness like calling Christianity “Bronze Age gods.”

What it all adds up to, is a media so obsessed with feeling good about themselves, that America can’t have a conversation about the dangers of radical Islam. It’s a world tailor made for people like nutty columnist David Sirota (OK, that’s like saying “wet ocean”). Sirota, you’ll recall, hoped that the bombers might be “a white American.”

As it turns out, it didn’t matter. The media just report what they want anyhow.

Dan Gainor is the Boone Pickens Fellow and the Media Research Center’s Vice President for Business and Culture. He writes frequently about media for Fox News Opinion. He can also be contacted on Facebook and Twitter as dangainor.

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White House retreats from doomsday spending cuts predictions, but keeps blame on Republicans

The White House retreated from its doomsday predictions Sunday about the impact of the $85 billion in federal spending cuts that have  kicked  in -- as Republican leaders appeared at least satisfied about delivering on their promise to limit government spending and hold down taxes.

Gene Sperling, the White House's top economic adviser, repeatedly said the cuts will not hurt as much on “Day One” as they will over the long haul.  

“Nobody ever suggested that this … was going to have all its impact in the first few days,” he told “NBC’s “Meet the Press.” “It is a slow grind.”

His remarks are in contrast to weeks of President Obama and his Cabinet warning that the cuts will result in furloughs or pay cuts for middle-class wage-earners such as teachers, Capitol Hill janitors and air traffic controllers, which they said could cause 90-minutes delays at major U.S. airports.

Sperling declined at least twice to directly answer questions about whether the worst-case-scenario rhetoric has hurt the president’s credibility on the issue. He instead stuck to his argument that independent economists forecast the cuts will result in 750,000 fewer jobs and that corporate executives now anticipate slower economic growth.

Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell told CNN’s “Face the Nation” Americans absorbed similar cuts once already this year.

"This modest reduction of 2.4 percent in spending over the next six months is a little more than the average American experienced just two months ago, when their own pay went down when the payroll tax holiday expired," the Kentucky Republican said.

Congress agreed to the cuts, known as sequester, in 2011 after failing to agree on more measure reductions -- to defense and some domestic spending. However, the cuts were intended to be so drastic that Democrats and Republicans would be forced to compromise before they started.

Still, Sperling rejected several Republican-backed plans and said no compromise would be reached unless the party agrees to tax increases.

Sen. Kelly Ayotte, R-N.H., responded by saying Congress agreed to such increases in January “at the president’s request” and questioned why Obama and other Democrats will not agree to additional spending cuts.

She argued for potential pay freezes for federal employees and reforms to the federal food stamps program.

“There’s a whole host of ideas to cut spending” without jeopardizing security, Ayotte said on ABC’s “This Week.”

However, she also said she would consider tax reform that comes with entitlement reforms. But she would not agree to revenue increases to pay for additional government spending.

Earlier on the show, Sperling said Republican strategy is flawed because the cuts will take resources from several of the party’s most valued positions – including national defense and border security.

“This is not a win for Republicans,” Sperling said. “This cuts into military preparedness.”

He hinted Sunday at Democrats’ likely strategy for retaking the House in 2014.

“Our hope is as more Republicans start to see this pain in their own districts they will choose bipartisan compromise over this absolutist position,” he said.

Sperling also dismissed a plan backed by at least some Republicans to give the president some flexibility in the cuts.

“It’s like saying you have to cut off three of your fingers but you can choose which ones,” he said.

Sperling also addressed an e-mail sent to Bob Woodward in which he said The Washington Post reporter might "regret" writing a story in which he would say Obama has "moved the goal posts" on sequester.

He told ABC that he and Woodward share a mutual respect and he hopes they can "put this behind us."

Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., told CBS’ “Face the Nation” that any tax increases were unacceptable.

 "I'm not going to do any more small deals,” he said. “I'm not going to raise taxes to fix sequestration. We don't need to raise taxes to fund the government."  

All of this comes ahead of a new, March 27 deadline that could spell a government shutdown and a debt-ceiling clash coming in May.

House Speaker John Boehner said his chamber would move this week to pass a measure to keep government open through Sept. 30.

McConnell said a government shutdown was unlikely to come from his side of Capitol Hill. The White House said it would dodge the shutdown and roll back the cuts, which hit domestic and defense spending in equal share.

Sperling said the White House is committed to trying to find a way that Republicans and Democrats can reach a compromise.

The billions in cuts apply to the remainder of fiscal 2013, which ends Sept. 30. But without a deal they will continue slashing government spending by about $1 trillion more over a 10-year period.

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