A famous government propaganda piece from World War II warned Americans that “loose lips sink ships” in the battle against Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan.
I highly doubt that FDR ever worried about Harry Truman’s lips and any hypothetical peril they could’ve inflicted on Admiral Nimitz’s sailors. Nor did Lincoln lose sleep over Andrew Johnson’s utterances or Bush because of Cheney’s carelessness or… pick your war. But President Obama clearly (and amazingly, for a historical perspective) can’t place the same sacred faith and trust in his own number two, Vice President Joe Biden, who recklessly outed Seal Team Six after they dispatched terror kingpin Osama bin Laden a few months back:
“Let me briefly acknowledge tonight’s distinguished honorees. Admiral James Stavridis is a, is the real deal. He can tell you more about and understands the incredible, the phenomenal, the just almost unbelievable capacity of his Navy SEALs and what they did last Sunday. […] Folks, I’d be remiss also if I didn’t say an extra word about the incredible events, extraordinary events of this past Sunday. As Vice President of the United States, as an American, I was in absolute awe of the capacity and dedication of the entire team, both the intelligence community, the CIA, the SEALs. It just was extraordinary.”
That was May 2011. Now it’s August, and a stunned nation is mourning members of Seal Team Six who perished in an Afghan rocket attack on their transport helicopter over the weekend
I ‘d love to know how Vice President Biden felt when he heard the terrible news?
We can’t yet say for sure how the bad guys knew or, for that matter, if they were aware at all of the downed chopper’s famous passengers before the decision to attack was made. But one thing is clear: by defying protocol and specifically identifying Osama bin Laden’s courageous executioners as Admiral James Stavridis’s seals, the Vice President of the United States made it extremely easy for Taliban forces to identify ‘Seal Team Six’ as a preferred target.
Sadly, of course, this is just the latest example of a distressingly sloppy administration that is more concerned with celebrating good news than creating it, Save Jerseyans. I’m sorry that some of America’s bravest sons may have had to pay the ultimate price for it.
