Like to laugh? Like to be informed? Then sign up for TheDC Morning email here.
1.) What can Congress NOT do for you — Anything you’re interested in them doing apparently. TheDC’s Caroline May reports:
“In a list of 12 priorities for leaders in Washington, Americans ranked gun violence and immigration reform at the very bottom, as the 11th and 12th priorities, respectively.The Gallup survey released Tuesday reveals that two of the major issues dominating headlines and the attention of lawmakers are not the issues most Americans rank as a top or high priority. The top priorities for Americans, according to the survey are ‘creating more jobs’ and ‘helping the economy grow,’ both with 86 percent of Americans saying those issues should be the number one priorities.”
2.) Shut ya mouth — Whistleblowers spoke out about Benghazi yesterday. One expressed shock over how the State Department characterized the attack in its immediate aftermath. TheDC’s Christopher Bedford reports:
“Testifying before the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, Gregory Hicks, the former deputy chief of mission/chargé d’affairs in Libya, answered questions on Ambassador to the U.N. Susan Rice blaming a spontaneous demonstration for the Sept. 11, 2012 embassy attacks on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi, Libya. ‘In a phone call after the interview I asked… [Acting Assistant Secretary for Near Eastern Affairs Beth Jones] her why the ambassador had said there was a demonstration when the embassy had reported that it was only an attack,’ Hicks said. ‘She said I don’t know… The sense I got was that I needed to stop the line of questioning.'”
There are no stupid questions except good questions the State Department deems troublesome.
3.)BREAKING: Chris Matthews is wrong — Back during the election, Chris Matthews dismissed people for being correct. TheDC’s Jeff Poor reports on one such incident related to the Benghazi terrorist attack:
“In October, just before the presidential debate at Lynn University in Boca Raton, Fla., Chris Matthews shouted down a supporter of then-Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney, saying, ‘it was about the video. Read the newspaper. Thank you. Everybody knows it’s about the video. It’s all about the video.’ … However, based on testimony from the then-second-in-command U.S. diplomat Gregory Hicks, who testified at Wednesday’s House Oversight Committee hearing on the Benghazi terrorist attack, it wasn’t about the video.’I was stunned. My jaw dropped. And I was embarrassed,’ Hicks when asked to respond to Susan Rice’s television appearances blaming the YouTube video on the Sunday shows after that attack.”
In other news, viewers have been dismissing Chris Matthews — and his network — for some time.
4.) When Castro came to America … illegally — How would you like a little known, but tremendously interesting, immigration anecdote that sheds no light into the immigration debate? TheDC’s Jamie Weinstein reports:
“Among the least important questions raised by the current immigration debate is this: Who is America’s most famous illegal immigrant to have sneaked across the Mexican border? The answer may just be Fidel Castro. He wasn’t an illegal immigrant for long, but according to both Castro himself and a former CIA officer who has followed Castro since the 1960s, the long-time Cuban dictator, who ceded power to his brother Raul in 2006, entered the U.S. illegally in 1956. In his 2007 book ‘After Fidel: Raul Castro and the Future of the Cuban Revolution,’ former CIA officer Brian Latell recounts Castro’s 1956 journey across the Rio Grande to raise money to fund his fight against the Cuban regime of Fulgencio Batista.”
Actually, TheDC Morning takes back the part about not shedding light on the immigration debate. As a friend of TheDC Morning noted on Twitter, had the U.S. just granted illegal immigrants amnesty on the day Castro crossed the border illegally, perhaps things in Cuba would have gone differently.
5.) Tweet of Yesterday — Donald J. Trump: Sorry losers and haters, but my I.Q. is one of the highest -and you all know it! Please don’t feel so stupid or insecure,it’s not your fault [Editor’s note: While this looks like a parody, this is a real tweet by Donald Trump]
6.) Today in North Korean News — BREAKING: “KPA Command in Southwestern Sector of Front Issues Order for Its Units to Make Counterstrike at Enemies”
VIDEO: Benghazi survivor ’embarrassed’ by Susan Rice’s TV appearances