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Secret Service Scandal Rocks Obama Trip
Politico ^ | Friday, April 13, 2012 | Donovan Slack
Posted on April 13, 2012 11:04:16 PM EDT by kristinn
Up to a dozen Secret Service agents in Colombia for President Barack Obama’s trip there have been relieved of their duties amid allegations of misconduct.
The Secret Service did not detail the accusations but said they did not affect security for the president, who landed in the country Friday for a weekend at the Summit of the Americas.
The Associated Press reported that the allegations involved prostitutes. The actions happened before the president’s arrival on Friday, the AP reported, citing unnamed sources.
“There have been allegations of misconduct made against Secret Service personnel in Cartagena, Colombia prior to the President’s trip. Because of this, those personnel are being relieved of their assignments, returned to their place of duty, and are being replaced by other Secret Service personnel,” the Secret Service said in the statement.
“The Secret Service takes all allegations of misconduct seriously. This entire matter has been turned over to our Office of Professional Responsibility, which serves as the agency’s internal affairs component,” the agency said. “These personnel changes will not affect the comprehensive security plan that has been prepared in advance of the President’s trip.”
(Excerpt) Read more at politico.com ...
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Colombian whores are impossible to resist, even for SS.
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hookers are legal there, right?
it's legal, they're on break, but i guess obama be hating on them getting their pencils wet.
I'm betting this has been going on for 100 years... only now, thanks to bloggers and authors, this shit comes to light.
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hookers are legal there, right?
it's legal, they're on break, but i guess obama be hating on them getting their pencils wet.
I'm betting this has been going on for 100 years... only now, thanks to bloggers and authors, this shit comes to light.
It's like going to Vegas and getting fired for gambling. Pretty retarded.
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Barack Obama's bodyguards sent home from Colombia summit amid prostitution [drinking] allegations
Telegraph - UK ^ | April 14, 2012
Posted on April 14, 2012 6:27:41 AM EDT by Cincinatus' Wife
Reports suggested that the misconduct involved prostitutes in Cartagena, site of the Summit of the Americas. A Secret Service spokesman did not dispute that.
A US official said 12 officials were sent home. The agents were staying at Cartagena's Hotel Caribe, which is also hosting members of the White House staff and press corps during the summit
A hotel employee said the agents arrived at the beachfront hotel about a week ago, and claimed they were drinking heavily during their stay.
The employee said the agents left the hotel Thursday, a day before Obama and other regional leaders arrived for the weekend summit.
The Washington Post reported that Jon Adler, president of the Federal Law Enforcement Officers Association, said the accusations related to at least one agent having involvement with prostitutes in Cartagena. The association represents federal law enforcement officers, including the Secret Service.
(Excerpt) Read more at telegraph.co.uk ...
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Obama's Dirty Dozen: 12 Secret Service Agents Sent Home From Colombia Misconduct With Prostitutes
Daily Mail (UK) ^ | April 13, 2012
Obama's Dirty Dozen: 12 Secret Service Agents Sent Home From Colombia Over Misconduct With Prostitutes At least one of the agents is reported to have been found cavorting with Colombian prostitutes Several of the 12 men sent home are married The misconduct is believed to have occurred before the President's arrival in Colombia for the Summit of Americas
13 April 2012
A dozen Secret Service agents assigned to protect President Barack Obama at an international summit in Colombia have been sent home over allegations that at least one of them was found to be cavorting with prostitutes.
A Secret Service spokesman did not dispute a tip received by The Associated Press that the misconduct which led to them agents being relieved of duty involved prostitutes in Cartagena, the site of the Summit of the Americas.
A U.S. official, who was not authorized to speak publicly on the matter and requested anonymity, put the number of agents at 12.
Barack Obama arrives to Rafael Nunez airport in Cartagena, Colombia, today where 12 of his secret service agents were sent home from for misconduct with prostitutes
The Washington Post reported that Jon Adler, president of the Federal Law Enforcement Officers Association, said the accusations related to at least one agent having involvement with prostitutes.
The association represents federal law enforcement officers, including the Secret Service.
Ronald Kessler, a former Post reporter and the author of a book about the Secret Service, told the Post that he had learned that 12 agents were involved, several of them married.
(Excerpt) Read more at dailymail.co.uk ...
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it's hard to blame obama for it, when they were fired.
wait, for you 33, it's actually easy :)
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it's hard to blame obama for it, when they were fired.
wait, for you 33, it's actually easy :)
Nothing is EEEEEE VVVVVVV EEEEEE RRRRRRR obama's fault.
Dont we all remember similar stuff w reagan, bush clinton and GWB?
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Nothing is EEEEEE VVVVVVV EEEEEE RRRRRRR obama's fault.
Dont we all remember similar stuff w reagan, bush clinton and GWB?
Of course it's Obama's fault - even though he wasn't on the same continent at the time
he's still responsible for every action by every SS agent at any given time
Kind of the same way that Bush was responsible when the secret service and the FBI let a gay prostitute using a fake name and fake news agency into the White House and into press conferences
I'm assuming it was Bush's choice to make googly eyes and hug and kiss him
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Of course it's Obama's fault - even though he wasn't on the same continent at the time
he's still responsible for every action by every SS agent at any given time
Kind of the same way that Bush was responsible when the secret service and the FBI let a gay prostitute using a fake name and fake news agency into the White House and into press conferences
I'm assuming it was Bush's choice to make googly eyes and hug and kiss him
obama runs a horrible govt - GSA scandal - not obamas fault, nothing is his fault EVER!!!!
Obama is completely out of control of anything that EVER goes wrong, but when something , anything, goes right - its solely and only due to his masterful organization brilliance and competence. Funny too - there are so few of those items and so many of that prior horrible things no?
OBAMA BLAMES . . . . . . . . . . . .
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Assymmetric Secret Servicing Initiative: Obama's Colombia Visit Found To Subsidize Local Alternative Monogamy Market
www.zerohedge.com
Submitted by Tyler Durden on 04/13/2012 23:35 -0400
Barack ObamaNeo-KeynesianNoneWhite House
Obama may not be the most successful president when it comes to creating jobs at home, but when success is measured by the number of blowjobs outsourced abroad, he may be truly second to none, as his visit to Colombia proves before it has officially begun. According to the AP, "A dozen Secret Service agents sent to Colombia to provide security for President Barack Obama at an international summit have been relieved of duty because of allegations of misconduct." Relieved here being a perfectly randomly selected verb. Because according to a tip received by The Associated Press "the misconduct involved prostitutes in Cartagena, Colombia, the site of the Summit of the Americas. A Secret Service spokesman did not dispute that allegation." Or, as Goldman would call it, an "AsSymmetric (Secret) Servicing Initiative" where much more than just inside information is leasked. Unfortunately, while he may be far more successful in generating jobs in Latin America than domestically, even those jobs have proven to be quite transitory, just like virtually all quickie temp jobs "created or saved" in the US in the past several years. Furthermore, just like in the US, we doubt that the incremental wealth benefits will trickle down to the local population. After all, unlike in the US, endogenous Colombian liquidity may be abundant everywhere but certainly not at the central bank, which is far, far tighter at a rate of 5.25% (and rising), compared to extra loose central planners the "developed" world over.
More on tomorrow's watercooler talk:
A U.S. official, who was not authorized to speak publicly on the matter and requested anonymity, put the number of agents at 12. The agency was not releasing the number of personnel involved.
The Washington Post reported that Jon Adler, president of the Federal Law Enforcement Officers Association, said the accusations related to at least one agent having involvement with prostitutes in Cartagena. The association represents federal law enforcement officers, including the Secret Service.
Ronald Kessler, a former Post reporter and the author of a book about the Secret Service, told the Post that he had learned that 12 agents were involved, several of them married.
The incident threatened to overshadow Obama's economic and trade agenda at the summit and embarrass the U.S. The White House had no comment.
And no, Obama was not among those directly subsidizing the oldest profession in Colombia.
Donovan said the allegations of misconduct were related to activity before the president's arrival Friday night.
Obama was attending a leaders' dinner Friday night at Cartagena's historic Spanish fortress. He was due to attend summit meetings with regional leaders Saturday and Sunday.
Ironically enough, in traditional economic canon, a transaction spillover, occurs in the context of an externality, not internalities. Perhaps all this Neo-Keynesian gibberish really was true all along...
All joking aside, here is how Politico framed the 5 political benefits (with or without friends) that the Colombian visit was supposed to embiggen. We can probably trim that list to one: endless humor for the late night stand-up comedy circuit as well as hours of rhetorical poetry waxing by Obama's political adversaries.
Average:
4.61111.Your rating: None Average: 4.6 (18 votes)
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"Local Alternative Monogamy Market"
LOL
they should remove sticks from their ass and let people love who they wanna love.
"Alternative monogamy" = jealous other ppl have sex with new hot people and they don't.
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obama runs a horrible govt - GSA scandal - not obamas fault, nothing is his fault EVER!!!!
Obama is completely out of control of anything that EVER goes wrong, but when something , anything, goes right - its solely and only due to his masterful organization brilliance and competence. Funny too - there are so few of those items and so many of that prior horrible things no?
OBAMA BLAMES . . . . . . . . . . . .
333 - today would be a good day to get back on your meds
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333 - today would be a good day to get back on your meds
Obama has debased every level of the government. Just like the Black Hut has been turned into little more than frat house with boozing, pimping, parties, etc, so has anything else this asshole has gone near.
But I really can't blame the SS. the thought of EVER having to place myself in harms way for these two grifting ghetto street marxists who loathe this country probably would drive anyone to whores and booze.
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Obama has debased every level of the government. Just like the Black Hut has been turned into little more than frat house with boozing, pimping, parties, etc, so has anything else this asshole has gone near.
But I really can't blame the SS. the thought of EVER having to place myself in harms way for these two grifting ghetto street marxists who loathe this country probably would drive anyone to whores and booze.
wow.
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Obama has debased every level of the government. Just like the Black Hut has been turned into little more than frat house with boozing, pimping, parties, etc, so has anything else this asshole has gone near.
But I really can't blame the SS. the thought of EVER having to place myself in harms way for these two grifting ghetto street marxists who loathe this country probably would drive anyone to whores and booze.
it really must suck to be you and get up every morning knowing you're going to spend every waking moment being tormented by everything that Obama does (real and imagined)
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Its funny that they got busted for buying hookers in a country where hookers are legal.
I wonder how/why this is even a story.. Who decided they needed to rat these guys out for getting drunk and getting laid when its perfectly within the bounds of the countries legality, and its not like they were shirking their responsibilities. Sounds like some stuck up holier than thou types got pissed off someone was doing something "immoral" and turned them in.
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BTW Not Obama's fault 333, he had no involvement with these agents, he didnt pick them, he didnt direct their actions. Same concept as the whole OBL thing.
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it really must suck to be you and get up every morning knowing you're going to spend every waking moment being tormented by everything that Obama does (real and imagined)
actually - feeling great -
BAD NEWS FOR OBAMA = TYPICALLY GOOD NEWS FOR AMERICA
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actually - feeling great -
BAD NEWS FOR OBAMA = TYPICALLY GOOD NEWS FOR AMERICA
and how is this story "good news" for America?
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and how is this story "good news" for America?
The more the obama admn keeps melting down and flailing all over the place day after day after day on every single issue, the more likely is that he is done in november and we can wash away this historical mistake.
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The more the obama admn keeps melting down and flailing all over the place day after day after day on every single issue, the more likely is that he is done in november and we can wash away this historical mistake.
brilliant analysis, as always
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Its funny that they got busted for buying hookers in a country where hookers are legal.
I wonder how/why this is even a story.. Who decided they needed to rat these guys out for getting drunk and getting laid when its perfectly within the bounds of the countries legality, and its not like they were shirking their responsibilities. Sounds like some stuck up holier than thou types got pissed off someone was doing something "immoral" and turned them in.
it's far-right religious types getting all pissy about it. jealous, to be sure.
And we can probably believe these dudes have been quietly getting laid while on break from their duties over there for decades. it's legal, it's in another country, and it's their own damn business. It's only the moral police that care.
obama over-responded hee. tough for repubs to hate on him for it. but they will lol
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it's far-right religious types getting all pissy about it. jealous, to be sure.
And we can probably believe these dudes have been quietly getting laid while on break from their duties over there for decades. it's legal, it's in another country, and it's their own damn business. It's only the moral police that care.
obama over-responded hee. tough for repubs to hate on him for it. but they will lol
::) ::)
Ever hear of blackmail asshole ? ? ? ? ?
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the same far right religious types that get caught playing footsie in the men's bathroom with other men :D :D
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the same far right religious types that get caught playing footsie in the men's bathroom with other men :D :D
::) ::)
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rolling your eyes,does that say you see nothing wrong playing footsie with men in the men's bathroom
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The Secret Service Prostitution Scandal Is The 'Biggest In Its History'
Brett LoGiurato | 28 minutes ago | 414 | 5
Wikimedia Commons
The U.S. Secret Service is in the midst of what one reporter calls the "biggest scandal" in its history.
It's a scandal of alleged misconduct and solicitation of prostitutes, according to The Washington Post. A dozen Secret Service agents who were sent to Colombia to protect President Obama were dismissed yesterday.
Ronald Kessler — a former WaPo reporter and author of “In the President’s Secret Service: Behind the Scenes With Agents in the Line of Fire and the Presidents They Protect" — told the Post about the investigation. Later, he called it "clearly the biggest scandal in Secret Service history."
Prostitution is legal in some "tolerance zones" of Colombia. However, this flap began when one of the women involved complained to police that a Secret Service officer did not pay her, Kessler later told CNN.
The Washington Post also points out that soliciting prostitution is "considered inappropriate" in accordance with Secret Service code of conduct. Kessler also said that several of the Secret Service agents involved are married.
Here's the full statement from Edwin Donovan, the agency's spokesman:
"There have been allegations of misconduct made against the Secret Service in Cartagena, Colombia, prior to the president's trip. Because of this, those personnel are being relieved of their assignments, returned to their place of duty, and are being replaced by other Secret Service personnel. The Secret Service takes all allegations of misconduct seriously."
Donovan told the Post that the officers have been replaced and that President Obama's security on his trip to Colombia has not been compromised.
Right. President Obama's trip. This mess really threatens to overshadow that trip and the goodwill Obama was looking to gain from it.
At a summit involving 33 countries, Obama is expected to key on economic and trade relations with Latin America countries like Panama and Colombia. Colombia’s President Juan Manuel Santos told ABC it was a "smart move" for Obama to attend, perhaps winning him more support from Hispanic voters in the election this fall.
“I certainly think this will help him, because the fact that he is here, what he is going to say, what we, with Colombia, are going to decide on the free trade agreement and other issues, this will definitely help him with the Hispanic vote in the U.S. I think it’s a smart move on his part to come at this moment.”
Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/secret-service-prostitution-scandal-is-the-biggest-in-history-2012-4#ixzz1s2FYrOX9
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so this is obama's fault :D :D :D :D :D :D :D :D :D :D :D :D :D :D :D :D :D :D :D :D :D :D :D :D :D :D :D
Grasping At Straws
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Law Enforcement Agencies Losing Credibility Under Obama White House
Friends of Ours ^ | 04/14/12 | Friends of Ours
Barack Obama commands so little respect that some members of the Secret Service apparently reduced the President's visit to Colombia as little more than a debaucherous spring break as reported by CNN: "roughly a dozen Secret Service agents and officers are being investigated over early findings that they allegedly brought back several prostitutes to a hotel in Cartagena."
Moral collapse, criminal breaches and policy debacles within federal law enforcement agencies have become an increasing problem under the Obama Administration.
Last week disgraced former FBI agent Adrian Busby was sentenced to a year and a day in prison after making false statements to impede a criminal investigation into a confidential informant with whom he was having an affair as reported by Robert Gearty for the Daily News.
Perhaps the greatest crisis within the law enforcement under Team Obama has been the gun walking operation by the ATF known as Fast and Furious. More than 200 people, including U.S. Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry, have been murdered by guns supplied to the Mexican drug cartels by the United States government pursuant to Fast and Furious, and recently forty high-powered assault weapons from the operation were found in the home of a reputed enforcer for the Sinaloa cartel as reported by Richard A. Serrano for the Los Angeles Times: "'These Fast and Furious guns were going to Sinaloans, and they are killing everyone down there,' said one knowledgeable U.S. government source, who asked for anonymity because of the ongoing investigations."
(Excerpt) Read more at bitterqueen.typepad.com ...
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Law Enforcement Agencies Losing Credibility Under Obama White House
Friends of Ours ^ | 04/14/12 | Friends of Ours
Barack Obama commands so little respect that some members of the Secret Service apparently reduced the President's visit to Colombia as little more than a debaucherous spring break as reported by CNN: "roughly a dozen Secret Service agents and officers are being investigated over early findings that they allegedly brought back several prostitutes to a hotel in Cartagena."
Moral collapse, criminal breaches and policy debacles within federal law enforcement agencies have become an increasing problem under the Obama Administration.
Last week disgraced former FBI agent Adrian Busby was sentenced to a year and a day in prison after making false statements to impede a criminal investigation into a confidential informant with whom he was having an affair as reported by Robert Gearty for the Daily News.
Perhaps the greatest crisis within the law enforcement under Team Obama has been the gun walking operation by the ATF known as Fast and Furious. More than 200 people, including U.S. Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry, have been murdered by guns supplied to the Mexican drug cartels by the United States government pursuant to Fast and Furious, and recently forty high-powered assault weapons from the operation were found in the home of a reputed enforcer for the Sinaloa cartel as reported by Richard A. Serrano for the Los Angeles Times: "'These Fast and Furious guns were going to Sinaloans, and they are killing everyone down there,' said one knowledgeable U.S. government source, who asked for anonymity because of the ongoing investigations."
(Excerpt) Read more at bitterqueen.typepad.com ...
is that your screen name
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240, you're being an idiot thinking it's no big deal for these agents to do this. I don't give a shit if it's legal there, that has nothing to do with it. It is absolutely not ok for them to put themselves in potentially compromising positions like this. Enemies have used girls for intel for how long now and you think it's nobody's business? haha, WRONG. This is a big nono that could put the president at risk or more.
3333, you're also being a dumbass by suggesting this is Obama's fault and then crying about nothing being Obama's fault when called out for blaming Obama on this. ::)
And maybe I'm being an idiot for letting conspiracy theories enter my head over this. This is unusual and I doubt they usually go around acting like sailors on leave despite 240 making it sound like that's the norm for SS agents.
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240, you're being an idiot thinking it's no big deal for these agents to do this. I don't give a shit if it's legal there, that has nothing to do with it. It is absolutely not ok for them to put themselves in potentially compromising positions like this. Enemies have used girls for intel for how long now and you think it's nobody's business? haha, WRONG. This is a big nono that could put the president at risk or more.
3333, you're also being a dumbass by suggesting this is Obama's fault and then crying about nothing being Obama's fault when called out for blaming Obama on this. ::)
And maybe I'm being an idiot for letting conspiracy theories enter my head over this. This is unusual and I doubt they usually go around acting like sailors on leave despite 240 making it sound like that's the norm for SS agents.
Well originally I was thinking how in the military, youre still subject to many American Laws while abroad under the UCMJ, but I also know many friends that hit all the Asian port cities for hookers because it wasnt a big deal.. So I dont really know what it falls under.
Youre absolutley right about possible compromising scenarios (That I didnt think of), but the SS are hand picked and are deadly serious about their operational security so I doubt that any one of them would give the hookers any information... (A big part of their job is not giving up any information even under torture).
I think its more of an image thing than anything... Its common knowledge that military members are out fucking hookers in Thailand but SS are held to a higher standard.
I believe this is more an issue of how the SS looks to the public rather than they did anything wrong... at the end of the day theyre still people and they still need to cut loose and enjoy themselves.
I have a feeling if he had paid that hooker this would have never come out and they would just quietly look the other way; the whole "boys will be boys" mentality as it was. But since she came forward they had to make a big deal out of it because they dont want people to think that the SS is out fucking hookers and getting drunk while theyre supposed to be protecting the President and representing the US.
On a strictly non-professional level I have no problem with it as long as they keep it quiet and out of the public eye. But its totally irresponsible of them to not pay and cause an incident. He got a whole lot of his constituents fired because of that. (But they are in a 3rd world shithole, its possible that he paid her but she tried to pull some shit on him because she thought he was loaded)
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i didnt htink of that angle... yeah i guess guys could be blackmailed for putting their dingy where it doesn't belong. good point.
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Five U.S. Service members are suspected of "inappropriate conduct" related to the Secret Service unit providing security at the Summit of the Americas in Cartagena, Colombia.
"The conduct is alleged to have occurred in the same hotel where the recalled United States Secret Service agents were staying," said a Saturday release by U.S. Southern Command, out of Miami. The members of Joint Task Force "violated the curfew established by the United States Senior Defense Official in Colombia," the command said.
(PICTURES: Summits of the Americas Through the Years)
The news of the service members' violation of curfew comes after 12 Secret Service Agents were accused of misconduct on Saturday.
White House press secretary Jay Carney told reporters on Saturday that President Obama, who is in Cartagena, Colombia, for the Summit of the Americas, had been updated on the situation but would not comment on the presiden't reaction.
(RELATED: Secret Service Agents Accused of Misconduct)
"It would not be appropriate for the President to characterize something that's being looked into by the Secret Service at this time," Carney said.
The military personnel are now confined to quarters and will return to the U.S. after the mission, with the rest of their unit.
Air Force Gen. Douglas Fraser, Southern Command commander, said that he is "disappointed by the entire incident and that this behavior is not in keeping with the professional standards expected of members of the United States military."
Army Col. Scott Malcom, the chief of public affairs for SOUTHCOM, told National Journal on Saturday that service members would face an investigation for their curfew violation.
Malcom, who said he could not identify the service members or what branch of the military they belonged to, said SOUTHCOM found out about the members' involvment after the "brouhaha" with the Secret Service.
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Here Are The Wild Details From The Secret Service's Prostitution Scandal
Grace Wyler | Apr. 14, 2012, 8:45 PM | 2,590 | 20
Barack Obama's trip to Colombia this weekend has been overshadowed by a prostitution scandal involving at least 11 Secret Service agents assigned to the White House's advance security detail.
Since the Washington Post first broke the story this morning, details have started to leak about the incident, which took place during a wild night of partying at a hotel in Cartagena Wednesday night, two days before Obama's arrival in Colombia.
The Wall Street Journal reports that the staff at the Hotel Caribe were first alerted to the Secret Service agents' cavorting by a dispute between at least one local woman and at least one Secret Service agent over a bill for services rendered. When the agent would not open the door for the hotel manager, the hotel called the local police.
The hotel then checked to see who might have brought the call girls to the party, and initially came up with a list of 22 Americans — 17 Secret Service agents and five members of the U.S. special forces — who may have been involved in the partying.
The U.S. Embassy was then informed and 11 agents were recalled from Colombia on Thursday. The Secret Service said in a statement tonight that all 11 agents were put on administrative leave today following interviews about the incident with agency officials in Washington.
The Daily Mail reports that "close to all" of the agents had prostitutes in their rooms, and that "many" of them are married, according to U.S. Rep. Peter King (R-NY), chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee, which oversees the Secret Service.
"This incident is not reflective of the behavior of our personnel as they travel every day throughout the country and the world performing their duties in a dedicated, professional manner," the agency said in a statement. "We regret any distraction from the Summit of the Americas this situation has caused."
None of the agents involved were on the President's personal security detail, according to the statement.
The 5 special forces members involved in the incident remain in Colombia, but have been confined to their quarters and have orders not to have any contact with anyone, according to Defense Department officials.
A hotel employee told the AP that the agents arrived at the hotel about a week ago and had been drinking heavily during their stay.
The White House was informed of the scandal Thursday, and the President was told on Friday, the day he arrived in Cartagena, White House Press Secretary Jay Carney told reporters in Colombia today.
The issue "has been more of a distraction for the press” than the President, Carney said. He referred all questions about the incident to the Secret Service.
Prostitution is generally illegal in Colombia, but allowed in designated "tolerance zones."
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Tags: Secret Service, Sex, Prostitute, Colombia, Scandals, Obama | Get Alerts for these topics »
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http://www.nytimes.com/2012/04/15/world/americas/secret-service-agents-face-questioning-on-misconduct.html?_r=2&hp
Total breakdown of all law and order under TJE Obama junta.
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http://www.nytimes.com/2012/04/15/world/americas/secret-service-agents-face-questioning-on-misconduct.html?_r=2&hp
Total breakdown of all law and order under TJE Obama junta.
no doubt
;)
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no doubt
;)
BATF???
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BATF???
nope
just you
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3333, you look like a total ass trying to blame this shit on Obama. You don't have to connect every bread crumb back to Obama. He didn't have anything to do with this. Yea, I agree, fuck Obama, he sucks, but come man... Nobody is going to buy that this is Obama's fault ::) This is a story worth posting and talking about, but the angle you're playing with it is fucking dumb--so dumb I might send it to the dump.
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3333, you look like a total ass trying to blame this shit on Obama. You don't have to connect every bread crumb back to Obama. He didn't have anything to do with this. Yea, I agree, fuck Obama, he sucks, but come man... Nobody is going to buy that this is Obama's fault ::) This is a story worth posting and talking about, but the angle you're playing with it is fucking dumb--so dumb I might send it to the dump.
What about fast n furious? What about DOJ? Notice a pattern?
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Biden Earned $21,000 Last Year From the Secret Service
by KEITH KOFFLER on APRIL 14, 2012, 12:16 PM
No, he’s not moonlighting as an agent.
Vice President Joe Biden last year earned $20,900 in rental income from the Secret Service, which is paying him to host agents on his property so they can protect him.
Most high-profile people in need of protection pay people to keep them safe. Government officials are allowed to have taxpayers pick up the tab. Biden is unique in that he actually gets paid by his bodyguards for the right to protect him.
Biden’s tax records list rental income of $20,900 from a “cottage” on is property, which is reportedly being leased by the Secret Service and paid for at a rate that could earn him even more money next year.
Biden took deductions for mortgage interest and taxes that allowed him to report only $12,653 of the amount on his federal tax return.
Of course, the Bidens badly need the money. They only had an adjusted gross income of $379,035 last year. This probably also explains why they gave less than 1.5 percent of their income to charity.
Among the $5,540 in charitable donations were $1,000 to the UN World Food Program; $1,080 to the Northern Virginia Community College Alumni Scholarship Fund; $1,000 to the Diocese of Wilmington; Delaware; $360 to a breast health initiative launched by Dr. Jill Biden; and $50 to the Wounded Warrior Project.
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What about fast n furious? What about DOJ? Notice a pattern?
yea, I'm with you on that shit but that doesn't translate to me making absurd statements blaming Obama for shit it would be hard to imagine he could have prevented. Come on, you have to feel a bit stupid trying to suggest this is Obama's fault.
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yea, I'm with you on that shit but that doesn't translate to me making absurd statements blaming Obama for shit it would be hard to imagine he could have prevented. Come on, you have to feel a bit stupid trying to suggest this is Obama's fault.
I'm just saying that agencies and departments we never saw such bs w seem to all going to pot.
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I'm just saying that agencies and departments we never saw such bs w seem to all going to pot.
bullshit, there have been all kinds of scandals from the CIA to the President both republican and dem going back several decades. There's been a lot of shit over the years so don't pretend this is some shocking thing lower than what's happended in the past.
Dumbshit Obama didn't have anything to do with this. I'd rather focus on the shit he is clearly at fault with.
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Secret Service hooker flap over $47
NY Post ^ | 4/15/12 | GEOFF EARLE in DC and DON KAPLAN
A Secret Service agent shamed the United States after a wild night of babes and booze that ended in an argument with a Colombian hooker over as little as $47.
One of 11 elite agents assigned to ensure President Obama’s protection at a summit meeting in Cartagena, Colombia, was busted after his lady of the evening refused to leave his hotel room in the morning without her fee.
That woman was one of 11 hookers hired by the agents — and the only one who hadn’t left Cartagena’s swank Hotel Caribe, where White House staffers, members of the press and dignitaries are staying during the Summit of the Americas meeting, sources said.
(Excerpt) Read more at nypost.com ...
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3333, come right out and say it or not. Is this something you can blame Obama over? Yes or no. If yes explain why. Can't wait for this if you have the balls to answer....
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obama runs a horrible govt - GSA scandal - not obamas fault, nothing is his fault EVER!!!!
Obama is completely out of control of anything that EVER goes wrong, but when something , anything, goes right - its solely and only due to his masterful organization brilliance and competence. Funny too - there are so few of those items and so many of that prior horrible things no?
OBAMA BLAMES . . . . . . . . . . . .
You really need to get yourself some help, son.
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You really need to get yourself some help, son.
"nothing is his fault EVER!!!!"
LOLOLOLOL.... It's hard not to picture this being said by a child having a tantrum lol...
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What about fast n furious? What about DOJ? Notice a pattern?
i notice obama/holder still haven't gone to prison for it.
weird the repubs would just let them slide.
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i notice obama/holder still haven't gone to prison for it.
weird the repubs would just let them slide.
that is weird. There is absolutely enough out now that Holder should be in deep fucking shit begging for his life. I guess they have the media on their side, both with Fox and the left. I'm sure there is a valid conspiracy somewhere in there lol...
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Got to laugh at Obama drones acting like he and Holder had nothing to do with F&F. The amount of dick sucking on this site makes those on the Huff Po look like nuns.
Does anyone besides 333 actually discuss politics on this site anymore? This board has completely gone to shit and has devolved into nothing more than a bunch of dudes following 333 around while ignoring the topics of any of the threads he starts.
Guess it's just another sign of this site's slow stroll towards death.
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:). Bf can yo really blame them? In four short years they went from the messiah and the one we have been waiting for to a chicago street marxist who will go down as the worst potus ever.
There is simply nothing whatsoever for them to discuss.
I do give hugo credit though. He is probably one of the few obama voters who had promise for obama who has been honest about what has been going on. u
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Got to laugh at Obama drones acting like he and Holder had nothing to do with F&F. The amount of dick sucking on this site makes those on the Huff Po look like nuns.
Does anyone besides 333 actually discuss politics on this site anymore? This board has completely gone to shit and has devolved into nothing more than a bunch of dudes following 333 around while ignoring the topics of any of the threads he starts.
Guess it's just another sign of this site's slow stroll towards death.
are you high?
99% of the shit 333 posts is just nonsense and when he posts a legitimate topic he then proceeds to shit all over himself by trying to tie everything to his idiotic belief that Obama is trying to "collapse the nation" in order to usher in a communist regime....
and you seem to be his number one fanboy
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nothing more than a bunch of dudes following 333 around while ignoring the topics of any of the threads he starts.
Good post.
Very True.
33's got lots of stalkers.
Ignore the issue...cry the moment 33 doesn't say or phrase something exactly right. ::)
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Good post.
Very True.
33's got lots of stalkers.
Ignore the issue...cry the moment 33 doesn't say or phrase something exactly right. ::)
he starts at least half the threads on this board
how exactly is anyone "stalking" him
he posts shit and then gets his ass beaten
rinse and repeat 25 times a day
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:). Like on what exactly straw?
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:). Like on what exactly straw?
start with this thread and work backwards
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Secret Service scandal could be bigger, lawmaker says
Washington Post ^ | 04/15/12
Posted on April 15, 2012 12:02:29 PM EDT by AtlasStalled
The scandal involving at least 11 U.S. Secret Service personnel that began Wednesday in Colombia could be much larger than initially reported, a Republican lawmaker said Sunday.
House Oversight and Government Reform Committee Chairman Darrell Issa (R-Calif.), whose panel maintains jurisdiction over all federal agencies, said he had reason to believe that more than 11 Secret Service personnel were involved but never specifically explained why.
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...
Lol. Hope and change.
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http://www.noticias24.com/internacionales/noticia/35512/en-fotos-hillary-clinton-deja-atras-el-trabajo-para-disfrutar-de-la-noche-en-cartagena
Awesome. Hillary making a joke of this country as well.
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http://www.reuters.com/assets/print?aid=USBRE83D0E220120415
Lol Shit show from start to finish w Obama.
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Latin America rebels against Obama over Cuba [Obama has had a bruising time at the two-day meeting]
Reuters ^
Posted on April 15, 2012 5:00:21 PM EDT by Sub-Driver
Latin America rebels against U.S. over Cuba
3:43pm EDT
By Andrew Cawthorne and Brian Ellsworth
CARTAGENA, Colombia (Reuters) - Unprecedented Latin American opposition to U.S. sanctions on communist Cuba left President Barack Obama isolated at the Summit of the Americas on Sunday and illustrated Washington's waning influence in the region.
In contrast to the rock-star status he enjoyed at the 2009 summit in Trinidad and Tobago shortly after taking office, Obama has had a bruising time at the two-day meeting in Colombia of some 30 heads of state from across the Americas.
Sixteen U.S. security personnel were caught in an embarrassing prostitution scandal, Brazil and others have bashed Obama over U.S. monetary policy, and he has been on the defensive over calls to legalize drugs.
Thanks to the U.S. and Canadian line on Cuba, the heads of state were unable to produce a final declaration as the summit fizzled out on Sunday.
"There was no declaration because there was no consensus," said Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos, who hosted the summit.
(Excerpt) Read more at reuters.com ...
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Hillary Clinton swills beer in Colombia (Team Obama running amuck...)
The HIll ^ | 4/15/12 | Jonathan Easley
Posted on April 15, 2012 1:25:44 PM EDT by jimbo123
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton cut loose at Café Havana in Cartagena, Colombia on Sunday, swilling beer and hitting the dance floor in pictures captured by AFP-Getty Images.
(Excerpt) Read more at thehill.com ...
What a complete embarrassment.
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Latin America rebels against Obama over Cuba
Reuters via Yahoo! News ^ | April 15, 2012 | Andrew Cawthorn
Posted on April 15, 2012 5:03:28 PM EDT by Oldeconomybuyer
CARTAGENA, Colombia (Reuters) - Unprecedented Latin American opposition to U.S. sanctions on Cuba left President Barack Obama isolated at a summit on Sunday and illustrated Washington's declining influence in a region being aggressively courted by China.
Unlike the rock-star status he enjoyed at the 2009 Summit of the Americas after taking office, Obama has had a bruising time at the two-day meeting in Colombia of some 30 heads of state.
For the first time, conservative-led U.S. allies like Mexico and Colombia are throwing their weight behind the traditional demand of leftist governments that Cuba be invited to the next Summit of the Americas.
Cuba was kicked out of the Organization of American States (OAS) a few years after Fidel Castro's 1959 revolution, and has been excluded from its summits due mainly to U.S. opposition.
But Latin American leaders are increasingly militant in opposing to the 50-year-old U.S. trade embargo on the island.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.yahoo.com ...
Obama FAIL.
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yeah, if Issa has shown one thing... he gets results.
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Latin America rebels against Obama over Cuba
Reuters via Yahoo! News ^ | April 15, 2012 | Andrew Cawthorn
Posted on April 15, 2012 5:03:28 PM EDT by Oldeconomybuyer
CARTAGENA, Colombia (Reuters) - Unprecedented Latin American opposition to U.S. sanctions on Cuba left President Barack Obama isolated at a summit on Sunday and illustrated Washington's declining influence in a region being aggressively courted by China.
Unlike the rock-star status he enjoyed at the 2009 Summit of the Americas after taking office, Obama has had a bruising time at the two-day meeting in Colombia of some 30 heads of state.
For the first time, conservative-led U.S. allies like Mexico and Colombia are throwing their weight behind the traditional demand of leftist governments that Cuba be invited to the next Summit of the Americas.
Cuba was kicked out of the Organization of American States (OAS) a few years after Fidel Castro's 1959 revolution, and has been excluded from its summits due mainly to U.S. opposition.
But Latin American leaders are increasingly militant in opposing to the 50-year-old U.S. trade embargo on the island.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.yahoo.com ...
Obama FAIL.
LOL @ Rock star reception.
The world doesnt respect Obama, they laugh at him. He's weak in the worlds eyes. He's a bitch.
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:). Obama deserves to be laughed at. He is a pathetic joke. He is all sizzle no steak and knows that he can always fool the blackens straws andres and 240 types.
But more and more people realize he is little more than a media creation based on lies.
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Got to laugh at Obama drones acting like he and Holder had nothing to do with F&F. The amount of dick sucking on this site makes those on the Huff Po look like nuns.
Does anyone besides 333 actually discuss politics on this site anymore? This board has completely gone to shit and has devolved into nothing more than a bunch of dudes following 333 around while ignoring the topics of any of the threads he starts.
Guess it's just another sign of this site's slow stroll towards death.
Maybe it's time for you to post somewhere else.
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Obama wants 'rigorous' Secret Service probe (Hussein gonna be "angry")
Yahoo ^ | 4/15/12
Posted on April 15, 2012 8:35:27 PM EDT by Libloather
Obama wants 'rigorous' Secret Service probe
AFP – 1 hr 41 mins ago
US President Barack Obama said Sunday he expected a "rigorous" probe into a sex scandal involving Secret Service agents, warning he would be "angry" if the allegations were true.
The incident -- which saw 11 Secret Service and five military personnel pulled from their duties in Cartagena, Colombia at the Summit of the Americas -- overshadowed the talks attended by Obama and other regional leaders.
The US Secret Service, which has sent the men back to the United States, is investigating claims they brought prostitutes to their hotel rooms in Cartagena late Wednesday and had a dispute over payment with one of the women.
"I expect the investigation to be thorough and rigorous," Obama said at a press conference with Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos at the end of the summit.
"If it turns out the allegations that have been made in the press are confirmed, then of course I'll be angry."
(Excerpt) Read more at news.yahoo.com ...
I'll bet Obama wants to probe some SS agents.
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Obama: "I'll be angry" if Secret Service scandal is true
cbs ^ | 4/15/2012 | ap
Posted on April 15, 2012 9:12:46 PM EDT by tobyhill
President Barack Obama, speaking for the first time about allegations that Secret Service agents hired prostitutes, said Sunday that "of course I'll be angry" if those accusations are proven true by an investigation.
Obama said the agents represent the United States and are supposed to conduct themselves with the highest levels of dignity anywhere in the world. "Obviously, what's been reported doesn't match up to those standards," Obama said in a news conference wrapping his appearance at a Latin America summit.
The president never directly mentioned that the specific accusations, confirmed by media outlets, that agents were cavorting with prostitutes before the president arrived in Colombia.
The Secret Service sent 11 agents home and placed them on leave for misconduct as the agency reviews what happened.
(Excerpt) Read more at cbsnews.com ...
LOL. Ooohhhhhhh Obama be angry!
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President Obama Is Disgusted At The Secret Service Scandal
Brett LoGiurato | Apr. 15, 2012, 9:00 PM | 938 | 18
Official White House Photo by Pete SouzaPresident Barack Obama came out firing on Sunday, calling for a "rigorous" and "thorough" probe into 11 Secret Service officers assigned to protect him in a trip to Colombia. The dismissal of those officers due to allegations involving soliciting prostitutes — and the lewd details that have followed — have overshadowed Obama's trip to a 33-country summit in Colombia.
Obama said he would wait until the review of the 11 officers and five members of the military is complete, but he blasted the officers and the agency based on what has been reported thus far.
Some excerpts from his press conference, per CNN:
"I expect that investigation to be thorough and I expect it to be rigorous. If it turns out that some of the allegations that have been made in the press are confirmed, then of course I'll be angry."
"We're representing the people of the United States and when we travel to another county I expect us to observe the highest standards. Obviously, what's been reported doesn't match up with those standards."
Obama is angry because the scandal has caused embarrassment throughout his weekend Summit of the Americas. And it has completely overshadowed the diplomatic purposes of the summit in general. Many, including Colombia President Juan Manuel Santos, thought it was supposed to be an opening for Obama to make inroads with Hispanic voters with ties to the countries.
Meanwhile, other important lawmakers weighed in on the scandal, as well. U.S. Rep. Peter King (R-N.Y.), who is the chair of the House Homeland Security Committee, said his committee would be performing a full investigation.
"My committee is going to be investigating exactly how this happened, why it happened, how to prevent it from happening in the future," King told CBS.
And Darrell Issa, a Republican and chair of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, said he doubted only 11 members of the Secret Service were involved.
"We think the number might be higher, and we're asking for the exact amount of all the people who were involved," Issa said. "How did this happen, and how often has this happened before? Is the whole organization in need of some soul-searching?"
Click here to see more details from the scandal >
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Hillary Clinton The Secretary of PARTYING
TMZ Online ^ | 4/15/2012 | TMZ staff
Posted on April 15, 2012 9:42:46 PM EDT by baileybat
In a move more reminiscent of something her husband Bill might do, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was photographed last night dancing and knocking back a beer at a club in Cartagena, Colombia.
(Excerpt) Read more at tmz.com ...
can you communist rats finally admit to what a disgrace this entire admn is?
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Hillary Clinton The Secretary of PARTYING
TMZ Online ^ | 4/15/2012 | TMZ staff
Posted on April 15, 2012 9:42:46 PM EDT by baileybat
In a move more reminiscent of something her husband Bill might do, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was photographed last night dancing and knocking back a beer at a club in Cartagena, Colombia.
(Excerpt) Read more at tmz.com ...
can you communist rats finally admit to what a disgrace this entire admn is?
Try to stay on topic, spanky.
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Nothing is EEEEEE VVVVVVV EEEEEE RRRRRRR obama's fault.
Seriously guy... you need to stop sniffing glue or gasoline or whatever the fuck it is that you do that has got you so mentally fucked up. You can't even make a single rational post. Hell, a single rational sentence.
You suggest, in your irrational and paranoid stupor, that if someone says " For some <X>, <X> isn't Obama's fault" it translates to "For all <X>, <X> isn't Obama's fault". Alas, that's not how it works.
Obama has made mistakes – a lot of mistakes – for which he is responsible. There's a ton of things that you can use to make legitimate and valid criticisms about him. So why attempt to criticize him for something for which he's clearly not responsible, like a bunch of Secret Service people allegedly being unable to keep their dick inside their trousers and resorting to prostitutes?
Unless, of course, you actually don't believe anything that you say, and you're actually trying to discredit and effectively drown out those who have legitimate criticisms to advance Obama's re-election. ;D
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Seriously guy... you need to stop sniffing glue or gasoline or whatever the fuck it is that you do that has got you so mentally fucked up. You can't even make a single rational post. Hell, a single rational sentence.
You suggest, in your irrational and paranoid stupor, that if someone says " For some <X>, <X> isn't Obama's fault" it translates to "For all <X>, <X> isn't Obama's fault". Alas, that's not how it works.
Obama has made mistakes – a lot of mistakes – for which he is responsible. There's a ton of things that you can use to make legitimate and valid criticisms about him. So why attempt to criticize him for something for which he's clearly not responsible, like a bunch of Secret Service people allegedly being unable to keep their dick inside their trousers and resorting to prostitutes?
Unless, of course, you actually don't believe anything that you say, and you're actually trying to discredit and effectively drown out those who have legitimate criticisms to advance Obama's re-election. ;D
Prepare to be accused of 'knee-padding'.
Anyone who does not hate Obama 100 percent will be labeled a traitor by this guy.
33386 makes fun of wounded veterans, he is so out of his mind.
But he's an entertaining character because he has created and alternative reality for himself, replete with fake girlfriend and law degree.
His racist buddies always defend him and now you are probably on the shitlist too. Get ready for some internet toughness to be thrown against you.
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Lol. Like I said - NOTHING is ever Obamas fault. Everything is always someone else's fault , nothing is ever a reflection on this failed admn, EVER.
Fast n Furious - Solyndra, Solar Trust, no budget in three years, etc etc, all out of obamas control.
No one ever accountable for financial crimes, not obamas fault.
Breakdown at GSA, money squandered at Stim Bill, not is fault.
Horrible energy policies - not his fault.
Got it?
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Hillary Clinton The Secretary of PARTYING
TMZ Online ^ | 4/15/2012 | TMZ staff
Posted on April 15, 2012 9:42:46 PM EDT by baileybat
In a move more reminiscent of something her husband Bill might do, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was photographed last night dancing and knocking back a beer at a club in Cartagena, Colombia.
(Excerpt) Read more at tmz.com ...
can you communist rats finally admit to what a disgrace this entire admn is?
33,
seriously, she's a human. she had a beer. are you really at the point where you're offended and angry that the sec of state has a beer?
Dude, focus on shit that matters. Economy tanking. But crying about a beer really minimizes any impact you have with relevant stories.
Plus... um.... don't we make fun of code pink b*tches for being offeded by everything, for having no balls, etc? I mean, don't you hate those whiners that are "offended" all day?
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33,
seriously, she's a human. she had a beer. are you really at the point where you're offended and angry that the sec of state has a beer?
Dude, focus on shit that matters. Economy tanking. But crying about a beer really minimizes any impact you have with relevant stories.
Plus... um.... don't we make fun of code pink b*tches for being offeded by everything, for having no balls, etc? I mean, don't you hate those whiners that are "offended" all day?
Did you see the pics? I can't ever remember a SOS acting like a drunk mess in a foreign country.
BTW - economy? STFU! I post tons of economic stories and all I get are either creepy stalkers, bale bush, or excuses why it's nothing to do w Obama policy.
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Inside the [alleged] Secret Service's hooker hot spot
New York Daily News ^ | 04/16/12
Posted on April 16, 2012 6:22:23 AM EDT by AtlasStalled
It was in this one-story, windowless, brick building with a cheesy neon sign on top that 11 Secret Service agents assigned to protect the President ended up embarrassing their country all for a little fun and flesh, local sources told the Daily News.
Drinking beers and whisky that range in price from 40,000 to 150,000 pesos ($24 to $84) for bottle service, the agents had their pick of young girls with long, black and brown hair and lots of makeup.
“The gringos got rowdy at the bar. They drank fine whisky and slept with the prettiest ones, the ones that charge 300,000 pesos (about $180),” one club worker told the El Heraldo newspaper of Cartagena. “Some did not want to pay. To make it worse, they almost beat up employees who wanted them to pay up.”
(Excerpt) Read more at nydailynews.com ...
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Did you see the pics? I can't ever remember a SOS acting like a drunk mess in a foreign country.
BTW - economy? STFU! I post tons of economic stories and all I get are either creepy stalkers, bale bush, or excuses why it's nothing to do w Obama policy.
i didnt see you complain when bush, at the height of georgia being invaded by russia, almost fell out of his seat drunk at the olympics, then walked out to slap the ass of a female volleyball player ???
Either they're both disgusting representative of our nation, or they're both not.
Was hilary having a beer and laughing, or did she fall out of her seat ala bush?
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it's a republican thing ;D
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i didnt see you complain when bush, at the height of georgia being invaded by russia, almost fell out of his seat drunk at the olympics, then walked out to slap the ass of a female volleyball player ???
Either they're both disgusting representative of our nation, or they're both not.
Was hilary having a beer and laughing, or did she fall out of her seat ala bush?
You know my thoughts on Bush.
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http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/04/16/us-americas-summit-idUSBRE83D0E220120416
Argentine President Cristina Fernandez, who has insisted without success that Washington recognize its claim to the Falkland Islands controlled by Britain, was one of several presidents who left the summit well before its official closure.
She missed a verbal gaffe by Obama, who referred to the “Maldives” instead of the “Malvinas” when using the name Latin Americans give to the disputed islands.
________________________ ________
Maldives (i/ˈmɒldaɪvz/ or /ˈmɒldiːvz/), (Dhivehi: ދިވެހިރާއްޖެ, Dhivehi Raa'je), officially Republic of Maldives (Dhivehi: ދިވެހިރާއްޖޭގެ ޖުމްހޫރިއްޔާ, Dhivehi Raa'jeyge Jumhooriyya), also referred to as the Maldive Islands, is an island nation in the Indian Ocean formed by a double chain of twenty-six atolls oriented north-south off India's Lakshadweep Islands, between Minicoy Island and Chagos Archipelago. It stands in the Laccadive Sea, about 700 kilometres (430 mi) south-west of Sri Lanka and 400 kilometres (250 mi) south-west of India. During the colonial era, the Dutch referred to the country as "Maldivische Eilanden" in their documentation, while "Maldive Islands" is the anglicised version of the local name used by the British, which later came to be written "Maldives".
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Lol. Like I said - NOTHING is ever Obamas fault. Everything is always someone else's fault , nothing is ever a reflection on this failed admn, EVER.
Plenty is his fault and he bears responsibility for. But plenty doesn't mean "everything". Blame Obama for his mistakes and faults. Hold him accountable for what he does.
How, exactly and specifically, is it Obama's fault that a third party hired a prostitute and refused to pay her?
Fast n Furious - Solyndra, Solar Trust, no budget in three years, etc etc, all out of obamas control.
But some guy's libido and poor decision making is not out of his control?
No one ever accountable for financial crimes, not obamas fault.
How does any of that make Obama responsible because some other guy allegedly hired a prostitute and allegedly refused to pay her?
Breakdown at GSA, money squandered at Stim Bill, not is fault.
How are any of those things related to - and how do they implicate Obama in - the Secret Service incident in question?
Horrible energy policies - not his fault.
How did these horrible energy policies cause the guy to get a raging hard-on and to need the services of a prostitute to get some relief, thus making Obama responsible?
Got it?
No. Perhaps you can explain exactly how Fast-n-Furious causes the guy to need the services of a prostitute and how exactly Obama was involved? Did he hook him up with a number or something?
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Plenty is his fault and he bears responsibility for. But plenty doesn't mean "everything". Blame Obama for his mistakes and faults. Hold him accountable for what he does.
How, exactly and specifically, is it Obama's fault that a third party hired a prostitute and refused to pay her?
But some guy's libido and poor decision making is not out of his control?
How does any of that make Obama responsible because some other guy allegedly hired a prostitute and allegedly refused to pay her?
How are any of those things related to - and how do they implicate Obama in - the Secret Service incident in question?
How did these horrible energy policies cause the guy to get a raging hard-on and to need the services of a prostitute to get some relief, thus making Obama responsible?
No. Perhaps you can explain exactly how Fast-n-Furious causes the guy to need the services of a prostitute and how exactly Obama was involved? Did he hook him up with a number or something?
The problem is that there is an overall breakdown of government over the last four years even worse than Bush and it is a reflection from the top.
There is no accountability in this Admn, no standards, no one ever gets fored for malfeasance in office, etc.
Fish rots from the head down.
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Epic thread backfire.
Tough weekend getting your ass kicked all over the place here huh?
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How is it a backfire?
SS is in breakdown mode just like DOJ, EPA, DOE, GSA, BATF, etc etc.
Again - nothing is EVER obama's fault. EVER! All just a coincidence!
I forgot - BUSHS' FAULT!
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Where is the evidence that this is Obama's fault? Besides on the inside your delusional head.
"Evidence". "Proof". "Facts". Something they obviously didn't introduce you to when you got your fake law degree.
All you have provided so far is backpedaling, whining, and excuses.
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Where is the evidence that this is Obama's fault? Besides on the inside your delusional head.
"Evidence". "Proof". "Facts". Something they obviously didn't introduce you to when you got your fake law degree.
All you have provided so far is backpedaling, whining, and excuses.
The entire government agencies are all in meltdown.
1. DOE - solyndra, billions in failed loans, solar trust, etc.
2. DOJ - fast n furious, holders scandals, black panthers case, etc etc.
3. BATF - fast n furious
4. EPA - scandal plagued by falsifying data and defying court orders, etc.
5. GSA - million dollar thefts and larcenies
6. SS - hookers and prostitutes
and on and on an on.
All just a coincidence right? Not to mention the fact that no other admn in my lifetime in three short years, clinton included, had such wide ranging corruption and breakdowns.
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How dignified. ::) ::)
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Where is the evidence that this is Obama's fault? Besides on the inside your delusional head.
"Evidence". "Proof". "Facts". Something they obviously didn't introduce you to when you got your fake law degree.
All you have provided so far is backpedaling, whining, and excuses.
I see you are still struggling. No surprise.
Come back when you have "evidence" or "proof" of Obama directly being responsible for these guys with the hookers.
Or just continue to flail around here looking like an ass like you normally do. Which is what you will do anyway.
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The problem is that there is an overall breakdown of government over the last four years even worse than Bush and it is a reflection from the top.
There is no accountability in this Admn, no standards, no one ever gets fored for malfeasance in office, etc.
Even if all of that were true, it still doesn't make Obama responsible for this particular incident. Rather than focusing on the incidents for which he actually is responsible, you focus on things like this and make an ass out yourself.
Again, I ask you how is Obama responsible for the private conduct of anyone other than himself (and, to a certain extent, his children)? How is this particular incident his fault, in concrete specific terms. What did he do, and how did that lead to the immediate next step of a Secret Service employee allegedly hiring a prostitute?
Fish rots from the head down.
And how exactly did this rotting - causes by Obama no doubt - result in this incident? Perhaps the rotting caused the pants of the Secret Service agent to rot, exposing his genitals to a prostitute who was already aroused - having just seen a picture of Obama - and couldn't resist?
Seriously 33... Not everything is Obama's fault. People make some decisions for themselves. And they should be held responsible for them.
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Even if all of that were true, it still doesn't make Obama responsible for this particular incident. Rather than focusing on the incidents for which he actually is responsible, you focus on things like this and make an ass out yourself.
Again, I ask you how is Obama responsible for the private conduct of anyone other than himself (and, to a certain extent, his children)? How is this particular incident his fault, in concrete specific terms. What did he do, and how did that lead to the immediate next step of a Secret Service employee allegedly hiring a prostitute?
And how exactly did this rotting - causes by Obama no doubt - result in this incident? Perhaps the rotting caused the pants of the Secret Service agent to rot, exposing his genitals to a prostitute who was already aroused - having just seen a picture of Obama - and couldn't resist?
Seriously 33... Not everything is Obama's fault. People make some decisions for themselves. And they should be held responsible for them.
Again - its the entire ADMN!
There is a culture of corruption, cronyism, crime, and decadence in this admn from the TOP DOWN.
It has infested every level of this admn. This is just another example.
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How dignified. ::) ::)
So you're offended by alcohol now?
Are you a secret Muslim?
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So you're offended by alcohol now?
Are you a secret Muslim?
Again - in my lifetime i can never remember anything even close to this. not to mention that she is drinking in a place called "Havana" all while all of the other countries at the summit unified in their opposition to obama's cuba policies. How ironic.
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Again - in my lifetime i can never remember anything even close to this. not to mention that she is drinking in a place called "Havana" all while all of the other countries at the summit unified in their opposition to obama's cuba policies. How ironic.
Are you even American?
I demand a birth certificate.
Maybe you were trained by Muslims in junior high because they knew you would become so powerful one day.
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Are you even American?
I demand a birth certificate.
Maybe you were trained by Muslims in junior high because they knew you would become so powerful one day.
He's the Yoda of the Cut and Paste world.
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Here Are The Wild Details From The Secret Service's Prostitution Scandal
Grace Wyler | Apr. 14, 2012, 8:45 PM | 25,117 | 79
(AP Photo/Fernando Vergara)
The notorious Hotel Caribe
President Barack Obama's trip to Colombia this weekend has been overshadowed by a prostitution scandal involving at least 11 Secret Service agents assigned to the White House's advance security detail.
Since the Washington Post first broke the story this morning, details have started to leak about the incident, which took place during a wild night of partying at a hotel in Cartagena Wednesday night, two days before Obama's arrival in Colombia.
The Wall Street Journal reports that the staff at the Hotel Caribe were first alerted to the Secret Service agents' cavorting by a dispute between at least one local woman and at least one Secret Service agent over a bill for services rendered. When the agent would not open the door for the hotel manager, the hotel called the local police.
The hotel then checked to see who might have brought the call girls to the party, and initially came up with a list of 22 Americans — 17 Secret Service agents and five members of the U.S. special forces — who may have been involved in the partying.
The U.S. Embassy was then informed and 11 agents were recalled from Colombia on Thursday. The Secret Service said in a statement tonight that all 11 agents were put on administrative leave today following interviews about the incident with agency officials in Washington.
The Daily Mail reports that "close to all" of the agents had prostitutes in their rooms, and that "many" of them are married, according to U.S. Rep. Peter King (R-NY), chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee, which oversees the Secret Service.
"This incident is not reflective of the behavior of our personnel as they travel every day throughout the country and the world performing their duties in a dedicated, professional manner," the agency said in a statement. "We regret any distraction from the Summit of the Americas this situation has caused."
None of the agents involved were on the President's personal security detail, according to the statement.
The 5 special forces members involved in the incident remain in Colombia, but have been confined to their quarters and have orders not to have any contact with anyone, according to Defense Department officials.
A hotel employee told the AP that the agents arrived at the hotel about a week ago and had been drinking heavily during their stay.
The White House was informed of the scandal Thursday, and the President was told on Friday, the day he arrived in Cartagena, White House Press Secretary Jay Carney told reporters in Colombia today.
The issue "has been more of a distraction for the press” than the President, Carney said. He referred all questions about the incident to the Secret Service.
Prostitution is generally illegal in Colombia, but allowed in designated "tolerance zones."
Click here to see more on why this is being called the biggest scandal in Secret Service history >
Or watch our 64-second video on everything you need to know about the Secret Service scandal:
http://www.businessinsider.com/obama-secret-service-agents-suspended-military-involved-colombia-prostitute-scandal-2012-4#ixzz1sDOC2HkF
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So you're offended by alcohol now?
Are you a secret Muslim?
Hard to blame Hillary on second thought - or the SS considering who the CIC is.
.
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Obama, Shakira Join Forces at Colombian Cultural Event
ABC OTUS News ^ | 04-16-2012 | edge919
Obama has just made a Freudian slip in Colombia; maybe it's because of hanging out with Shakira. He was participating in "a cultural event to recognize the historically marginalized Afro-Colombian communities and to grant the descendents of slaves the formal title to their land." The story says:
Standing alongside President Santos of Colombia and singer Shakira in the Plaza de San Pedro, Obama reflected on his own ancestry.
"Early in my presidency, my family and I visited Ghana in West Africa and we visited the historic Cape Coast Castle and I'll never forget my two young daughters, the descendents of Africans and African-Americans, looking out through the door of no return where so many Africans began their forced journey to this hemisphere," he said.
First this says Obama was reflecting on HIS OWN ancestry. What exactly does Obama's ancestry have to do with his comment?? He was not born to African-Americans in the United States. His father's family weren't slaves, plus they were from East Africa, not West Africa. His mother's family weren't slaves either.
And second, see how he describes his daughters. What's missing??
(Excerpt) Read more at news.yahoo.com ...
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Still no evidence or proof? I see.
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Inside the Secret Service's hooker hot spot: Agents assigned to protect Obama found their girls at the Pley Club in Cartagena, Colombia, sources say
EXCLUSIVE: It was in this one-story, windowless, brick building with a cheesy neon sign on top that they ended up embarrassing their country for a little fun and flesh
By Edgar Sandoval In Cartagena, Colombia , Alison Gendar In Washington AND Bill Hutchinson / NEW YORK
DAILY NEWS
Monday, April 16, 2012, 3:00 AM
Secret Service agents found girls aplenty at Pley Club, a less than ritzy love den in Cartagena, Colombia.
In the dingy Colombian love club where locals say President Obama’s Secret Service agents picked up a harem of hookers, scantily clad women do dirty dances and brazenly sell their bodies.
Small black tables covering a dimly lit dance floor at the Pley Club in a low-rent district of Cartagena were filled Sunday night mostly with tourists.
A white stage was reserved for dancers wearing form-fitting, brightly colored dresses that showed off enough cleavage and leg to entice customers to dig deep in their wallets.
RELATED: SECRET SERVICE AGENT REFUSED TO PAY HOOKERS
It was in this one-story, windowless, brick building with a cheesy neon sign on top that 11 Secret Service agents assigned to protect the President ended up embarrassing their country all for a little fun and flesh, local sources told the Daily News.
Drinking beers and whisky that range in price from 40,000 to 150,000 pesos ($24 to $84) for bottle service, the agents had their pick of young girls with long, black and brown hair and lots of makeup.
(Pley Club via Facebook)“The gringos got rowdy at the bar. They drank fine whisky and slept with the prettiest ones, the ones that charge 300,000 pesos (about $180),” one club worker told the El Heraldo newspaper of Cartagena. “Some did not want to pay. To make it worse, they almost beat up employees who wanted them to pay up.”
Despite the newspaper report, confirmed by locals, Juan Carlos, manager of the club, insisted as far as he knows, the agents never set foot in his premises.
But he was quick to explain the ground rules for buying more than a dance.
“The girls dance for the audience. They put on a show,” Carlos told The News. “Then, they walk around and talk to the guys. A dance can cost from 80,000 to 90,000 pesos.
“Then, if they like each other, they negotiate a deal,” he said. “The tourists come here and have a good time. We don’t let them mistreat the girls. They come to us if someone isn’t treating them right. Customers get drunk, but it never gets out of hand.”
(Pley Club via Facebook)The agents are accused of bringing their hookers back to the luxury Hotel Caribe in Cartagena and throwing a room-trashing tantrum like a rowdy rocker when confronted about not paying one of them for her services .
The latest twist in the embarrassing international scandal — which has thrust a spotlight on the agency responsible for watching Obama’s back — came as the President said he’s reserving his anger until all the facts are in.
But Obama surely won’t be pleased by details dug up by The News at the hotel, where the President and other world leaders met for an economic summit over the weekend.
A staffer at Hotel Caribe said one agent started tossing furniture and others pulled their badges to try to deflect the controversy when the hotel manager intervened for a prostitute who wasn’t paid.
“When the hotel manager showed up, one of the agents starting throwing chairs and tables around,” the staffer told The News.
The brouhaha prompted the manager to call local police, who were forced to make a report exposing the misconduct charges against the agents to the world.
“They were showing their badges saying, ‘Look, look who we are!’ ” the hotel staffer said. “He didn’t want to pay one of the girls. They had huge egos.”
Pley Club working girl Maria Jose, 34, said she’s often experienced johns not wanting to pay. “ A lot of us girls have to put up with tourists like that,” she said. “ It happens every day.”
Officials said 11 Secret Service agents, including two supervisors, embroiled in the South American shenanigans were yanked back home and are under investigation.
The agents were part of Obama’s security detail dispatched to Colombia to do advance work for the President’s three-day trip to the Summit of the Americas.
Obama arrived in the seaside city on Friday after the misbehavior imploded. Before heading back to Washington Sunday, the President said his faith in the Secret Service has not been rattled.
“What happened here in Colombia is being investigated by the director of the Secret Service,” Obama said at a joint press conference with Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos. “I expect that investigation to be thorough and I expect it to be rigorous.”
“If it turns out that some of the allegations that have been made in the press are confirmed, then, of course, I’ll be angry because my attitude with respect to the Secret Service personnel is no different than what I expect out of my delegation that’s sitting here,” Obama said. The Secret Service agents, most of whom are married, apparently went astray while partying in the Barrio el Bosque section of Cartagena, where prostitution is legal.
Experts say that even though hiring hookers is legal, it puts agents at risk of blackmail.
Jon Adler, president of the Federal Law Enforcement Officers Association, said he has been told by sources close to the probe that an altercation involving the agents happened at a nightclub, but he refused to elaborate.
“I think the allegations are hype after the fact and in any case those questions should be left to the investigators to review, not the gossips,” Adler said.
Rep. Pete King (R-L.I.), chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee, said he is conducting a parallel investigation in case there are any discrepancies.
“If there are, and if there needs to be further review, there might be hearings,” King said Sunday. “It would not be some kind of morality play, but looking at agents putting themselves in position where they could be compromised, and how to prevent it from happening again.”
Rep. Darrell Issa, chairman of a House investigative panel, vowed lawmakers will be looking “over the shoulder” of the Secret Service "to make sure that the agency isn’t endangering the nation’s VIPs.
“Things like this don’t happen once if they didn’t happen before,” said Issa (R-Calif.), who leads the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee.
Meanwhile, five U.S. Defense Department service members have also been accused of the misconduct in Cartagena and confined to their base.
The U.S. Southern Command said in a statement Sunday that the service members “violated the curfew established by the United States senior defense official in Colombia and may have been involved in inappropriate conduct.”
whutchinson@nydailynews.com
Read more: http://www.nydailynews.com/news/world/secret-service-hooker-hot-spot-eleven-agents-assigned-protect-president-found-girls-prey-club-sources-article-1.1062230#ixzz1sDVFfbgs
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Still no proof.
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Still no evidence or proof? I see.
Haha. An instant classic.
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LOL - Rush making the same exact points I have.
This entire Admn is one big joke and party 24/7. This breakdown in morale and discipline is par for the course for this ridiculous administration that is a hideous joke and obscenity.
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"None of the agents involved were on the President's personal security detail, according to the statement.
The 5 special forces members involved in the incident remain in Colombia, but have been confined to their quarters and have orders not to have any contact with anyone, according to Defense Department officials. "
Can someone clear this up?
What is considered 'special forces members' and what is considered secret service?
Cause if it's just some military getting a nut where it's legal - who gives a shit?
If it's the men protecting POTUS doing it - yes, bit problem there.
Beck was pretty honest about it - we have to jump to a lot of conclusions to believe any sec service agent - who are polygraphed constantly about affairs, bad habits, threats, corruption, etc - Would throw away a lifetime of work to have sex with a hooker.
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Could be members of the SEAL team that goes with the president everywhere. Usually there is a SEAL team present, rumored to be DEVGRU (Team 6 as the media likes to call them, even though they havent gone by that name in years) are present is situations like this.
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So 240 - you think this is all a lie now? What about the woman at the bar who said they acted like a bunch of holligans when money became an issue?
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FYI I cant see a SEAL team doing this - or any SF operators that Ive met. Theyre all fiercely professional and I cant imagine any of them doing this. Especially DEVGRU, since theyre all handpicked and a big part of that is how they conduct themselves within the teams.
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So 240 - you think this is all a lie now? What about the woman at the bar who said they acted like a bunch of holligans when money became an issue?
I think, like becks guest said, it was a low level law enforcement.
I'm sure whoever it is the SS hires to smash local jaws are some bona fide badasses, and if they're with hookers, and its legal or not, it's a local code violation.
but I guess a headline "low level law enforcement agent contracted by the SS gets into argument with foreign hooker".
I mean, "Secret service sex scandal!" sounds way better.
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I think, like becks guest said, it was a low level law enforcement.
I'm sure whoever it is the SS hires to smash local jaws are some bona fide badasses, and if they're with hookers, and its legal or not, it's a local code violation.
but I guess a headline "low level law enforcement agent contracted by the SS gets into argument with foreign hooker".
I mean, "Secret service sex scandal!" sounds way better.
They werent being supervised?
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They werent being supervised?
Since you ask the Q,
Please explain what you know about the required supervisory role of the secret service over support security personnel.
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Since you ask the Q,
Please explain what you know about the required supervisory role of the secret service over support security personnel.
I know enough that in my 36 years on the planet, I have never heard crap like this going on at such a wide degree across the government in all agencies.
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I know enough that in my 36 years on the planet, I have never heard crap like this going on at such a wide degree across the government in all agencies.
so do you believe multiple members of the SS were knowingly giving up their careers to the poly here?
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so do you believe multiple members of the SS were knowingly giving up their careers to the poly here?
I believe that a culture of corruption has been spread across the entire of goverbment to where things that never before tolerated are now not only accepted, but encouraged.
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I believe that a culture of corruption has been spread across the entire of goverbment to where things that never before tolerated are now not only accepted, but encouraged.
that doesn't answer the Q. that's some vague drama queen shakesphere meets cindy sheehan shit.
do you believe multiple members of the SS were knowingly giving up their careers to the poly here?
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that doesn't answer the Q. that's some vague drama queen shakesphere meets cindy sheehan shit.
do you believe multiple members of the SS were knowingly giving up their careers to the poly here?
Yes. Same as Fast n Furious.
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Yes. Same as Fast n Furious.
Are ATF guys polygraphed? And i'd guess no, or Issa would be doing it now lol.
The POLY changes EVERYTHING here, 333386.
Guys spend decades to become a SS agent, and they are polygraphed constantly - about affairs and drinking and other items.
I'm sure some low level security guys mixed it up. I'm sure no high level SS agent fcked a hooker. Agree or disagree?
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Are ATF guys polygraphed? And i'd guess no, or Issa would be doing it now lol.
The POLY changes EVERYTHING here, 333386.
Guys spend decades to become a SS agent, and they are polygraphed constantly - about affairs and drinking and other items.
I'm sure some low level security guys mixed it up. I'm sure no high level SS agent fcked a hooker. Agree or disagree?
Like I said - Peter King said this am a supervisor is involved in this matter as well. Lets see what else comes out.
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Members of elite Secret Service unit among those suspended in Colombia
By Michael Isikoff
NBC News
Two Secret Service supervisors and three members of the agency's elite Counter-Assault Teams were among the 11 agents sent back from Colombia and placed on administrative leave over allegations that they brought prostitutes to their hotel rooms in Cartagena, law enforcement officials tell NBC News.
The involvement of Counter-Assault Team (CAT) members-- who are not members of the Uniformed Division, but full-fledged Secret Service agents -- ratchets up the seriousness of the incident, officials said. The heavily armed agents play a key role in protecting the president, serving as part of any presidential motorcade, usually a few cars back from the president's. Their responsibility is to "neutralize" any attack "as quickly as possible," according to the Secret Service website.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"Their job is to fend off a heavy assault on the motorcade to give POTUS a chance to flee to a safe locale," one law enforcement source familiar with the investigation told NBC News, speaking on condition of anonymity.
The source said the two of the CAT team members were directly involved in the dispute with one of the prostitutes at the Hotel Caribe that led to the scandal. After bringing back the prostitute to their hotel room, the agents reportedly got into a dispute with one of the women when she complained she hadn’t been paid. The women then went to the Colombian police -- who reported the matter to the U.S. Embassy.
Others involved in the incident include three members of the Secret Service Counter-Sniper Team, which is part of the Uniformed Division.
The source also said the incident raised the possibility of a potential security breach, telling NBC News that all Secret Service personnel had been given copies of the president's schedule, which they are told to lock up in a safe in their hotel rooms.
Michael Isikoff is an NBC News national investigative correspondent.
http://openchannel.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/04/16/11228347-members-of-elite-secret-service-unit-among-those-suspended-in-colombia?lite
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Rush making the same exact points I have.
Oh! Well! If Rush is making those same exact points... well, then, all is well. Carry on.
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Pentagon: More than 5 troops probed in Colombia
By ROBERT BURNS
AP National Security Writer
WASHINGTON (AP) -- The number of U.S. military members under investigation for alleged misconduct at a Colombia hotel on the eve of President Barack Obama's visit over the weekend may be greater than the five originally cited, officials said Monday.
Pentagon press secretary George Little said Monday that he could not provide a specific number, but that military members who are being investigated were assigned to support the U.S. Secret Service in preparation for Obama's official visit to Cartagena. He said they were not directly involved in presidential security.
"We believe that there may be more than five involved in this incident," Little said.
The Secret Service sent 11 of its agents home from Colombia amid allegations that they had hired prostitutes at a Cartagena hotel. The military members being investigated were staying at the same hotel, Little said.
Army Col. Scott Malcom, chief spokesman for U.S. Southern Command, which organized the military team that was assigned to support the Secret Service's mission in Cartagena, declined to say how many additional service members are under investigation. He also would not say which branch of the military they were from.
"We are still putting together all the facts," Malcom said.
A defense official in Washington said at least some of those under investigation are members of the Army. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because the matter is under active investigation.
Malcom said a colonel from the Southern Command staff, whom he would not identify by name, had been sent to Cartagena to gather facts. He said at least five military members under investigation were being flown to Miami Monday.
The U.S. Southern Command had announced on Saturday that five service members assigned to the presidential mission in Colombia had violated curfew and may have been involved in "inappropriate conduct."
In a statement Saturday, Air Force Gen. Douglas Fraser, commander of Southern Command, said he was "disappointed by the entire incident" and that "this behavior is not in keeping with the professional standards expected of members of the United States military."
The Secret Service placed the 11 agents on leave while the agency reviews what happened.
"I expect that investigation to be thorough, and I expect it to be rigorous," Obama said Sunday. "If it turns out that some of the allegations that have been made in the press are confirmed, then of course I'll be angry. ... We are representing the people of the United States, and when we travel to another country, I expect us to observe the highest standards."
California Rep. Darrell Issa, chairman of a House investigative panel, said he wasn't certain whether Congress would hold hearings on the alleged misconduct. But lawmakers will be looking "over the shoulder" of the Secret Service, he said, to make sure that the agency's methods for training and screening agents aren't endangering the nation's VIPs.
---
Associated Press writer Pauline Jelinek contributed to this report.
© 2012 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. Learn more about our Privacy Policy and Terms of Use.
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LOL @ issa investigating. We all saw the awesome job he did on that Fast & Furious thing.
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LOL @ this jackass still trying to blame Obama.
What a bitter life it must be to have your ass kicked all over Getbig on bullshit like this.
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LOL @ this jackass still trying to blame Obama.
What a bitter life it must be to have your ass kicked all over Getbig on bullshit like this.
NOTHING IS HIS FAULT - EVER!
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This isn't.
The fact you keep crying like a baby only indicates you desperately need meds to cope with life.
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This isn't.
The fact you keep crying like a baby only indicates you desperately need meds to cope with life.
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Typical lack of proof.
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FROM PETER KING:
Dear 33,
This past weekend it was reported that a group of Secret Service agents were accused of misconduct involving prostitutes in Colombia.
I find this irresponsible. One of those prostitutes could have been paid by terror to infiltrate and hear what's going on. I expect the investigation to be thorough and rigorous.
For more of my thoughts on this issue click here:
CBS New York has more: http://newyork.cbslocal.com/2012/04/16/ny-rep-king-calls-alleged-actions-of-secret-service-members-irresponsible/
Meanwhile, this morning I guest hosted the John Gambling Radio Show (WOR - 710AM) and you can listen to all the audio below:
NYPD Commissioner Ray Kelly: http://wor710.com/topic/play_window.php?audioType=Episode&audioId=5798274
WCBS Political Reporter Marcia Kramer: http://wor710.com/topic/play_window.php?audioType=Episode&audioId=5798266
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Secret Service revokes security clearances of 11 accused of misconduct
A general view of the Hotel Caribe in Cartagena, Colombia, April 15, 2012. (Getty)
(CBS/AP) WASHINGTON - The Secret Service has revoked the top secret security clearances for all 11 agents and officers accused of misconduct during a presidential mission to Colombia over the weekend.
The Secret Service personnel were sent back to the U.S. through Miami and interviewed in Washington regarding the alleged hiring of prostitutes and other misconduct. They have been placed on administrative leave and barred from entering Secret Service facilities worldwide.
Two Secret Service supervisors were among the 11 involved. A top official confirms that the group also included three members of the Counter-Assault Teams, the agents who wear black commando outfits and carry large weapons.
Secret Service officials are rejecting a Wall Street Journal suggesting there is a larger cultural problem at the agency known as "Wheels down, rings off."
"That's not true," a top law enforcement official said. "We hold employees to a high standard. This incident was an anomaly."
Separately Monday, the Pentagon said there may be more U.S. military members under investigation for the alleged inappropriate behavior than the five announced over the weekend.
Pentagon press secretary George Little said Monday that he could not provide a specific number, but that military members who are being investigated were assigned to support the U.S. Secret Service in preparation for President Barack Obama's visit to Cartagena. He said they were not directly involved in presidential security.
Issa: No Secret Service "pre-wheels up" parties
Obama: "I'll be angry" if Secret Service scandal is true
A defense official told CBS News correspondent David Martin that it looks like "more than 10" U.S. military personnel could be involved.
The Secret Service sent 11 of its agents home from Colombia amid allegations that they had hired prostitutes at a Cartagena hotel.
The U.S. Southern Command had announced on Saturday that five service members assigned to the presidential mission in Colombia had violated curfew and may have been involved in "inappropriate conduct."
A military source told CBS News the one of the five is an explosives ordnance disposal technician in the Air Force.
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devolved into nothing more than a bunch of dudes following 333 around while ignoring the topics of any of the threads he starts.
Wow...3 pages of this post being proven correct...lol.
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:). Just read that is is going to come out soon that the girls were underage.
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:). Just read that is is going to come out soon that the girls were underage.
how many agents from the president's detail were involved, 33?
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how many agents from the president's detail were involved, 33?
Who the hell cares?
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Obama’s Falklands Gaffe Could Start A War
PJ Tatler ^ | April 16, 2012 | Bryan Preston
Posted on April 16, 2012 7:00:37 PM EDT by jazusamo
The island chain 300 miles off the coast of Argentina has two names. The United Kingdom, which controls them as a protectorate, and the rest of the world call those islands the Falklands. Argentina calls them the Malvinas. Argentina has never owned the islands. Islanders are 90% British, descendants of the original settlers, and support their relationship with the UK. The UK has controlled the Falklands since 1830, and fought a war over them against Argentina in 1982 to keep them.
But that didn’t stop President Barack Obama from attempting to use the Argentinian name for the islands. And he even got that badly wrong .
President Obama erred during a speech at the Summit of the Americas in Cartagena, Colombia, when attempting to call the disputed archipelago by its Spanish name.
Instead of saying Malvinas, however, Mr Obama referred to the islands as the Maldives, a group of 26 atolls off that lie off the South coast of India.
It takes someone with a very limited understanding of geography to confuse the Maldives, a sovereign country near India, with the Malvinas, a political name attached to islands that are actually called the Falklands. For starters, the two island chains are in different oceans, more than 8,000 miles apart. The Falklands are in the south Atlantic; Maldives are in the Indian Ocean.
Of more importance, though, is Obama’s decision to wade into a sensitive issue between two of our allies in this way. The Falklands war was 30 years ago this month. The Argentine government has been ratcheting up anti-British rhetoric, demanding that the UK hand “Las Malvinas” over, and threatening to invade again. In his summit speech Obama claimed that the US is neutral, which was our official stance during the 1982 war and is now, but attempting to use the name “Malvinas,” and then bungling that, can be taken to suggest that he isn’t so neutral and would side with Argentina against the British.
The Telegraph calls this an “uncharacteristic” error, but this isn’t the first time Barack Obama has betrayed his geographical ignorance and political boneheadedness. In a recent speech in Hawaii, the president thought he was in Asia despite being born in Hawaii. Hawaii, a volcanic island chain 4,000 miles east of Asia, is not part of Asia or any other continent. In November 2011, Obama said that he was disturbed when Iranians stormed the “ English embassy” in Tehran, which was actually the British embassy. England is one of four nations, along with Scotland, and Wales, plus Northern Ireland, the United Kingdom. Calling it the “British embassy” would have been accurate; calling it the “English embassy” was not.
Besides all of that, Obama made the “Maldives” remark at the Summit of the Americas, a summit which has been full of outrages, errors and scandal. In this summit we’ve had the Secret Service call girl scandal and pics of our secretary of state boozing it up have hit the web. The error was by no means “uncharacteristic.”
The Falklands gaffe is the most significant, though. In the mixed signals and inattention it betrays on the part of the President of the United States, it could lead to another war.
Update : In another “uncharacteristic” gaffe, in 2009 Barack Obama invented a language: “Austrian.” There is an Austrian school of economics, but the Austrian people speak German. I suppose we should be thankful that he didn’t confuse them with Australians.
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Who the hell cares?
the answer is zero. And I have to think if a dozen of the presiden'ts men were banging a 12 year old, you woudl suddenly care about the number ;)
listen to that beck interview. The SS coordinates with several HUNDRED law enforcement agents for every POTUS visit. We all agree there are some seriously bad seeds out there. The only thing you could criticize obama for is the response - and he's condemned it in a big way.
Oh, you're upset about the 'culture of corrpution. America - no apologies, baby.
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Obama’s Falklands Gaffe Could Start A War
PJ Tatler ^ | April 16, 2012 | Bryan Preston
Posted on April 16, 2012 7:00:37 PM EDT by jazusamo
The island chain 300 miles off the coast of Argentina has two names. The United Kingdom, which controls them as a protectorate, and the rest of the world call those islands the Falklands. Argentina calls them the Malvinas. Argentina has never owned the islands. Islanders are 90% British, descendants of the original settlers, and support their relationship with the UK. The UK has controlled the Falklands since 1830, and fought a war over them against Argentina in 1982 to keep them.
But that didn’t stop President Barack Obama from attempting to use the Argentinian name for the islands. And he even got that badly wrong .
President Obama erred during a speech at the Summit of the Americas in Cartagena, Colombia, when attempting to call the disputed archipelago by its Spanish name.
Instead of saying Malvinas, however, Mr Obama referred to the islands as the Maldives, a group of 26 atolls off that lie off the South coast of India.
It takes someone with a very limited understanding of geography to confuse the Maldives, a sovereign country near India, with the Malvinas, a political name attached to islands that are actually called the Falklands. For starters, the two island chains are in different oceans, more than 8,000 miles apart. The Falklands are in the south Atlantic; Maldives are in the Indian Ocean.
Of more importance, though, is Obama’s decision to wade into a sensitive issue between two of our allies in this way. The Falklands war was 30 years ago this month. The Argentine government has been ratcheting up anti-British rhetoric, demanding that the UK hand “Las Malvinas” over, and threatening to invade again. In his summit speech Obama claimed that the US is neutral, which was our official stance during the 1982 war and is now, but attempting to use the name “Malvinas,” and then bungling that, can be taken to suggest that he isn’t so neutral and would side with Argentina against the British.
The Telegraph calls this an “uncharacteristic” error, but this isn’t the first time Barack Obama has betrayed his geographical ignorance and political boneheadedness. In a recent speech in Hawaii, the president thought he was in Asia despite being born in Hawaii. Hawaii, a volcanic island chain 4,000 miles east of Asia, is not part of Asia or any other continent. In November 2011, Obama said that he was disturbed when Iranians stormed the “ English embassy” in Tehran, which was actually the British embassy. England is one of four nations, along with Scotland, and Wales, plus Northern Ireland, the United Kingdom. Calling it the “British embassy” would have been accurate; calling it the “English embassy” was not.
Besides all of that, Obama made the “Maldives” remark at the Summit of the Americas, a summit which has been full of outrages, errors and scandal. In this summit we’ve had the Secret Service call girl scandal and pics of our secretary of state boozing it up have hit the web. The error was by no means “uncharacteristic.”
The Falklands gaffe is the most significant, though. In the mixed signals and inattention it betrays on the part of the President of the United States, it could lead to another war.
Update : In another “uncharacteristic” gaffe, in 2009 Barack Obama invented a language: “Austrian.” There is an Austrian school of economics, but the Austrian people speak German. I suppose we should be thankful that he didn’t confuse them with Australians.
Wasnt everyone crucifying Bush everytime he made any kind of grammatical error? Where are those same people now? I hated Bush as much as the next guy, but jesus, the difference here is striking. I literally couldnt go 5 minutes without hearing someone tearing Bush apart for being a moron because of his grammatical errors. Not ONCE have I ever heard anyone say anything about Obama's verbal fuckups, which there have been plenty.
The media is especially bad, they always hounded Bush about everything and anything. Not one peep when Obama does exactly the same shit. (IMHO its worse, as he campaigned and tried to potray Bush as incompetent when he himself makes the same bungles). Its like he gets a free pass for the same shit he tore Bush apart.
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http://www.newsmax.com/PrintTemplate.aspx?nodeid=436004
Nothing to see here. Move along. Underage hookers now?
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Supervisors and elite agents involved in Secret Service scandal
NY Post ^ | 4/16/12 | Newscore
Posted on April 16, 2012 8:01:42 PM EDT by jimbo123
Two Secret Service supervisors and three elite agents were among those placed on administrative leave amid allegations they brought prostitutes back to their hotel rooms in Cartagena, Colombia, in advance of a presidential visit this past weekend, FOX News Channel confirmed Monday.
-snip-
The NBC News source noted that agents had copies of the president's schedule in their rooms and the incident may have caused a security breach.
(Excerpt) Read more at nypost.com ...
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Kessler to Newsmax: Secret Service Prostitutes May be Underage Girls
NewsMax ^ | April 16, 2012 | Martin Gould and John Bachman
Posted on April 16, 2012 5:49:17 PM EDT by 2ndDivisionVet
Investigators probing the Secret Service prostitute scandal are looking into whether any of the girls involved were underage, Ronald Kessler, the journalist who broke the story, tells Newsmax.TV exclusively.
Kessler warned that more scandalous details of the Colombian cavorting are still to come, including the age of the prostitutes.
(VIDEO AT LINK)
Kessler, Newsmax’s chief Washington correspondent, broke the story of the scandal over the weekend. The details have since been confirmed by the Secret Service, and President Barack Obama has called for an investigation.
Up to a dozen agents were sent home from Cartagena, Colombia, where the president was attending the Summit of the Americas.
Kessler, whose reporting partly led to the dismissal of FBI Director William Sessions in 1993, said Secret Service Director Mark Sullivan also needs to be fired, especially as this is the second major scandal he has presided over. He was also in charge when three intruders wormed their way past security to attend a 2009 White House dinner in honor of Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh...
(Excerpt) Read more at newsmax.com ...
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A preliminary investigation into the night of alleged debauchery involving members of President Obama's advance security team in Colombia has revealed that additional military personnel may have been involved in the prostitution scandal, Pentagon officials said Monday.
The U.S. Southern Command initially reported that five members of the U.S. special forces had participated in the partying, but preliminary reviews of hotel security tapes indicate that the number was likely much higher. A senior defense official told the AP that "at least 10 military members may have been involved."
Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said Monday that the agency is conducting a "full investigation" into the incident," and emphasized that he expects a strong response.
"I don't want to prejudge it, but obviously, if violations are determined to have been the case, then these individuals will be held accountable, and that's as it should be," Panetta told reporters Monday.
General Martin Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, added:
"We're embarrassed by what occurred in Colombia, though we're not sure exactly what it is, but what we do know is that we distracted — that several of our members distracted the issue from what was a very important regional engagement for our president. So we let the boss down, because nobody's talking about what went on in Colombia other than this incident."
Separately, the Secret Service announced today that it has revoked the top security clearances for all of the 11 agents suspended for allegedly hiring prostitutes in Colombia. CBS News reports that two of the agents involved were supervisors and three were members of the commando Counter-Assault teams. None of the agents served on Obama's personal security detail.
The scandal appears to have prompted some soul-searching within the Secret Service, although the agency denies that the incident indicates a widespread "wheels up, rings off" culture among its agents. President Obama has demanded a "thorough" investigation into the incident, and several high-ranking members of Congress have demanded a broader probe of the agency as a whole.
Now check out the resort where Obama's security team partied with prostitutes >
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Exclusive: Secret Service Bragged About Protecting Obama While Partying At Colombian Brothel
ABC News’ Reena Ninan, Christine Romo and Mary Bruce Report:
CARTAGENA, Colombia — ABC News has learned exclusively that the Secret Service officials accused of misconduct in Colombia revealed their identities by boasting at a Cartagena brothel that they worked for President Obama.
Partying at the “Pley Club” Wednesday night, eleven members of the president’s advance team allegedly bragged “we work for Obama” and “we’re here to protect him.”
The officials spent the night throwing back expensive whiskey and enlisting the services of the club’s prostitutes, according to a bouncer at the club and a police source.
Sources tell ABC News several of the men agreed to pay for, and received, services from the “highest category” prostitutes available at the club, who charge upwards of $200.
The men paid for the sexual services in advance but when it came time to settle the bill, there was a dispute over the charges.
The group became belligerent and the police were called. The argument between the officials and the bouncers from the club escalated and ultimately spilled onto the street, according to several eye witness accounts.
The police have since been directed by U.S. authorities not to comment on that night or the scandal surrounding the Secret Service, according to a senior police official in Cartagena.
Prostitution is legal in Colombia and the women who work at the Pley Club live on the premises.
The club, located on a dusty street in the industrial Bosque neighborhood, just blocks from the port, has a rough exterior but boasts plush “pley rooms” inside.
The Pley Club is a well-known brothel in this historic city. Some taxi drivers in the resort-town are paid a commission for recommending the club and its prostitutes to tourists.
The officials were in Cartagena on assignment ahead of the president’s visit for the Summit of the Americas last weekend.
The controversy surrounding the officials’ misconduct, however, overshadowed the summit last week and local residents are questioning why the city put so many resources into the international event only to be left with a tarnished reputation.
“Cartagena didn’t benefit one cent from President Obama’s visit. All people remember are that the Secret Service agents slept with our prostitutes,” said a man who works in the neighborhood.
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Just to make sure, the "sources" here are a Colombian police officer and some bouncer from a Colombian bar. And whores.
As we know, hundreds of people assist the secret service in their efforts. A few of them talk things up in bars and get into an argument with the whores working there, and suddenly it's a reason to trash the POTUS.
If obama was in the champagne room with them, I could see trashing them. But this feels like weak - your sources are shady at best.
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Just to make sure, the "sources" here are a Colombian police officer and some bouncer from a Colombian bar. And whores.
As we know, hundreds of people assist the secret service in their efforts. A few of them talk things up in bars and get into an argument with the whores working there, and suddenly it's a reason to trash the POTUS.
If obama was in the champagne room with them, I could see trashing them. But this feels like weak - your sources are shady at best.
ABC news is shady to you?
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ABC news is shady to you?
ABC news reports the allegations and cites the sources as a Colombian police officer and some bouncer from a Colombian bar. And whores.
You, the viewer, can decide if you believe foreigners who work at a whorehouse, or not.
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NOTHING IS HIS FAULT - EVER!
..
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..Twenty or 21 women brought to Colombia hotel by agents, military -senator
Reuters – 38 minutes ago....
WASHINGTON (Reuters) -
Twenty or 21 women were brought back to the hotel in Colombia by U.S. Secret Service agents and members of the U.S. military in an incident last week involving alleged misconduct with prostitutes, U.S. Senator Susan Collins said on Tuesday.
Collins was briefed by the director of the Secret Service, Mark Sullivan, on Monday evening. "There are 11 agents involved. Twenty or 21 women foreign nationals were brought to the hotel, but allegedly Marines were involved with the rest," the Republican senator said in comments emailed to Reuters by her spokesman.
(Reporting By Susan Cornwell; Editing by Eric Beech)
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..Twenty or 21 women brought to Colombia hotel by agents, military -senator
Reuters – 38 minutes ago....
WASHINGTON (Reuters) -
Twenty or 21 women were brought back to the hotel in Colombia by U.S. Secret Service agents and members of the U.S. military in an incident last week involving alleged misconduct with prostitutes, U.S. Senator Susan Collins said on Tuesday.
Collins was briefed by the director of the Secret Service, Mark Sullivan, on Monday evening. "There are 11 agents involved. Twenty or 21 women foreign nationals were brought to the hotel, but allegedly Marines were involved with the rest," the Republican senator said in comments emailed to Reuters by her spokesman.
(Reporting By Susan Cornwell; Editing by Eric Beech)
Heh.
Doesnt suprise me. Marines have been buying hookers in port cities for decades. This is pretty common fare for them.
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Anytime I get horny I just pray to Jesus and he gives me a handjob.
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I am still waiting for the bread crumbs that lead back to Obama. Think The Globe will reveal those? Or will that lead to cities being torched too?
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President Gave a Speech at Hooker's Point As Hookergate Erupted
By Susan Jones
April 17, 2012
(CNSNews.com) - Oh, the irony: On Friday, April 13, on his way to the Summit of the Americas in Cartagena, Colombia, President Obama stopped at the Port of Tampa to give a speech at the Hooker's Point Security Operations Center.
As the president spoke at Hooker's Point, hookergate -- a scandal involving the President's Secret Service advance team -- was erupting in Cartagena.
According to press reports, the day before the president arrived in Colombia, 11 Secret Service agents and at least ten military personnel were sent home for partying with prostitutes at a Cartagena hotel on Wednesday night.
The Secret Service personnel are now on administrative leave and they've had their security clearances revoked as the investigation continues, the agency announced.
In his speech at the Hooker's Point Operations Center (sometimes spelled Hookers), President Obama discussed the benefits of trade with Latin America.
His first comments on the Secret Service hooker scandal came two days later, on April 15, at a joint news conference with the president of Colombia.
Obama told reporters that "what happened here in Colombia" is being investigated by the Secret Service:
"I expect that investigation to be thorough and I expect it to be rigorous," the president said. "If it turns out that some of the allegations that have been made in the press are confirmed, then of course I'll be angry -- because my attitude with respect to the Secret Service personnel is no different than what I expect out of my delegation that’s sitting here. We're representing the people of the United States. And when we travel to another country, I expect us to observe the highest standards because we're not just representing ourselves, we're here on behalf of our people. And that means that we conduct ourselves with the utmost dignity and probity. And obviously what's been reported doesn’t match up with those standards.
But again, I think I'll wait until the full investigation is completed before I pass final judgment," he added.
______________________
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Obama Ignores Reporter Asking Him If Secret Service Chief Should Resign (video)
RealClearPolitics ^ | April 17, 2012 | RealClearPolitics
"Mr. President, should [Secret Service] Director [Mark] Sullivan resign?" a reporter yelled out after President Obama was done speaking about regulating oil markets in the Rose Garden.
"Obama turned his back and left," MSNBC reported.
(Excerpt) Read more at realclearpolitics.com ...
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:). Just read that is is going to come out soon that the girls were underage.
I really hope that's not the case.
Makes the whole country look bad.
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I really hope that's not the case.
Makes the whole country look bad.
Well to be fair, theres a good chance they didnt know how old they were. Probably arent going to card chicks hooking out of a brothel.
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REPORT: Secret Service Agents Hired A LOT Of Prostitutes At This Seedy Colombian Strip Club
Grace Wyler |
Investigators now believe that Secret Service agents brought as many as 21 prostitutes back to their hotel in Colombia this week, according to a new new report from the Washington Post.
Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME), the top Republican on the Senate Homeland Security Committee, told the WaPo today that Secret Service Director Mark Sullivan has informed her that 20 or 21 prostitutes were hired by the agents, double the number of girls suggested in initial reports.
Eleven Secret Service agents have been suspended in the scandal, which may also have involved up to 10 military personnel assigned to Obama's advance security detail in Cartagena.
Several news outlets reported today that the agents picked up the women at the Pleyclub, a low-rent strip club/brothel in Cartagena, where the "gringos" drank "fine whiskey," hired "the prettiest girls," and bragged about protected Obama, according to one anonymous Pleyclub employee quoted in Colombia's El Heraldo newspaper. Other employees of Pleyclub have denied that the agents left with girls from the club.
Photos from the clubs Facebook page indicate that it is a pretty seedy place, where men can hire the girls dancing onstage to take them to private "pleyrooms."
Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/secret-service-agents-hired-up-to-21-prostitutes-in-colombia-scandal-2012-4#ixzz1sKttweJ4
________________________ ____________________
21 prostitutes out of the same place seems high no?
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Well to be fair, theres a good chance they didnt know how old they were. Probably arent going to card chicks hooking out of a brothel.
That's irrelevant. Most federal employees and just about everyone I know that goes overseas has to take training in Trafficking of Persons where this is covered. If there's even a hint, you get burned.
Even if it's legal in the country they are in...they are adjudicated under the American system.
If they didn't know they should've just stayed away (assuming they were underage).
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That's irrelevant. Most federal employees and just about everyone I know that goes overseas has to take training in Trafficking of Persons where this is covered. If there's even a hint, you get burned.
Even if it's legal in the country they are in...they are adjudicated under the American system.
If they didn't know they should've just stayed away (assuming they were underage).
Oh I agree, especially in being attached to the Presidential detail, you'd think theyd understand that its a little different.
But like I said earlier, doesnt really suprise me, I personally know a bunch of Marines that loved going to dock in Asia specifically for the hookers. Pretty sure their CO's knew what was going on, they just looked the other way.
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Oh I agree, especially in being attached to the Presidential detail, you'd think theyd understand that its a little different.
But like I said earlier, doesnt really suprise me, I personally know a bunch of Marines that loved going to dock in Asia specifically for the hookers. Pretty sure their CO's knew what was going on, they just looked the other way.
Semper Fi...
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Semper Fi...
Do or die. Ooh Rah buddy.
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Prostitution scandal ricochets through Washington
By JULIE PACE
Associated Press
AP Photo/Alex Brandon
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WASHINGTON (AP) -- The Secret Service prostitution scandal escalated Tuesday with the disclosure that at least 20 women had been in hotel rooms with U.S. agents and military personnel just before President Barack Obama arrived for a summit with Latin American leaders. The head of the Secret Service said he had referred the matter to an independent government investigator.
Secret Service Director Mark Sullivan, shuttling between briefings for lawmakers on Capitol Hill, was peppered with questions about whether the women had access to sensitive information that could have jeopardized Obama's security.
Sullivan said the 11 Secret Service agents and 10 military personnel under investigation were telling different stories about who the women were. Sullivan has dispatched more investigators to Colombia to interview the women, said Rep. Peter King, R-N.Y., chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee.
"Some are admitting (the women) were prostitutes, others are saying they're not, they're just women they met at the hotel bar," King said in a telephone interview. Sullivan said none of the women, who had to surrender their IDs at the hotel, were minors. "But prostitutes or not, to be bringing a foreign national back into a secure zone is a problem."
King said it appeared the agency actually had "really lucked out." If the women were working for a terrorist organization or other anti-American group, King said, they could have had access to information about the president's whereabouts or security protocols while in the agents' rooms.
"This could have been disastrous," King said.
The burgeoning scandal has been a growing election-year embarrassment for Obama, who has said he would be angry if the allegations proved to be true.
At the White House, Obama was asked at the end of a Rose Garden event whether he believed Sullivan should resign. The president ignored the shouted inquiries; his spokesman later Obama had confidence in the Secret Service chief.
"Director Sullivan acted quickly in response to this incident and is overseeing an investigation as we speak into the matter," White House press secretary Jay Carney said.
On Thursday, eleven Secret Service agents were recalled to the U.S. from Colombia and placed on administrative leave after a night of partying that allegedly ended with at least some bringing prostitutes back to their hotel. On Monday, the agency announced that it also had revoked the agents' security clearances.
At least 10 U.S. military personnel staying at the same hotel were also being investigated for their role in the alleged misconduct.
Two U.S. military officials said they include five Army Green Berets. Both officials spoke on condition of anonymity about an investigation that is still under way.
One of the officials said the group also includes two Navy Explosive Ordinance Disposal technicians, two Marine dog handlers and an Air Force airman. The Special Forces Green Berets were working with Colombia's counterterrorist teams, the official said.
The agents and service members were in Colombia setting up security ahead of Obama's three-day trip to the port city of Cartagena for a summit attended by about 30 other world leaders.
People briefed on the incident said the agents brought women back to Cartagena's Hotel Caribe, where other members of the U.S. delegation and the White House press corps also were staying. Anyone visiting the hotel overnight was required to leave identification at the front desk and leave the hotel by 7 a.m. When a woman failed to do so, by this account, it raised questions among hotel staff and police, who investigated. They found the woman with the agent in a hotel room and a dispute arose over whether the agent should have paid her.
While the identities of those being investigated have not been revealed, Maryland Republican Senate candidate Daniel Bongino told The Associated Press Tuesday that his brother, an agent who was on duty in Colombia, is "cooperating" with the investigation. Bongino, a former agent himself, insisted that his brother was not a target of the investigation.
The Secret Service has insisted that Obama's security was not undermined by the incident, which happened before he arrived in Colombia.
Sen. Susan Collins of Maine, the ranking Republican on the Homeland Security Committee said Tuesday that "20 or 21 women foreign nationals" were brought to the hotel. Eleven of the Americans involved were Secret Service, she said and "allegedly Marines were involved with the rest."
In at least one of his briefings with lawmakers, Sullivan said he was calling on an inspector general to hold an independent review. Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, welcomed that news, saying an independent review "should help the agency regain some respect from the American taxpayers and from people around the world."
The Secret Service did not immediately respond to a request for comment about Grassley's account.
Meanwhile, a person familiar with the agency's operations said it was unlikely the agents involved would have had access to detailed presidential travel itineraries or security plans. Those materials are often given to agents only on the day they carry out their assignments and are kept in secure locations, not hotel rooms, the person said, speaking on the condition of anonymity.
Danny Spriggs, a 28-year veteran of the service and a former deputy director, said there was no doubt that the agents had put themselves in a compromising situation in which security could have been affected. But he said the incident did not reflect a systemic problem.
"I think we need to be careful not to paint that incident and paint the agency with a broad brush," said Spriggs, now the vice president of global security for the AP. "The vast majority of the men and women of the Secret Service conduct their duties with the utmost professionalism."
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Associated Press writers Laurie Kellman, Robert Burns and Kimberly Dozier in Washington and Verena Dobnik in New York contributed to this report.
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Secret Service Agents Took 20 Women To Colombian Hotel, Says Senator
Guardian (UK) ^ | April 17, 2012 | Karen McVeigh
Posted on April 17, 2012 9:47:23 PM EDT by Steelfish
Secret Service Agents Took 20 Women To Colombian Hotel, Says Senator Susan Collins says director is pursuing 'vigorous internal investigation' as scandal triggers scrutiny of agency's culture
Karen McVeigh 17 April 2012 At least 20 women were brought back to a hotel in Colombia by secret service agents and military personnel who are now under investigation into allegations of misconduct involving prostitutes, according to a US senator.
Speaking after she was briefed by the director of the secret service, Susan Collins, the top Republican on the Senate homeland security committee, said on Tuesday: "There are 11 agents involved. Twenty or 21 women foreign nationals were brought to the hotel, but allegedly marines were involved with the rest."
A spokesman for the secret service told the Guardian that it had revoked the top security clearances of the 11 employees, who have been placed on administrative leave and can no longer access official facilities. A number of military personnel, believed to be as many as 10, were also allegedly involved in misconduct at the hotel in Cartagena where President Barack Obama was due to stay ahead of a summit.
A US official told Reuters on Monday that more than 10 military service members may have been involved.
The incident, which overshadowed Obama's visit to the summit in Colombia, has triggered scrutiny of a culture where, according to the Washington Post, married secret service agents joke during aircraft take-off that their motto is "wheels up, rings off". It has also prompted questions about discipline and leadership in the service.
(Excerpt) Read more at guardian.co.uk ...
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New low ‘blow’: Coke eyed at Secret Service ho-down (Cocaine)
NY Post ^ | 4/18/12 | HARRISON HERNANDEZ in Cartagena, Colombia and CHUCK BENNETT and LORENA MONGELLI
Posted on April 18, 2012 7:21:40 AM EDT by jimbo123
The Secret Service sure knows how to party.
Cocaine and several bottles of whiskey apparently fueled the elite agents’ boneheaded fling with about 20 hookers at a posh hotel in Cartagena, Colombia, a hotel staffer told The Post.
The employee responded to the trashed room with police and other Hotel El Caribe workers when one prostitute raised hell after a Secret Service member initially refused to pay her.
“When I went upstairs I walked into a messy room. The room was littered with two whiskey bottles — and a line of white powder, I believed to be cocaine, was on top of a round glass table in the room,” the staffer told The Post.
(Excerpt) Read more at nypost.com ...
I wonder if Barry did a few lines like the good ole days.
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Escort Recounts Quarrel With Secret Service Agent
By WILLIAM NEUMAN
www.nyt.com
CARTAGENA, Colombia — A Secret Service agent preparing for President Obama’s arrival at an international summit meeting and a single mother from Colombia who makes a living as a high-priced escort faced off in a room at the Hotel Caribe a week ago over how much he owed her for the previous night’s intercourse. “I tell him, ‘Baby, my cash money,’ ” the woman said in her first public comments on a spat that would soon spiral into a full-blown scandal.
The dispute — he offered $30 for services she thought they had agreed were worth 25 times that — triggered a tense early morning struggle in the hallway of the posh hotel involving the woman, another prostitute, Colombian police officers arguing on the women’s behalf and American federal agents who tried but failed to keep the matter — which has shaken the reputation of the Secret Service — from escalating.
Sitting on a couch in her living room wearing a short jean skirt, high-heeled espadrilles and a tight spandex top with a plunging neckline, the woman described how she and a girlfriend were approached by a group of American men at a discotheque. In an account that tracked with the official version of events coming out of Washington, but could not be independently confirmed, she said the men bought a bottle of Absolut vodka for the table and when that was finished bought a second one.
“They never told me they were with Obama,” she said. “They were very discreet.”
A taxi driver who picked up the woman at the Hotel Caribe the morning of the encounter said he heard her and another woman recount the dispute over payment. When approached by The Times, the woman was reluctant to speak about what occurred. As she nervously told her story, a friend gave details that seemed to corroborate her account.
There was a language gap between the 24-year-old woman, who declined to give her full name, and the American man who sat beside her all night and eventually invited her back to his room. She agreed, stopped on the way to buy condoms but told him he would have to give her a gift. He asked how much. Not knowing he worked for President Obama but figuring he was a well-heeled foreigner, she said she told him $800.
The price alone, she said, indicates that she is an escort, not a prostitute. “You have higher rank,” she said. “An escort is someone who a man can take out to dinner. She can dress nicely, wear nice makeup, speak and act like a lady. That’s me.”
By 6:30 the next morning, after being awoken by a telephone call from the hotel front desk reminding her that, under the hotel’s rules for prostitutes, she had to leave, whatever deal the two had agreed on had broken down. She recalled that the man told her he had been drunk when they discussed the price. He countered with an offer of 50,000 pesos, the equivalent of about $30.
Disgusted with such a low offer, she pressed the matter. He became angry, ordered her out of the room and called her an expletive, she said.
She said she was crying at that point and went across the hall, where another escort had spent the night with a second American man from the same group. Both women began trying to get the money.
They knocked on the door but got no response. She threatened to call the police, but the man’s friend begged her not to, saying they did not want trouble. Finally, she said, she left to go home but came across a policeman who was stationed on the hallway and called in an English-speaking colleague.
He accompanied her back to the room and the dispute escalated. Two other Americans from the club emerged from their rooms and stood guard in front of their friend’s locked door. The two Colombian officers tried to argue the woman’s case.
A hotel security officer arrived. Eventually, she lowered her demand to $250, which she said was the amount she has to pay the man who helps find her customers. Eager to resolve the matter fast, the American men eventually gave her a combination of dollars and local currency worth about $225, and she left.
It was only days later, once a friend she had shared her story with called to say that the dispute had made the television news, that she learned that the man had been a Secret Service agent.
She was dismayed, she said, that the news reports have described her as a prostitute as though she walked the streets picking up just anyone.
“It’s the same but it’s different,” she said, indicating that she is much more selective about her clients and charges much more than a streetwalker. “It’s like when you buy a fine rum or a BlackBerry or an iPhone. They have a different price.”
The woman veered between anger and fear as she told of her misadventure. “I’m scared,” she said, indicating she did not want the man she spent the night with to get into any trouble but now feared that he might retaliate against her.
“This is something really big,” she said. “This is the government of the United States. I have nervous attacks. I cry all the time.”
The Secret Service declined to comment on the woman’s account. Among the issues under review is whether the security personnel went out that night looking for prostitutes or whether they encountered them where they had been drinking.
“There was no evidence that these women were seeking these guys out — that they were waiting for Secret Service agents — but all of that is being looked into,” said Representative Peter T. King, the chairman of the House Committee on Homeland Security.
Mr. King, who was briefed on the matter on Tuesday by Mark Sullivan, the Secret Service director, said that the Secret Service agents at the hotel had provided conflicting reports about the night’s events.
“Some of them were saying they didn’t know they were prostitutes,” he said. “Some are saying they were women at the bar. I understand that there was quite a bit of drinking.”
When a reporter read the woman’s account to him over the phone on Wednesday, Mr. King said, “Nothing you are telling me contradicts what I have been told.” He said that there was no evidence that the women obtained information about the president’s security, but he added: “That is still be looked at.”
He said that investigators believe the youngest woman involved was 20 years old.
As for cooperating with the American investigators who are seeking to interview as many as 21 different women who they believe may have spent the night with American security officers in advance of Mr. Obama’s arrival, the woman who was involved in the payment dispute said she was not interested in that. She said she was planning to leave Cartagena soon.
Michael S. Schmidt contributed reporting from Washington.
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Congressional Oversight Leaders Say Secret Service Agents Brought Prostitutes into Contact With Sensitive Security Information
Updated 36 min ago
The partying U.S. Secret Service agents and officers who allegedly brought prostitutes into their Cartagena, Colombia hotel rooms brought the call girls "into contact with sensitive security information," the Chair and ranking Democrat on the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform wrote to Mark J. Sullivan, the director of the U.S. Secret Service today.
Sources tell ABC news that his was a reference to Sullivan, in a Monday meeting with congressional investigators, expressing concern that there was sensitive information in one or more of the rooms at the Hotel Caribe.
The charge is contained in a letter from Reps. Darrell Issa, R-Calif., and Elijah Cummings, D-Md., who wrote to Sullivan today that the
"nation's capacity to protect the President, the Vice President, and visiting foreign leaders, among others, is dependent on the character and judgment of the agents and officers of the U.S. Secret Service. The actions of at least 11 agents and officers in Colombia last week showed an alarming lack of both.
You can read the letter HERE.
"The facts as you described them raised questions about the agency's culture," the two congressmen write. "The incident in Cartagena is troubling because Secret Service agents and officers made a range of bad decisions, from drinking too much, to engaging with prostitutes, to bringing foreign nationals into contact with sensitive security information, to exposing themselves to blackmail and other forms of potential compromise."
In addition, the committee leaders asked for detailed information about the incident, including a "description of the Secret Service's current understanding of possible agent misconduct that occurred on the evening of Wednesday, April 11 and the morning of Thursday, April 12?; a "complete description and account of all U.S. Government personnel who were involved in or had contemporaneous knowledge of misconduct by agents and officers"; a timeline; summaries of all disciplinary actions since 2002 that have been taken against the 11 agents and officers involved in the Colombian incident; and a determination as to whether "all women involved in this incident were at least 18 years of age."
-Jake Tapper
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What's with Obama? His Falklands gaffe angers Brits, puzzles others
IBD Editorials ^ | April 18, 2012 | Andrew Malcom
Posted on April 18, 2012 8:25:55 PM EDT by Kaslin
OK, picture this: President George W. Bush, he of the cast-iron Texas tongue, at a news conference concluding an international summit.
He's asked about a dispute involving Argentina and Great Britain, our closest overseas ally, the one that's lost 408 soldiers by our side in Afghanistan, where we've fought a decade together to prevent a second 9/11.
In his answer, Bush refers to the disputed territory by the wrong name, misplacing the islands by some 8,000 miles. Worse than his geographic ignorance, instead of backing Britain, whose prime minister he just buddy-buddied at an NCAA game and White House state dinner, Bush says, Well, that's not really something he thinks the United States would take sides on.
Britain?
Or Argentina?
Seriously?
Do you think there might be some prolonged outraged news coverage back home about the latest Bush blunder, this time a two-fer?
Well, Bush never did that. But Barack Obama did last weekend.
We've seen ample coverage of the Colombian prostitute situation since. But have you been impressed by the media mockings of this latest international stupidity by the 44th United States president, who's previously talked about such things as the Austrian language, the president of Canada, E Pluribus Unum the national motto and traveling all 57 states?
(Excerpt) Read more at news.investors.com ...
Obamas trip was a complete disaster. Gaffes galore, hookers, booze, Hillary drunk, etc.
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3 agents out in wake of Secret Service scandal
Associated Press ^ | April 18, 2012 | ALICIA A. CALDWELL
Posted on April 18, 2012 7:15:25 PM EDT by Free ThinkerNY
WASHINGTON (AP) -- The prostitution scandal at the Secret Service claimed its first casualties Wednesday. The agency announced three agents are leaving the service, even as separate U.S. government investigations were under way.
The tawdry episode took a sharp political turn when presumptive Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney said he would fire the agents involved.
(Excerpt) Read more at hosted.ap.org ...
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Here 240 - Ill go ahead for you. Hookergate was engineered to take the attention away from his idiocy.
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lol.
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Secret Service Pre-Planned Party at Colombian Hotel
Hotel Caribe
ABC News’ Reena Ninan, Christine Romo and Mary Bruce Report:
CARTAGENA, Colombia — Secret Service officials planning a wild night of fun in Colombia did some of their own advanced work last week, booking a party space at the Hotel Caribe before heading out to the night clubs, hotel sources tell ABC News exclusively.
As first reported by ABC, the men went to the “Pley Club” brothel, where they drank expensive whiskey and bragged that they worked for President Obama. The men were also serviced by prostitutes at the club.
But the night didn’t end there. The men brought women from the Pley Club back to the hotel and also picked up additional escorts from other clubs and venues around town, sources tell ABC News.
Eleven officials were involved and, according to Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, who was briefed on the misconduct by Secret Service, “twenty or twenty-one women foreign nationals were brought to the hotel.”
ABC has learned that, when booking the party space, the men told hotel staff that they anticipated roughly 30 people.
The following morning there was reportedly a dispute between one of the women and an official over the amount of money she was owed for spending the night. A quarrel ensued and the authorities were ultimately called.
The officials’ misconduct in Cartagena last week, ahead of the president’s visit for the Summit of the Americas, has already forced three agents out of their positions.
The Secret Service announced Wednesday that one supervisor was allowed to retire while another was “proposed for removal for cause.” A third, non-supervisory employee resigned. The remaining eight Secret Service personnel allegedly involved remain on administrative leave.
The Secret Service has also widened their investigation of the officials to include possible drug use during their partying in Cartagena, ABC News confirmed.
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Here 240 - Ill go ahead for you. Hookergate was engineered to take the attention away from his idiocy.
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lol.
:)
Zimmerman case was no longer interesting. ya never know. Levin and Rush and Hannity aren't talking about march jobs report that much - it's all trayvon this and secret service that. Lots of sexy stories keep obama's woeful economic performance out of the news!
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Secret Service Pre-Planned Party at Colombian Hotel
Hotel Caribe
ABC News’ Reena Ninan, Christine Romo and Mary Bruce Report:
CARTAGENA, Colombia — Secret Service officials planning a wild night of fun in Colombia did some of their own advanced work last week, booking a party space at the Hotel Caribe before heading out to the night clubs, hotel sources tell ABC News exclusively.
As first reported by ABC, the men went to the “Pley Club” brothel, where they drank expensive whiskey and bragged that they worked for President Obama. The men were also serviced by prostitutes at the club.
But the night didn’t end there. The men brought women from the Pley Club back to the hotel and also picked up additional escorts from other clubs and venues around town, sources tell ABC News.
Eleven officials were involved and, according to Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, who was briefed on the misconduct by Secret Service, “twenty or twenty-one women foreign nationals were brought to the hotel.”
ABC has learned that, when booking the party space, the men told hotel staff that they anticipated roughly 30 people.
The following morning there was reportedly a dispute between one of the women and an official over the amount of money she was owed for spending the night. A quarrel ensued and the authorities were ultimately called.
The officials’ misconduct in Cartagena last week, ahead of the president’s visit for the Summit of the Americas, has already forced three agents out of their positions.
The Secret Service announced Wednesday that one supervisor was allowed to retire while another was “proposed for removal for cause.” A third, non-supervisory employee resigned. The remaining eight Secret Service personnel allegedly involved remain on administrative leave.
The Secret Service has also widened their investigation of the officials to include possible drug use during their partying in Cartagena, ABC News confirmed.
Seems like conflicting reports - I read that the people went out to nightclubs and picked up the hookers escorts drunk as shit not really aware of what they were doing (which is plausible). ABC seems to want to make this malicious. The escort herself said she had no clue that they were working for the president. So im wondering where this article came up with its story.
Doesnt seem right.
Doesnt sound like trained top military and SS to me. The escort's story sounds more plausible.
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I don't know about everyone else, but I have this thing called an "internet browser".
It allows me to visit the webistes I'm interested in.
So maybe not all the articles from the intrenet need to be pasted here.
Thanks anyway.
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How dumb is the guy who caused this whole thing to blow up? He should have paid the woman and the hotel the money they were asking for. That might be a dumber mistake than using prostitutes in the first place.
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:D
Obama: "My daughters will look like Tania after plastic surgery"
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How dumb is the guy who caused this whole thing to blow up? He should have paid the woman and the hotel the money they were asking for. That might be a dumber mistake than using prostitutes in the first place.
This is what im saying - this is nothing knew with military members - the idiot that didnt pay the bill really fucked all his frieds over. (Of course it goes without saying this probably shouldnt have happened in the 1st place)
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Secret Service supervisors involved in Colombia scandal identified
By David Nakamura and Carol D. Leonnig, Updated: Thursday, April 19, 8:40 PM
One of the Secret Service supervisors who were ousted from the agency this week for their involvement in the Colombia prostitution scandal made light of his official protective work on his Facebook page, joking about a picture of himself standing watch behind Sarah Palin.
David Randall Chaney, 48, posted several shots of himself on duty in a dark suit and sunglasses, including one that shows him behind the 2008 Republican vice presidential nominee during that campaign.
“I was really checking her out, if you know what i mean?” Chaney wrote in the comments section after friends had marveled at the photo. He is married and has an adult son.
Chaney, who had been a supervisor in the Secret Service’s international programs division, retired under pressure Wednesday, according to people familiar with an internal agency investigation into the allegations that 11 agents and uniformed officers participated in a night of carousing April 11 ahead of President Obama’s visit to the Summit of the Americas.
He was one of two senior supervisors who are accused in the scandal, which investigators believe included heavy drinking, visits to a strip club and payments to women working as prostitutes. Several people familiar with the matter have identified the other supervisor as Greg Stokes, who was assistant special agent in charge of the K-9 division. Stokes has been notified by agency officials that he will be fired, though he will be given an opportunity to contest the charges, those with knowledge of the case said.
The disclosure that two high-level managers were involved in the misconduct has raised questions of accountability and personal conduct in an agency whose top leadership has insisted that the Cartagena incident is an isolated and aberrant case, not a sign of a deeper cultural problem within the institution.
Chaney and Stokes have each worked at the Secret Service for nearly two decades, and both have served significant time with the presidential protection detail, people who know the men said. Both are based in Washington.
The supervisors were sent on the trip to supervise dozens of younger, less-experienced agents who were part of the advance team preparing for Obama’s arrival.
Lawrence Berger, the general counsel for the Federal Law Enforcement Officers Association and an attorney for Chaney and Stokes, declined to comment on details of the allegations involving his clients. He said the agency’s investigation is not complete for either man and stressed that any judgment about their roles in the scandal is “premature.”
“It’s our ultimate position that nothing they may or may not have done in Colombia negatively impacted the efficiency of their mission,” Berger said. “Nothing that has been reported to have been done has impacted negatively their mission or the president’s visit.”
Members of Congress who have been briefed on the matter have said 21 men are suspected of bringing as many as 21 prostitutes to their rooms. Ten service members also have been accused of participating, along with the 11 Secret Service personnel.
The incident became public after one man got into a dispute over payment with a woman on the morning of April 12, drawing the attention of hotel staff and Colombian authorities, who reported the matter to the U.S. Embassy.
The Secret Service recalled its 11 employees and replaced them with another team before Obama arrived April 13. All were placed on administrative leave, and their top-secret security clearances were revoked.
The Secret Service announced Wednesday that three of the men were being dismissed from the agency for their involvement. The third man is a junior member of the team who has voluntarily elected to resign, those familiar with the investigation said.
Berger did not answer questions about his clients’ employment status.
“They have a passion for the agency’s mission,” he said. “They’ve both been doing it for over 17 or 18 years, day in and day out, and very well.”
On Thursday, Capitol Hill lawmakers who oversee the Department of Homeland Security said they expected more resignations and firings in the case. Rep. Peter T. King (R-N.Y.), chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee, said the 11 agents involved in the scandal underwent drug tests and polygraph exams. Agency investigators in Colombia have visited all of the hotels where Secret Service personnel stayed and have interviewed each of the maids who cleaned rooms in the Hotel Caribe, King said.
People who know the two supervisors have described Chaney’s duties in the international programs division as supervising a department that provides support and administrative help to the agency’s foreign of fices. Stokes has been described as the assistant special agent in charge of the K-9 training division at the James J. Rowley Training Center in Beltsville.
Attempts to reach both men were unsuccessful. Calls made to Chaney’s home and cell phone and to Stokes’s home were not returned. No one answered the door when a reporter visited Chaney’s home in Northern Virginia. Parked outside was a silver Ford pickup truck, bearing stickers with a colorful outline of Texas, Chaney’s home state, and the mantra “SECEDE.”
A relative of Chaney said she would relay a message to him.
The commitment to the Secret Service runs deep in Chaney’s family. His father, George Washington Chaney, was a Secret Service agent in President John F. Kennedy’s era and knew the agents on his detail when Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas.
The elder Chaney had remarked to friends that he started at the service working “diaper duty,” where he watched President Dwight D. Eisenhower’s children and grandchildren in Gettysburg, Pa., and also met his wife. Later, he traveled to work in Dallas, where he was on President Lyndon B. Johnson’s protective detail. He also served a stint in the service’s El Paso office and then became the agent in charge of personnel in the D.C. headquarters, where he was working when Kennedy was shot.
He retired in 1977 and started a new line of work as a document examiner in Dallas, where he and his wife, “Toddie,” raised their five children.
On David Chaney’s Facebook page, he posted several shots of himself with Palin.
In one picture, he is wearing a dark suit and sunglasses, standing near a black vehicle behind Palin as she approaches a crowd. In the comments section next to the photo, a friend remarked that Chaney appeared to be “lurking in the shadows” behind Palin.
Another kidded that there seemed to be “real chemistry” between the two.
Chaney posted: “I was really checking her out, if you know what i mean?”
Another friend asked if one of the buttons on Palin’s lapel was emblazoned with Chaney’s face.
Chaney replied, “well if it was could you blame her, anything to satisfy a stalker.”
In another set of Facebook photos, Chaney documents a trip he took with his grown son to Egypt. One photo shows a voluptuous belly dancer in a revealing bikini-like top and tight, sequined skirt positioned between him and his son.
“Not in front of my son,” Chaney joked in the comments section.
One current agent, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to discuss the investigation, said both Chaney and Stokes were respected, well-liked agents and supervisors, who were both quick to offer advice and mentor younger agents and officers.
“I was just completely shocked to hear they were involved,” the agent said.
Staff writer Ed O’Keefe and staff researchers Alice Crites and Lucy Shackelford contributed to this report.
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Secret Service Supervisor Involved In Colombia Scandal Bragged On Facebook About Checking Out Palin
Business Insider ^ | April 19, 2012 | Adam Taylor
Posted on April 19, 2012 9:22:30 PM EDT by Free ThinkerNY
The Washington Post's David Nakamuraand and Carol D. Leonnig have some fascinating new details up about the Secret Service supervisors involved in Colombia scandal.
Of particular note is the story of David Randall Chaney, a 48-year-old supervisor who was married with an adult son.
After posting photos of himself standing behind Sarah Palin during 2008's presidential election, Chaney reportedly commented, "I was really checking her out, if you know what i mean?”
(Excerpt) Read more at businessinsider.com ...
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lol @ "men" who are "offended" that a dude checked out a woman.
change the tampon already, stop acting like the world is ended. Some dude banged hookers, got caught, and now they're getting fired.
Everyone is so soft these days. I can't see Charlton Heston speaking to everyone like "to be honest, I wasn't comfortable that that kind of objectivication, I was offended by their sordid comments and I feel they owe us an apology".
No, heston would drink his whiskey shot and tell em to shut the hell up.
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Palin = winning.
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Palin = winning.
A B E
Anything but elections.
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Palin = winning.
For some definition of winning, at any rate.
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(http://l.yimg.com/bt/api/res/1.2/oV.AqISGc9V44JYn3Uxm8Q--/YXBwaWQ9eW5ld3M7Zmk9aW5zZXQ7aD0yODg7cT04NTt3PTUxMg--/http://media.zenfs.com/en_us/News/us.news.abcnews.otus/ht_daily_news_colombian_escort_thg_120419_wmain.jpg)
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3 more out in Secret Service scandal
By: Jennifer Epstein
April 20, 2012 03:31 PM EDT
At least three more Secret Service employees involved in the Colombian prostitution scandal are expected to lose their jobs Friday, as the Pentagon increased to 11 the number of military personnel it’s investigating as part of the incident.
The three additional departures, confirmed to POLITICO by a federal official, bring the total number of employees to be forced out or to have quit their jobs to at least six. There are 11 members total of the Secret Service thought to be involved in the scandal, which occurred ahead of President Barack Obama’s trip to Cartagena for the Summit of the Americas.
A Secret Service spokesman wouldn’t confirm or deny the latest departures, or whether they had been fired or quit.
(Also on POLITICO: Photographer claims NYT doing checkbook journalism in Cartagena)
The Pentagon, meanwhile, said Friday that it is investigating 11 members of the military, up from the 10 it had previously identified, The Associated Press reported. The U.S. Southern Command last Saturday had originally pegged the number of military personnel involved at five.
Six are members of the Army in the 7th Special Forces Group, which has headquarters at Eglin Air Force Base outside Valparaiso, Fla., according to the AP. Two each are from the Marines and the Navy, and one is from the Air Force. The Marines and Navy personnel are based in San Diego, and the Air Force member is based in Charleston, S.C.
The first three Secret Service employees left on Wednesday. One supervisor, who’s since been identified as David Chaney, chose to retire under pressure, while another, Greg Stokes, was notified that he will be fired, though he has a right to contest the action. The third employee is a more junior member of the agency who chose to resign.
White House press secretary Jay Carney said Friday that, despite the scandal, “the president has high regard for the agency.” Carney said the president hasn’t talked to Secret Service director Mark Sullivan, but wouldn’t rule out that they might speak soon.
Carney also responded to criticism from Republicans including former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin and Alabama Sen. Jeff Sessions, saying it was “preposterous to politicize” the issue.
© 2012 POLITICO LLC
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Pley Money
Fired Secret Service agent remains eligible for up to $2.1 million in taxpayer-funded pension payout
BY: Bill McMorris - April 20, 2012 1:19 pm
The disgraced Secret Service supervisors accused of engaging in a cocaine-fueled hooker party on the taxpayer dime will still cash in on lucrative taxpayer-funded pensions.
Three Secret Service agents tasked with protecting President Barack Obama have been terminated since it was revealed that they reportedly caroused with prostitutes and drugs in Colombia.
The Washington Post Thursday identified the two supervisors who have been forced out of the agency. Supervisor David Randall Chaney, 48, has been allowed to retire, while Greg Stokes, the assistant special agent in charge of the K-9 division, has been fired with cause. A third low-level officer has resigned his post.
Chaney will soon be cashing in on a pension worth between $47,000 and $61,000 per year, according to a Washington Free Beacon analysis.
Despite the scandal, it will be nearly impossible to prevent him from collecting on the lucrative sum, according to Michael Spekter, an attorney specializing in defending federal benefit packages.
“Even if you’re fired for misconduct, unless you are found guilty of treason, you can get your retirement benefits that you’ve earned through your years of public service,” he said. “They don’t dock your pensions.”
Spekter has represented hundreds of federal employees during his 30-year career and has never seen a worker lose his pension.
Lawyers for the two agents told the Washington Post each man has between 17 and 18 years of service with the agency.
The Secret Service refused to comment on additional personnel matters. However, several federal law enforcement sources say that agents must have at least GS-14 seniority to qualify as supervisors—standards that also apply to the Secret Service.
Federal law enforcement supervisors working out of the D.C. metro area earn between $105,211 and $136,771. The positions qualify for pensions worth 2.5 percent of average highest salary over a period of three consecutive years, multiplied by years of service.
GS-14 supervisors receive pensions worth between $47,000 and $61,000 annually.
Since Chaney is retiring, he can collect on his pension almost immediately and could collect until age 83—the most recent average lifespan estimates for federal law enforcement officers, according to the Office of Personnel Management.
Over his lifetime, he could receive between $1.65 and $2.15 million in retirement.
Stokes, the fired agent, also qualifies for his pension and will begin collecting at age 62, which would earn him up to $1.3 million over his expected lifetime.
The Washington Free Beacon estimate could be on the low end of the spectrum.
Once in retirement, the agents will continue to enjoy a Cadillac health insurance plan while paying minimal premiums. They will also enjoy annual cost of living adjustments, which increase pensions based upon the consumer price index. Retirees enjoyed a 3.6 percent pay bump in 2012.
Scandals involving government or political employees often raise questions about whether they are entitled to such generous taxpayer-funded benefits.
The debate last surfaced when former Penn State assistant football coach Jerry Sandusky was charged with more than 50 criminal counts of sexually abusing 10 boys over 15 years. Public outcry led the state pension board to review his benefits, though Sandusky will continue to collect state checks until his trial is complete.
Andrew G. Biggs, a former principal deputy commissioner of the Social Security Administration, said pension benefits are viewed as money in the bank, regardless of who is holding the money.
“At some point you have to consider whether the employee earns this money or the employer does,” said Biggs, a scholar at the conservative American Enterprise Institute. “If you get fired in the private sector, you get to keep the money that’s in your 401(k).”
Frank Keegan, a pension expert at State Budget Solutions, said the employer-employee debate is complicated in the public sector.
“It’s the taxpayer’s money, not the government’s,” he said. “If people violate the public trust, taxpayers shouldn’t have to pay the pension costs for the rest of [the employee’s] life.”
Some state and local governments have passed laws that strip public officials and employees of their pensions if they are convicted of felonies or otherwise violate the public trust.
The most notable case to date has been that of the imprisoned former Illinois governor Rod Blagojevich. State Attorney General Lisa Madigan, whom the Democratic governor considered appointing to Barack Obama’s Senate seat, stripped Blagojevich of his $65,000 pension following his corruption conviction in 2011.
Beginning in 2019, however, Blagojevich will begin cashing $13,000 checks from the federal government for his congressional pension. He will also be halfway through his 14-year prison term.
The Secret Service is reviewing the conduct of nearly a dozen agents, as well as forcing those allegedly involved to undergo polygraph tests.
Biggs said the government’s exhaustive investigation digs at the root of the problem: office culture. He said the extensive guest list at the wild party—up to 20 military and Secret Service personnel and an equal number of prostitutes—demonstrates an agency culture akin to the General Service Administration’s lavish Las Vegas trip.
“If you want recourse, you don’t go after their pensions; you make it easier to fire federal employees,” he said. “I don’t know what happened over there, but if we give everybody their due process, we are going to get people paying attention.”
Agency officials have told congressional committees in the House and Senate that more heads are likely to roll—and take their lucrative pensions with them.
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Grassley Wants To Know If White House Aides Were Connected To Prostitution Scandal
FoxNews ^ | April 20, 2012
Posted on April 21, 2012 9:21:50 PM EDT by Steelfish
Grassley Wants To Know If White House Aides Were Connected To Prostitution Scandal April 21, 2012
GOP Sen. Chuck Grassley, the ranking member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, is asking the Secret Service whether members of the White House advance team are connected to the Colombian prostitution scandal, considering their “close working relationship” with federal agents.
Grassley, R-Iowa, sent the letter Friday to agency Director Mark Sullivan and acting Inspector General Charles Edwards. He also asked in the letter if the Secret Service is looking at whether the White House communications office also could be involved.
The scandal involving at least one Secret Service agent allegedly bringing a prostitute to his hotel room in Cartagena, Columbia, was made public April 13.
Grassley is concerned about whether White House officials were in the same hotel and if the prostitutes could have had access to their rooms.
The agents were there in advance of President Obama participating in an international trade summit. Twelve Secret Service agents have been implicated in the incident. Six have been ousted, including one who was allowed to retire. The rest are on paid administrative leave while the incident is being investigated and have had their security clearance suspended.
In addition, the Pentagon says the incident also involved 11 military members -- six Army, two Navy explosive ordinance disposal technicians, two Marine dog handlers and an Air Force airman.
White House spokesman Jay Carney said Friday the administration has no reason to think staffers were involved and implied he would not be looking into the matter.
(Excerpt) Read more at foxnews.com ...
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http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2012/apr/21/grassley-were-white-house-staff-involved-prostitut
Nice - moving up the chain. WH staff now involved?
I'll bet they were scouting male prostitutes for Obama.
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Representative Peter King: More Secret Service Agents Likely To Leave Agency Over Sex Scandal
Posted:
04/21/2012 3:09 pm Updated: 04/22/2012 1:13 am
WASHINGTON, April 21 (Reuters) - Most of the U.S. Secret Service agents accused of misconduct with prostitutes ahead of President Barack Obama's recent visit to Colombia are likely to leave the agency, a top U.S. Republican lawmaker said on Saturday.
Six of 11 employees linked to a night of partying in the coastal city of Cartagena on April 11-12 have left the agency over the scandal, which embarrassed the United States and overshadowed Obama's participation in the Summit of Americas meeting.
"I would think you'll see most of the 11 either resign, retire or will be forced to leave," Representative Peter King, chairman of the House of Representatives Homeland Security Committee, said in an interview on Fox News.
"I doubt, no matter what happens, you're going to see any of these 11 ever involved in any kind of detail like this again. They basically have to stay out of the public eye, if they stay on the job," King said.
The Secret Service, which is tasked with protecting the president, senior administration officials and other prominent figures, said on Friday that a 12th employee had been implicated in the probe and another had been cleared of "serious misconduct" in Cartagena but would face administrative action.
King, whose committee is also probing the Cartagena incident, said the 12th employee was involved in a separate incident that happened "five or six days before the president arrived."
The New York Republican said he had four investigators on the case and had spoken several times this week with Secret Service Director Mark Sullivan about the agency's own investigation.
"We want a full record (of the probe), so at the end we can decide if the Secret Service acted appropriately once they found out about it," King said. Two of the original 11 Secret Service employees involved in the scandal were supervisors, he added.
"They should have been in control of everything. Instead, they were accessories. They were part of it," King said.
"Among those eleven, besides what they did, they also are in trouble, if you will, for what they didn't do. And what they didn't do is report it," King said. (Reporting By Doug Palmer; Editing by Paul Simao)
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White House Communications Agency Under Investigation in Colombia Prostitution Scandal
NextGov ^ | Monday, April 23, 2012 | Bob Brewin
The investigation into the Colombia prostitution scandal has broadened to include the White House Communications Agency, Nextgov has learned.
Laura Williams, a spokeswoman for the Defense Information Systems Agency, which manages the White House office that provides the president with secure communications, confirmed that one individual from WHCA is under investigation, but could not provide any more details at this time.
(Excerpt) Read more at nextgov.com ...
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Panetta: Marines punished for prostitute attack
By LOLITA C. BALDOR, Associated Press – 2 hours ago
BRASILIA, Brazil (AP) — Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said Tuesday three Marines on a U.S. Embassy security team and one embassy staff member were punished for allegedly pushing a prostitute out of a car in Brasilia late last year after a dispute over payment.
The incident is similar, but unrelated, to the scandal involving Secret Service agents at the Summit of Americas in Cartagena, Colombia, before President Barack Obama arrived for a visit.
Panetta, speaking to reporters in Brasilia, says the Marines were pulled out of the country. Two had their ranks reduced. The embassy staffer was removed from his post.
Panetta said he had "no tolerance for that kind of conduct."
"Where it takes place you can be sure that we will act to make sure that they are punished and that that kind of behavior is not acceptable," he said.
According to a defense official, "there were at least two women with the Marines outside a nightclub." The official said it appears that one of the women started a fight in a vehicle, then she was removed from the car and when she tried to re-enter fell to the ground and was injured. The official also said that no charges were filed by Brazilian authorities.
According to another defense official, the embassy staff member was a supervisor. The second official said the woman broke her collarbone when she was pushed from the car in late December.
The official says the embassy tracked the woman down and paid for her medical expenses. But in the wake of the Cartagena scandal, she has hired an attorney and is suing the embassy. Both officials spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss an ongoing investigation.
Panetta is touring South America to meet with his counterparts in the region.
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Confidants: Secret Service agents contend misbehavior on trips not unprecedented
The Washington Post ^ | April 24, 2012 | Carol D. Leonnig and David Nakamura
Posted on April 24, 2012 10:40:54 PM EDT by Free ThinkerNY
Some Secret Service employees accused of misconduct in the Colombian prostitution scandal are privately contending that their conduct didn’t warrant dismissal because senior managers tolerated similar behavior during official trips, according to people familiar with the employees’ thinking.
Several of the men who agreed to resign under pressure last week are also considering reversing their decisions and fighting to keep their jobs, according to the people knowledgeable about the case.
The prospect of Secret Service agents sharing embarrassing tales about rank-and-file employees and superiors partying to the hilt could bring more anguish to an agency reeling from scandal.
Those close to the accused employees said that in an effort to fight for their jobs they could opt to divulge details of how colleagues spent some of their downtime on presidential trips — drinking heavily, visiting strip clubs and cavorting with women for hire.
“Of course it has happened before” said one agent not implicated in the matter, remarking on the Secret Service’s history of occasionally licentious partying. “This is not the first time. It really only blew up in this case because the [U.S. Embassy] was alerted.”
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...
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Secret Service Agents: We Were Too Drunk To Have Sex
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by Ben Shapiro 2 hours ago 22post a comment
www.breitbart.com
Last night, President Obama appeared on Jimmy Fallon’s unwatchable late-night show – a show most notable for Fallon’s almost-incredible inability to keep a straight face while telling the world’s least funny jokes – to discuss the Secret Service prostitution scandal. “The Secret Service, these guys are incredible,” Obama said. “They protect me, they protect our girls. A couple of knuckleheads shouldn’t detract from what they do. What they were thinking, I don’t know. That’s why they’re not there anymore.”
But the Secret Service agents in question don’t need Obama’s help n their defense. They’ve got a new one all lined up: they didn’t have sex with the prostitutes because they were too drunk to do so. As the Washington Post reports, “The people familiar with the accused employees said some of them have said there was no sexual activity because the men were so drunk that they fell asleep immediately after bringing the women to their rooms.” This may be the first time in recorded history that the “too drunk to have sex” defense has actually been leveraged.
The Post story also quotes multiple unnamed agents who defended their colleagues, explaining that having sex with prostitutes should have no impact on their ability to do their job; some sources also harkened back to 2009, when Secret Service agents assigned to President Clinton partied it up with strippers. “Some guys could have a good time Wednesday night, and Friday morning they would be on their post, shaved and ready to go,” said one agent.
The White House, of course, has largely covered up the scandal; instead of appointing an independent investigator, they’ve assigned their own person, who then exonerated the White House. They say sunlight is the best disinfectant. Now would be a good time to apply it, if only to avoid a syphilis outbreak.
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Clintigula set the playbook for debauchary
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Secret Service Agents: We Were Too Drunk To Have Sex
that is the most awesome line in human history.
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The White House, of course, has largely covered up the scandal; instead of appointing an independent investigator, they’ve assigned their own person, who then exonerated the White House.
ever heard of the 911 commission?
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EXCLUSIVE: New Secret Service Scandal Centers on Strippers, Prostitutes in El Salvador
kirotv.com ^ | Apriol 25, 2012 | Staff
Seattle-based Investigative Reporter Chris Halsne (KIROTV- CBS- COX MEDIA GROUP) just returned from El Salvador, where he interviewed a U.S. government subcontractor who worked extensively with the Secret Service advance team (snipers, K-9 and explosives sweeps) in San Salvador prior to President Obama’s trip there in March of 2011.
The eyewitness says he joined about a dozen Secret Service agents and a few U.S. military specialists at a strip club in San Salvador a few days before President Obama and his family arrived in El Salvador to meet with its new president, Mauricio Funes.
This source witnessed the majority of the men drink heavily ("wasted," "heavily intoxicated") at the strip club. He says most of the Secret Service "advance-team" members also paid extra for access to the VIP section of the club where they were provided a number of sexual favors in return for their cash. Although our source says he told the agents it was a "really bad idea" to take the strippers back to their hotel rooms, several agents bragged that they "did this all the time" and "not to worry about it." Our source says at least two agents had escorts check into their rooms. It is unclear whether the escorts who returned to the hotels were some of the strippers from the same club.
These alleged incidents in El Salvador occurred a full year prior to recent revelations that secret service agents used prostitutes in Cartagena, Colombia, on a presidential trip this month.
To further confirm information provided about behaviors in El Salvador that reportedly occurred in March of 2011, Halsne interviewed the owner of the San Salvador strip club in which the subcontractor said they visited. The strip club’s owner confirmed a large number of U.S. secret service agents (and some military escorts) “descended on his club” that week prior to President Obama’s visit. He claims agents were there at least three nights in a row. "No surprise to me.
The owner told Halsne his club routinely takes care of high-ranking employees of the U.S. embassy in San Salvador as well as visiting FBI and DEA agents. The owner says his reputation for "security" and "privacy" makes him a popular strip club owner with "those who want to be discreet." He told Halsne during a lengthy interview, he doesn’t allow prostitution inside the club and that all his "girls" are at least 18-years-old. He says the girls can do what they want after work, but he discourages them from making contact with customers at other locations.
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Colombia's top diplomat demands apology from President Obama for Secret Service hooker scandal
“It is necessary, and I want to hear it from the White House,' says Gabriel Silva
Comments (24)
By Joseph Straw, Alison Gendar AND Larry Mcshane / NEW YORK DAILY NEWS
Published: Friday, April 27, 2012, 3:00 AM
LUIS ROBAYO/AFP/Getty Images
Colombian ambassador Gabriel Silva wants apology from President Obama on Secret Service Cartagena hooker scandal.
Dania Suarez, hooker who claims agent tried to stiff her out of fee.
He puts the ass in ambassador.
Colombia’s angry top diplomat to America wants President Obama to publicly declare that he’s really, really, really sorry for the carnal carnage inflicted on the fine citizens of Cartagena by the Secret Service.
“The U.S. should apologize further,” Gabriel Silva told the Colombian newspaper El Tiempo about the sordid sex scandal that involved a dozen agents and another dozen military personnel.
“It is necessary, and I want to hear it from the White House,” Silva said in his tough talk to a scribe back home.
“A more clear expression of remorse is required to protect the reputation of Cartagena” — though Silva made no mention that scantily clad hookers legally roam the streets of his fair city.
RELATED: FIRST PHOTOS OF COLOMBIA ESCORT IN SECRET SERVICE HOOKER SCANDAL
Silva is apparently seeking asylum — from reality.
Heck, Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos had no beef with Obama when they stood shoulder-to-shoulder at a joint news conference during a summit in Cartagena — the first time the President addressed the unfolding scandal.
“If it turns out that some of the allegations that have been made in the press are confirmed, then, of course, I’ll be angry because my attitude with respect to the Secret Service personnel is no different than what I expect out of my delegation that’s sitting here,” Obama said April 15, two days after the brouhaha came to light.
“We’re representing the people of the United States, and when we travel to another country, I expect us to observe the highest standards because we’re not just representing ourselves.”
Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano condemned the “inexcusable” actions of the rogue agents and noted a thorough investigation is ongoing. Punishment has been swift. Two agents were flat-out fired and six were forced to resign. Another was pushed into retirement and three were cleared of misconduct — they still face internal discipline.
Obama has since deemed the dirty dozen a band of “knuckleheads.”
Even the deputy director of the Secret Service sat down with Silva to apologize to Colombia and Cartagena.
Silva is most upset about the portrayal of Cartagena. He’s particularly irate over the “superficial, sensationalist” U.S. media coverage that detailed the city’s thriving sex tourism industry. “Unfair,” he declared.
The ambassador’s demand came as the Secret Service acknowledged its investigation into a report that boozed-up agents partied with prostitutes at an El Salvador strip club before President Obama’s 2011 visit.
Drunken agents — who, according to hooker Dania Suarez, tried to stiff her on the service fee — bragged during their three-night spree that partying hard and cavorting with hookers was business as usual, according to a stunning report by Seattle’s KIRO-TV.
The Secret Service, in a memo sent to Capitol Hill, said it was taking the “allegations of misconduct seriously, and will thoroughly look into this matter,” the Daily News learned Thursday.The memo added that the agency has heard no reports of anything similar to the debauchery discovered before Obama’s visit this month to Colombia.
The agency has conducted 919 foreign advance trips in the last two years.
“As part of the Secret Service’s extensive investigation, it is examining this allegation,” said Rep. Peter King (R-L.I.), head of the House Committee on Homeland Security.
“This certainly does not mean that there is any validity to it — just that they are looking into all allegations.”
agendar@nydailynews.com
Read more: http://www.nydailynews.com/news/politics/colombia-top-diplomat-demands-apology-president-obama-secret-service-hooker-scandal-article-1.1068465#ixzz1tF8JabFr
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Secret Service problems much bigger than prostitutes
By Ronald Kessler, Published: May 1
So far, the biggest scandal in the history of the Secret Service involves agents hiring prostitutes in Colombia . But the media have largely ignored a much bigger scandal at the agency: a lax management culture that condones cutting corners, directly endangering the life of the president.
A prime example, revealed in my book on life inside the agency, is that when pressured, Secret Service managers tell agents to let people into events without requiring that they pass through magnetometers or metal detectors. When an event is about to start and people are still waiting to enter, annoyed campaign staffers and both Bush and Obama White House staffers have routinely told the Secret Service to stop screening people and let them in. Backed by senior Secret Service management, agents comply.
It gets worse. When Vice President Biden threw out the first pitch April 6, 2009, at the Baltimore Orioles’ season opener, the Secret Service had not screened with magnetometers any of the more than 40,000 fans at Camden Yards. Biden’s attendance was announced beforehand, yet the vice president was not wearing a bulletproof vest under his navy polo shirt as he stood on the pitcher’s mound.
“A gunman or gunmen, from anywhere in the stands, could have gotten off multiple rounds before we could have gotten in the line of fire,” a current agent, outraged that the Secret Service would be so reckless, told me.
The Secret Service suspends screening at one in five major presidential and vice presidential events, according to another current agent. Think about that: A terrorist could bring in a grenade and take out President Obama or Biden.
Other examples of corner-cutting include management not insisting that agents pass firearms requalification and physical fitness tests. The agency covers that up by routinely asking agents to fill out their own test scores.
One agent on the president’s detail regularly fails handgun tests but has not been removed, agents with firsthand knowledge have told me. Another agent on the detail is so out of shape that she cannot open the heavy doors to exit the president’s limousine, I’m told.
Instead of removing her from the president’s detail and requiring her to pass the fitness tests that all agents are supposed to take every three months, Secret Service management has told drivers to try to park so it would be easier for her to swing open the vehicle door.
Equally shocking, the Secret Service is not equipped with the most powerful firearms, such as the Colt M4 carbine used by the FBI and even Amtrak police.
The lax management culture filters down to agents at every level. When Dick Cheney’s daughter Mary was under protection, she insisted that her agents take her friends to restaurants. They rightly refused. But she threw a fit and got her detail leader removed over the incident. Asked for comment for my book, she told me: “These stories are simply not true, and I have nothing but the utmost respect for the men and women of the Secret Service.”
Management’s decision to undercut its agent, which I confirmed with several sources, sends a message to Secret Service Uniformed Division officers at the White House gates: If they turn away fashionably dressed people such as Tareq and Michaele Salahi or Carlos Allen because they are not on the guest list for a state dinner, and it turns out they should have been on the list, the officers could be in trouble because their own managers may not back them.
Similarly, the lax management culture tells agents that it’s fine to hire prostitutes when traveling abroad, even though that puts them at risk of blackmail by a terrorist or foreign intelligence service.
Since I broke the Colombia story in The Post, many have asked me if it surprised me. It doesn’t. While Secret Service agents overall are dedicated and will take a bullet for the president, they have been let down by their management.
Despite the scandals and the dozens of examples of corner cutting, President Obama has repeatedly expressed confidence in the agency under Director Mark Sullivan. That is as reckless as President John F. Kennedy’s refusal to let agents ride on the rear running board of his limousine in Dallas. If agents had been there, they would have jumped on Kennedy after the first shot — which was not fatal — and saved his life.
When Obama took office, threats against the president were up 400 percent from when George W. Bush was in office. They have since returned to about 3,000 a year, roughly the number as when Bush was president.
The Secret Service has been derelict in its duty to the American people and its own brave agents. It should not take another tragedy to bring about reform.
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Keeping busy?
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Secret Service Escort Says US Agents 'Showed No Respect'
Dania Suarez alleged prostitute from the Secret Service scandal.
By CHRISTINE ROMO and BRIAN ROSS (@brianross)
May 4, 2012
One of the Colombian escorts at the center of the Secret Service scandal emerged from hiding today, recounting in detail her night in Cartagena with a member of President Obama's protective detail and saying she fears for her safety.
Dania Suarez, a 24-year old dark-haired beauty, appeared on a call-in show carried by Colombia's W Radio and Carocol Television Friday morning, telling callers the agent was "heavily intoxicated" and everything in his luggage and his papers was left open in his room and could have been easily stolen.
Asked if she had been a spy could she have removed the papers, Suarez said, "Absolutely, absolutely."
"Clearly, in those moments, if I had wanted to, obviously, I could have done so," she said.
Suarez says she met the agent at a disco where they danced and she began to rub her hands over his body.
"He had a weird way of dancing in the disco," she said of the agent, identified in published accounts elsewhere as Arthur Huntington, who has left the Secret Service under circumstances that are unclear.
She said that Huntington did not appear to be searching for a prostitute but that "I found him on my own."
Suarez said Huntington fell asleep when they returned to his room and refused to answer the question of whether they actually had sex.
"If I answer this you will know what happened," she said.
Secret Service Fights to Restore Reputation Watch Video
Secret Service Scandal: Three Agents Out Watch Video
1st Grader Suspended for 'Sexy' Song Watch Video
Suarez said the agent "did not feel he got what he was being asked to pay for" and that this led to dispute over how much he owed her at the end of the evening.
She said she does not consider herself a prostitute, but an escort because prostitutes "are lower class and live in brothels."
She confirmed other accounts that the agent offered her $30, which led to a confrontation at the agent's door which drew the attention of the hotel manager and local police.
She said the U.S. agents pleaded, "Please, please no police, no police."
"Between all of them, they collected the money ... and that's what happened in the hall," she said. "They were part of Obama's security group and I told them I was going to call the police so they can pay me the money."
Suarez said she left Colombia for a few days because of concerns her life could be in danger and has had no contact with any American official.
"Maybe they are just as dumb as the Secret Service agents," she told the station.
Throughout her appearance this morning, dressed in a skimpy green blouse, Suarez laughed and smiled even as the host reminded her of the seriousness of the scandal.
"This is who I am and all I really care about is my mother and my young son," Suarez said.
She also said that she was with a friend when she first met Huntington in the disco, and that another agent who was with Huntington "fell in love" with her friend, though they did not have sex. "Their love story ended in the bar," she said.
According to Suarez, her friend would like to get back in touch with the other agent.
"My friend would say to me, 'I love that guy, how do I get in contact with him?'"
Click Here for the Blotter Homepage.
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LOL @ any american giving a shit about what a south american hooker has to say about americans who put their life on the line to protect our president, regardless of party.
Giving this admitted prostitute a platform is insane.
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LOL @ any american giving a shit about what a south american hooker has to say about americans who put their life on the line to protect our president, regardless of party.
I think that the nature of the statements she makes about gaining access to documents, compel us to look at those allegations seriously, especially since we know that some parts of her story (i.e. being allowed access to the room and the agent having consumed alcohol) are true. It's just the sheer unprofessionalism of it all. You are part of the advance team of a security detail, and you go get drunk, and bring an unknown, unvetted person to a location where, after you pass out, she may have unfettered access to identifications, weapons, documentation, communications equipment and so on?
As I said before, I am stunned at the behavior of the Agents. I don't care that some guy wanted to get his rocks off and that he hired a cumbucket so he didn't have to clean up after himself, although to be frank I don't expect this sort of behavior from members of the Secret Service, especially when on assignment. This is the sort of thing I expect from the "security" people that protect rappers.
I respect the guys who will dive to take a bullet to protect the President - and it really takes a special kind of person to do this sort of thing. But that respect doesn't mean that we should discount credible allegations about a serious breach of security. Indeed, because the Secret Service holds itself up to such a high standard, every allegation should be taken very seriously - by them, by our elected officials and, ultimately, by us.
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those guys' careers are over, and the spotlight will be on them forever now. We're not ggonna see any more funny business in the future.
333386 taking a victory lap with foreign whores going on and on... just sad.
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Secret Service Escort Says US Agents 'Showed No Respect'
Dania Suarez alleged prostitute from the Secret Service scandal.
By CHRISTINE ROMO and BRIAN ROSS (@brianross)
May 4, 2012
One of the Colombian escorts at the center of the Secret Service scandal emerged from hiding today, recounting in detail her night in Cartagena with a member of President Obama's protective detail and saying she fears for her safety.
Dania Suarez, a 24-year old dark-haired beauty, appeared on a call-in show carried by Colombia's W Radio and Carocol Television Friday morning, telling callers the agent was "heavily intoxicated" and everything in his luggage and his papers was left open in his room and could have been easily stolen.
Asked if she had been a spy could she have removed the papers, Suarez said, "Absolutely, absolutely."
"Clearly, in those moments, if I had wanted to, obviously, I could have done so," she said.
Suarez says she met the agent at a disco where they danced and she began to rub her hands over his body.
"He had a weird way of dancing in the disco," she said of the agent, identified in published accounts elsewhere as Arthur Huntington, who has left the Secret Service under circumstances that are unclear.
She said that Huntington did not appear to be searching for a prostitute but that "I found him on my own."
Suarez said Huntington fell asleep when they returned to his room and refused to answer the question of whether they actually had sex.
"If I answer this you will know what happened," she said.
Secret Service Fights to Restore Reputation Watch Video
Secret Service Scandal: Three Agents Out Watch Video
1st Grader Suspended for 'Sexy' Song Watch Video
Suarez said the agent "did not feel he got what he was being asked to pay for" and that this led to dispute over how much he owed her at the end of the evening.
She said she does not consider herself a prostitute, but an escort because prostitutes "are lower class and live in brothels."
She confirmed other accounts that the agent offered her $30, which led to a confrontation at the agent's door which drew the attention of the hotel manager and local police.
She said the U.S. agents pleaded, "Please, please no police, no police."
"Between all of them, they collected the money ... and that's what happened in the hall," she said. "They were part of Obama's security group and I told them I was going to call the police so they can pay me the money."
Suarez said she left Colombia for a few days because of concerns her life could be in danger and has had no contact with any American official.
"Maybe they are just as dumb as the Secret Service agents," she told the station.
Throughout her appearance this morning, dressed in a skimpy green blouse, Suarez laughed and smiled even as the host reminded her of the seriousness of the scandal.
"This is who I am and all I really care about is my mother and my young son," Suarez said.
She also said that she was with a friend when she first met Huntington in the disco, and that another agent who was with Huntington "fell in love" with her friend, though they did not have sex. "Their love story ended in the bar," she said.
According to Suarez, her friend would like to get back in touch with the other agent.
"My friend would say to me, 'I love that guy, how do I get in contact with him?'"
Click Here for the Blotter Homepage.
Pretty disturbing. :-\
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Secret Service Scandal: Colombia Woman Says She Fled Country
By FRANK BAJAK and VIVIAN SEQUERA 05/04/12 04:42 PM ET
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Colombia, Video, Colombia Secret Service Scandal, Secret Service, Dania, Dania Secret Service Scandal, Secret Service Prostitution Scandal, Secret Service Scandal, Secret Service Sex Scandal, World News
BOGOTA, Colombia — A woman who says she was the prostitute who triggered the U.S. Secret Service scandal in Colombia said Friday that the agents involved were "idiots" for letting it happen, and declared that if she were a spy and sensitive information was available, she could have easily obtained it.
The woman said she spent five hours in a Cartagena, Colombia, hotel room with an agent, and while she barely got cab fare out of him, she could have gotten information that would have compromised the security of U.S. President Barack Obama if the agent had any. "Totally," she replied when asked.
"The man slept all night," said the woman, who was identified by her lawyer as Dania Londono Suarez. "If I had wanted to, I could have gone through all his documents, his wallet, his suitcase."
She said in the 90-minute interview with Colombia's W Radio conducted in Spain that no U.S. investigator had been in touch with her, although reporters descended on her home a week after the incident when a taxi driver led them to it.
"They could track me anywhere in the world that I go but they haven't done so," she said, speaking in Spanish. "If the Secret Service agents were idiots, imagine the investigators."
That alarmed a U.S. congressman who is monitoring the case.
Rep. Peter King, chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee, issued a statement on Friday expressing concern that investigators "have been unable to locate and interview two of the female foreign nationals involved," including Londono. "I have asked the Secret Service for an explanation of how they have failed to find this woman when the news media seems to have no trouble doing so."
Eight Secret Service agents have lost their jobs in the scandal, although there is no evidence any of the 10 women interviewed by U.S. investigators for their roles in it have any connection to terrorist groups, King said earlier this week.
In the interview, Londono called the Secret Service agents caught up in the scandal "fools for being from Obama's security and letting all this happen."
"When I said, `I'm going to call the police so they pay me my money,' and it didn't bother them, didn't they see the magnitude of the problem?" she said.
Londono said the man she slept with never identified himself as a member of Obama's advance security detail for the April 14-15 Summit of the Americas and said she saw nothing in his room that would have indicated the man's job other than a brown uniform.
Londono said the man had agreed to pay her $800, but that she never would have made a public fuss about his failure to pay had she known he was part of Obama's security detail and realized the repercussions it would have for her.
"My life is practically destroyed," she said. "My name is in the gutter."
Her photo has been splashed all over the Internet since a newspaper took it off Facebook a week after the incident, when she said she fled Colombia fearing for her life.
"I was afraid they might retaliate," she said, saying she feared for herself and her family after looking up Secret Service on the Internet and seeing that some agents were sharpshooters.
The mother of a 9-year-old boy she said she had when she was 17, Londono said she would happily sell her story now and pose nude.
She said she had contracted one of Colombia's top lawyers, Abelardo De la Espriella. He confirmed her identity for The Associated Press and said she called him for the first time earlier Friday, recommended by the radio host who interviewed Londono.
He said he didn't see that there was any criminal infraction in the incident. Prostitution is legal in Colombia.
"Let's see how we can help her," De la Espriella said of Londono.
Londono appeared in the interview, part of which was also broadcast by Colombia's Caracol TV, with just a little makeup, her fingernails painted white and wearing a tight green dress.
W Radio asked that the location of the interview not be disclosed for Londono's security, and she later gave an interview to the Spanish radio network Cadena Ser, which said it was recorded in one of its studios.
Londono giggled nervously and refused to answer prying questions from reporters from several international news media during the W Radio interview on topics such as the nature of her sex act with the Secret Service agent.
She said that the desk clerk at the Hotel Caribe called at 6:30 a.m. to tell her it was time to leave, and the agent addressed her with an insult in telling her to get out.
Dania said it was nearly three hours after the man kicked her out of the room and she alerted a Colombian policeman stationed on the hallway before three colleagues of the agent, who had refused to open his door after giving her $30, scraped together $250 and paid her, she said.
"'The only thing they said was `Please, please. No police, no police,'" she said.
Later that day, April 12, the agent and 11 other Secret Service colleagues who may have also had prostitutes in their rooms at the five-star hotel were sent home, under investigation for alleged misconduct.
Londono's story agrees with what investigators in Washington have disclosed.
She said she met the man, one of 10-11 agents in a Cartagena bar, and accompanied him back to the hotel, stopping on the way to buy condoms.
She said the other agents at the bar were all drunk.
"They bought alcohol like they were buying water," she said, though she never saw any evidence that any of them used illegal drugs.
She said the man she was with was only moderately intoxicated. She said she did not know his name.
Londono said that she went to Dubai after the scandal broke and spent time with someone she had previously met in Cartagena. She would not say whether that person had been a client.
She said she was charging between $600 and $800 for sex while working in Cartagena and only accepted foreigners as clients, considering herself an "escort."
Asked why she became a prostitute, Londono said "it's an easy life" that would allow her to study and provide for her son.
At one point in the interview, her mother was brought in by phone, and described the shame she felt.
Londono said her mother did not know until the scandal broke that she was a prostitute and had been medicated for depression.
She said her son was unaware of his mother's celebrity, and said she considers herself finished with prostitution.
"This has cured me of it all," Londono said. "Even if I'm not hired for the magazine covers, I will never do it again."
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Associated Press writer Frank Bajak contributed from Lima, Peru.
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Colombia Secret Service Prostitution Scandal Spreads to the DEA
By PIERRE THOMAS and JASON RYAN
WASHINGTON, May 21, 2012—
go.com
Agents Allegedly Brought Masseuses to Their Apartment
A month after the Secret Service was rocked by allegations that agents brought prostitutes to a Colombia hotel where they were preparing for a visit by President Obama, the Drug Enforcement Administration today announced that at least three of its agents are also under investigation for allegedly hiring prostitutes in Cartagena.
Two of the agents allegedly had encounters with masseuses in the apartment of one of the agents, according to Sen. Susan Collins, the ranking member of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee.
"It's disturbing that we may be uncovering a troubling culture that spans more than one law enforcement agency," the Maine Republican said this evening. "In addition to the Secret Service scandal, we now learn that at least two DEA agents apparently entertained female foreign national masseuses in the Cartagena apartment of one of the agents. The evidence uncovered thus far indicates that this likely was not just a one-time incident."
The revelations that Secret Service personnel had been drinking heavily and cavorting with prostitutes ahead of Obama's trip to Colombia last month overshadowed the president's trip to the Summit of the Americas. Twelve members of the military were also investgated for allegedly hiring prostitutes.
Eight of the 12 Secret Service employees implicated in the scandal lost their jobs, another is in the process of losing his security clearances, and three agents were cleared of serious misconduct but still could be disciplined. The military has completed its investigation but no disciplinary action has been carried out.
"The Drug Enforcement Administration was provided information from the Secret Service unrelated to the Cartagena hotel Secret Service incident, which DEA immediately followed up on, making DEA employees available to be interviewed by the Department of Justice's Office of Inspector General," a DEA spokesperson said in a statement.
"DEA takes allegations of misconduct very seriously and will take appropriate personnel action, if warranted, upon the conclusion of the OIG investigation." the statement said.
A spokesman for the OIG said the DEA is cooperating in the investigation, which is being coordinated with the Secret Service, Department of Homeland Security Office of Inspector General, and the State Department's Diplomatic Security Service.
The DEA has agents posted in Colombia to work on counter-narcotic and drug interdiction missions with Colombian authorities. According to officials the agents were among those assigned in Colombia, they were not specifically working on the President's trip.
The revelations about the DEA agents comes ahead of a hearing scheduled on Wednesday with Secret Service Director Mark Sullivan testifying before the Senate Homeland Security and Government Affairs Committee.
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Secret Service sex scandal: Several say they didn’t break the rules
By Carol D. Leonnig and David Nakamura, Tuesday, May 22, 8:29 PM
Four Secret Service employees have decided to fight their dismissals for engaging in inappropriate conduct in Colombia last month, a development that could unravel what has been a swift and tidy resolution to an embarrassing scandal over agents’ hiring of prostitutes.
The agents are arguing that the agency is making them scapegoats for behavior that the Secret Service has long tolerated, a charge that Director Mark Sullivan may have to address when he appears before a Senate committee Wednesday. He has not spoken in public about the controversy, but according to his prepared testimony, he plans to tell Congress that there was no breach of operational security.
Several of the implicated agents have told associates that the facts of what happened in Cartagena differ from initial media accounts describing a group outing of a dozen men in search of prostitutes. Instead, the men went to different bars and clubs and met women under a variety of circumstances, in some cases resulting in voluntary trysts that did not involve money.
One 29-year-old field agent assigned to the Washington office, who is single and who resigned under the threat of being fired, told investigators in a polygraph examination that he did not think at the time that the two women he brought back to his hotel room were prostitutes. He is among those seeking to overturn their dismissals, according to three people familiar with his case.
The scandal has badly damaged the Secret Service’s reputation, and the fallout has spread to other federal agencies. A dozen members of the military also are accused of hiring prostitutes on the trip, and the Drug Enforcement Administration is looking into allegations, made by a Secret Service agent during the investigation, that DEA members had previously brought prostitutes to their apartments in Cartagena.
According to interviews with multiple former and current employees and people briefed on the inquiry, the Secret Service agents involved brought women to their hotel rooms without hesi ta tion. The agency says it was clear that employees should not do anything unbecoming of a Secret Service employee. Current and former agency employees say sexual encounters during official travel had been condoned under an unwritten code that allows what happens on the road to stay there.
They also contend that this tolerance is part of the “Secret Circus” — a mocking nickname that some employees use to describe what ensues when large numbers of agents and officers arrive in a city.
Shortly after landing in Cartagena at 11 a.m. on Wednesday, April 11, the 55 or so Secret Service members had down time to explore the Caribbean resort. They were there to provide extra security for Obama’s visit for an international summit but had two days before the commander in chief arrived. In Cartagena, prostitution is legal in designated “tolerance zones.”
Secret Service supervisor David Chaney, 48, had spent two decades with the agency and was among the most senior on the plane. He headed out that night to a strip club called the Pley Club, with junior agents in tow, according to two people with knowledge of the events.
Colleagues describe Chaney as gregarious — quick with a joke and to rally for colleagues facing a crisis — and too eager to befriend his subordinates. Efforts to reach Chaney were unsuccessful. Larry Berger, Chaney’s attorney, declined to discuss the details of the case, but said his client put the mission first and never compromised the president’s security.
Chaney has been married for 20 years, but that night he and his colleagues paid the Pley Club a small fee to take at least two of the performers back to the Hotel Caribe, where they and other members of Obama’s advance team were staying, according to the two people familiar with what happened that night.
Separately, a pair of married Secret Service agents who worked together on the agency’s tight-knit, elite counter assault team — Arthur Huntington and Joe Bongino — headed to the historic old city of Cartagena. They hit the Hard Rock Cafe, which had been recommended in the briefing guide prepared by the State Department, but it was dead. They moved down the street to Tu Candela, a popular bar and disco.
Although the service warns agents in training seminars that extramarital affairs could expose them to blackmail, some married agents are widely known to cheat on their wives. Associates said Huntington, 41, was one who acted differently on many of his trips than he did at home.
Efforts to reach Bongino and Huntington, who has since moved with his wife and two young sons out of their Severna Park home, were unsuccessful.
Huntington’s family has been active in Granite Baptist Church in Glen Burnie.
In Cartagena, while at Tu Candela that Wednesday night, Huntington asked Dania Suarez, a 24-year-old prostitute, to spend the night with him. She agreed in exchange for a “gift” of $800, she later told a television interviewer. Her girlfriend agreed to join Bongino for no charge, Suarez said. People briefed on the investigation corroborated this version of events.
A total of 12 agents were implicated in the activities of that night, after registering the women at the Hotel Caribe’s front desk in keeping with the hotel’s policy for non-paying overnight guests, according to multiple people briefed on the investigation.
Three of those implicated, including Bongino, were cleared of serious misconduct charges. In addition to the four who are challenging their dismissals, at least four others were forced out: Chaney, who immediately took early retirement; Huntington, who was pushed to resign; and two others, who were also dismissed. The fate of one agent is unknown.
One of those cleared is a single agent who speaks Spanish, and who picked up a local woman at the same bar and took her back to his hotel independent of his colleagues, according to two people briefed on the incident. He — along with Bongino and another colleague — kept their jobs after proving that they did not pay for sex. But both the Spanish-speaking agent and Bongino have been shifted off the elite counter assault team, those briefed on the incident said.
One of those who resigned under pressure but now wants to reverse that move is the single 29-year-old from the Washington field office, who was out with a divorced co-worker from the same office that night. They asked their server at dinner to recommend a non-touristy place for drinks, according to three individuals briefed on the inquiry.
They were directed to a bar with an Egyptian theme, a deejay and a dance floor. Both men later took women from the bar back to their hotel. The divorced colleague has been cleared in the incident, insisting that he told his guest to leave when she asked for money, although he faces minor administrative action.
The 29-year-old agent has told investigators a similar story: that he took two women to his room without realizing they were prostitutes. He maintained, under a polygraph exam, that he told the women to leave when they asked for money for sex, according to associates familiar with his account. He has withdrawn his resignation.
The Washington Post is not naming three of the agents who are fighting their ousters because their cases have not been resolved. Agency supervisor Greg Stokes, another employee recommended for termination and now pushing back against his punishment, has been named in previous reports.
One of those contesting his treatment was not originally under suspicion. That agent took a woman to a different hotel on another night and later came forward voluntarily to inform his bosses that he, too, had a sexual encounter.
The ramifications for that agent have been severe: His pregnant wife threatened to move out, his colleagues said. Like his peers, he was pressured to resign. He hired an attorney to determine whether he can fight for his job.
The morning after the carousing, the party ended for all when Huntington refused to pay Suarez and, she said, pushed her out of his room into the seventh-floor hallway, setting off the dispute that would lead to the exposure of the misconduct.
What none of the agents realized was the extent to which the Secret Service already had irritated the hotel manager, even before the hallway disturbance. The manager, according to people familiar with the investigation, was infuriated by the noise the agents made at the hotel bar and the inconvenience they caused other guests.
Outside the Hotel Caribe, Secret Service officers had repeatedly allowed their bomb-sniffing Belgian Malinois shepherds to defecate on the lone grassy patch along the hotel’s beachfront property — directly in front of the hotel manager’s apartment. The manager did not respond to e-mails and phone messages seeking comment.
After Colombian police alerted the U.S. Embassy, a Secret Service official dispatched to the hotel to investigate found the manager waiting with a clipboard full of complaints and quick to provide names.
On the afternoon of April 12, Paula Reid, the special agent in charge of Miami and South America, conducted initial interviews with the 12 men in Cartagena. Sullivan later ordered all 12 flown home the following morning, just hours before Obama arrived.
But their accounts varied — much more widely than initially reported. Agency investigators concluded that nine of the 12 men paid or solicited prostitutes, but the agents now disputing the findings insist that the punishment outweighs their crimes.
One of the implicated men has told associates that a senior security supervisor had advised agents to follow loose guidelines when spending time with women they met on the road: One-night stands were permitted, this supervisor explained, as long as the relationships were cut off when the agents left the country.
Now, the agency is underscoring off-duty conduct more clearly.
“You should always assume you are being watched when on an official assignment,” a director responsible for the counterassault team warned in a memo to staff members last week. “Do not put yourself in a situation in your personal or professional life that would cause embarrassment to you, your family, or the Secret Service.”
The agency’s rush to judgment came as a shock to the Spanish-speaker, who asked his overnight guest to write a note to his superiors that he thought would clear his name.
“I voluntarily spent the night,” this woman wrote, according to a document reviewed by The Post. “He only gave me $12 to pay for my taxi. . . . It was a pleasure meeting [him] and before saying goodbye I gave him my e-mail address hoping to see him again.”
Only one agent was completely cleared, after proving that someone else had improperly used his name to register a female guest.
Staff writers Carlos Lozada and Joe Davidson and research editor Alice Crites contributed to this report.
© The Washington Post Company
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EXCLUSIVE: Secret Service agents partied like rock stars on Obamas' Vineyard Vacation
By Jana Winter
Published June 19, 2012
FoxNews.com
The president is a lot more popular on Martha's Vineyard than the men and women who guard him.
MARTHA'S VINEYARD, Mass. – Long before President Obama's security detail was scandalized in Colombia and new revelations emerged last week about the Secret Service, members of the elite team earned an "Animal House" reputation at the blueblood vacation mecca of Martha's Vineyard.
Local residents say wild parties, fights and late-night carousing involving Secret Service members have become commonplace in recent years at the Vineyard, a favorite getaway for the First Family and longtime destination for upper-crust members of the Northeastern political, media and business establishment.
“I expect parties during the summer. People come here to have fun -- they’re on vacation,” said a resident who lives in the East Chop section of Oak Bluffs, near the six-bedroom Victorian mansion whose owners dubbed it the Secret Service’s “party house,” after agents staying in a cluster of adjacent homes converged on it for late-night soirees. “But I didn’t think it’d be Secret Service people here protecting the president.”
'If Secret Service says they’ve never received complaints about these same guys, then there is clear evidence to the contrary -- if they say that, they’re lying.'
- Homeowner who says house was trashed by Secret Service agents
Trashed rental homes, bad behavior and barroom brawls that have required the local police to step in have some disgusted Martha’s Vineyard homeowners vowing never to rent out to the Secret Service again. And while none of the disturbing behavior appeared to have any direct effect on the president’s safety, some occurred even as the president and his family were nearby.
One resident called police in the early morning on Aug. 18, 2011, about a party that went on until well past 4 a.m. on the day President Obama arrived for a nine-day vacation. Cars were parked on a lawn strewn with beer bottles and young women went in and out of the house as shouts from a spirited foosball game pierced the wee-hours air, neighbors told FoxNews.com.
A police report obtained by FoxNews.com describes two local cops arriving at 2:23 a.m. to find as many as a dozen people on the porch “talking and laughing loudly.”
“I was informed by two males that it’s a rental house and they were working the presidential vacation,” the report states. “I informed them that it was still 2:30 a.m. and people in the area are complaining about the loud voices, and [they] were told to go inside and close the windows.”
In response to FoxNews.com’s request for comment, Secret Service spokesman Max Milien in Washington said the Secret Service “has not received any complaints or information regarding alleged misconduct of its personnel operating in Martha's Vineyard during the summer of 2011. Any information brought to our attention that can be assessed as credible will be followed up on in an appropriate manner.”
But at least one Vineyard homeowner says that isn’t true.
She said her husband called the Secret Service in Washington last year to complain about the rowdy behavior of agents and damage they caused to their home, but his gripe was dismissed by officials who told her “that’s what they do on vacation” – even though the agents were on assignment at the Vineyard.
“If Secret Service says they’ve never received complaints about these same guys, then there is clear evidence to the contrary -- if they say that, they’re lying,” the woman told FoxNews.com. "We were the only ones to care, apparently. Nobody else cared about them partying, trashing the house, bringing girls home.
“We would not rent to them again,” she said.
She described a wake of destruction left by the commander-in-chief’s bodyguards, including the Counter Assault and Counter Sniper Teams, the same elite groups that got into trouble in Colombia. Antique furniture was destroyed, expensive "locally harvested" wide pine flooring was ruined and beer and liquor bottles were scattered throughout the property after agents stayed in the house, one of several stately million-dollar Victorians with pastel-painted wood shingles and wraparound porches of the exclusive East Chop section of Oak Bluffs.
The homeowners and several neighbors described another incident where police responded to complaints about a truck parked half on the lawn, half on the driveway. Cops arrived, spoke to the Secret Service agents inside and, moments later, a half-dressed woman came running out, got in the truck and sped off, said neighbors.
The home police responded to on Aug. 18, 2011, was described by one neighbor as a virtual “party house” for local college girls home for the summer, while another neighbor said she saw young women coming and going during more than one raging Secret Service party.
The owner of a six-bedroom home rented out the last two summers to the same Secret Service team that got in trouble in South America showed FoxNews.com a bullet he said was left behind by the agents and said CAT agents let neighborhood children and other residents handle their weapons.
More alarmingly, he said the men told him details of presidential security plans and logistics.
“They left ammo behind, they told me things they shouldn’t have been telling me, things they shouldn’t be telling anyone about the details about how they protect the president. They let us hold their weapons, see all their stuff, they had huge house parties,” said the man, who spoke to FoxNews.com with his wife on the condition they not be named.
Real estate agents with knowledge of the East Chop homes rented out to Secret Service said a child found a spent shell casing on a front lawn of one of the homes.
Glen Caldwell, the general manager of Offshore Ale in Oak Bluffs, told FoxNews.com about an incident last summer when one of his staff found a Secret Service badge on the floor after the bar had closed at the end of the night. The commission book also included a list of emergency phone numbers -- two 1-800 Secret Service numbers, a Department of Homeland Security ID card.
“It was on the floor of the bar for who knows how long, covered in peanuts. It was pretty clear that the guy was drunk,” Caldwell said.
When another worker found the badge, Caldwell said he put it in the bar’s safe. He then got a frantic call an hour or two later from someone asking if they’d found a Secret Service ID. He said the owner soon showed up at the bar and, when he asked for proof that the ID was his, showed a Virginia driver’s license bearing the same name.
“You didn’t call any of those numbers did you?” the agent nervously asked, recalled Caldwell, who had not.
A woman who was close to one of the agents and spent time with a group of them last summer said she was concerned about the national security implications of them bringing home women -- many of whom were foreign nationals -- nearly every night. She said the agents she spent time with did not bring their weapons out at night to the bars and parties, but that detailed information about the protection plans for the president was on all of their cellphones -- as were the phone numbers, locations and contact phone numbers for everyone on the detail.
In another incident, a local bartender said she and her boyfriend were playing pool with White House staffers who were members of Obama’s detail at an Oak Bluffs restaurant when they ran out of quarters. She said the staffers shot pool using what they said was the cash they were carrying for Obama -- the president doesn’t carry his own cash; White House staffers traveling with the president pay for his meals or other purchases.
Yet despite the myriad incidents, neither local law enforcement nor Secret Service officials in Washington would acknowledge a problem with the agents’ behavior on Martha’s Vineyard.
“This isn’t news,” Oak Bluffs Police Lt. Timothy Williams insisted to FoxNews.com, when asked about the East Chop address party. “There’s no news here,” he said, while also refusing to make available the officers who responded to the early morning party.
A chef at one popular restaurant, who cooked for a Secret Service party last summer, said the hi-jinks weren’t confined to the male agents. Three female Secret Service agents at the affair “partied just as much, if not more, than the other guys,” he said, and even organized tequila-fueled “ladies nights” out on the town.
The women also detailed protection strategies the security team provided for the president.
“The women talked about all the layers of protection -- what they do, how they protect the president -- the secret things that nobody is supposed to ever know about,” the chef said.
Several locals said they were disturbed the agents seemed to treat the president’s vacation as their own, even though the agents were on duty. Among the complaints are that some agents used their status to skip out on bar tabs, or using restricted parking areas while out boozing it up at local bars.
“They think they own the place, that they’re above the law,” said a bartender at the Wharf, a bar in Edgartown across the road from where White House advance team and Signal Corp communications teams set up shop in the month before the president’s arrival on the Vineyard. “[They’ll say], ‘I kill people for a living,’ ‘the president of the United States is alive because of me,’” the bartender said.
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Elsewhere, Vineyard residents reported Secret Service agents crashing parties all over the island. Last summer, the annual Harley-Davidson “Run to the Rock” event coincided with Obama’s visit, and many people reported seeing numerous Secret Service agents joining the party and drinking at the annual gathering.
Not everyone has problems with the Secret Service rentals.Walter Vail, an elected official in Oak Bluffs, said Secret Service teams that rented his home treated it with respect. He said the men used a large tree in his yard to do pull ups, ran windsprints down the main street and played wiffleball on the enormous lawn of a home next to his that was also rented.
And others on the island say Secret Service agents should be allowed to party, as long as they keep the First Family safe.
“Boys will be boys,” said Peter Martell, owner of the Wesley hotel in Oak Bluffs, which has hosted Secret Service since Bill Clinton first vacationed on Martha’s Vineyard in 1993.
Hotel workers say that for as long as they’ve been staying there, there’s been a cooler of beer waiting for each agent when he returns from his shift.
“They work their butts off, these guys, and they do a hell of a job. If they want to have a little fun here, what’s the harm?” Martell said.
Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2012/06/19/exclusive-secret-service-agents-partied-like-rock-stars-on-obamas-vineyard-vacation/#ixzz1yFyJdH3M
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Federal law enforcement personnel and a congressional committee are anxiously awaiting an overdue inspector general's report that they believe may reveal the involvement of two White House advance team members in the Secret Service prostitution scandal in Colombia earlier this year.
While much of the attention in the case has focused on the actions of Secret Service personnel, multiple law enforcement and congressional sources tell FoxNews.com that investigators also discovered two White House advance team members checked in prostitutes as overnight guests at a Cartagena hotel in the days before President Obama's April 13 visit.
"Three U.S. delegation members that stayed at the Hilton brought prostitutes back as overnight guests. One of them was ours (Secret Service) and the other two were White House staffers," a high-ranking Secret Service official told FoxNews.com. "We knew very early that White House staffers were involved."
Twelve of the 13 agents investigated for alleged misconduct in Cartagena stayed at another hotel, the El Caribe. Only one of those charged with misconduct had a room at the Hilton, where President Obama and the White House advance team also stayed.
White House Press Secretary Jay Carney said in April, just days after Obama's visit, that there was no indication any White House advance team members were involved in the prostitution scandal.
But whether there will be any reference to the White House staffers in the upcoming report, from the Department of Homeland Security's Office of Inspector General, remains to be seen. The report has yet to be delivered, though DHS OIG officials said Tuesday it would be submitted in the coming days. Acting DHS Inspector General Charles K. Edwards initially told a congressional panel in May he was aiming to present it by July 2.
The delay has sparked speculation the report was being altered or manipulated to conceal or minimize the roles of some of those involved, multiple Secret Service officials with senior leadership positions told FoxNews.com. Meanwhile, Senators Susan Collins of Maine and Joseph Lieberman of Connecticut, of the Senate Homeland Security Committee sent Edwards a letter on Sept. 14 asking for information about the status of the report.
A congressional source told FoxNews.com the Senate committee staff is particularly eager to see the report because it "includes information that two members of the White House advance team had prostitutes overnight."
"The Committee wants to know if White House staff engaged in improper conduct in Cartagena, which the White House previously denied," the source added.
"We are writing to inquire about the status of the investigation we requested into the April 2012 incidents in Cartagena, Colombia, involving the U.S. Secret Service and possibly other federal personnel and certain foreign nationals," the letter said. It was not clear what level of White House advance team personnel were involved or if they had access to classified material about the president's visit.
SEND TIPS TO guy@FOXNEWS.COM
The letter contained questions including the date the draft report was completed; if the report had been submitted to Secret Service and DHS for comment; and whether those comments will be identified separately in the final report. It also asks: "Have any changes been made to the report in response to comments received from the Secret Service or the Department?"
"Obviously we're worried the draft version of the report -- what the DHS IG investigators found on the ground in Cartagena -- is going to get changed and edited before the final version gets out," said a Secret Service source with knowledge of the IG's initial findings.
"Collins and Lieberman and the committee sent this letter in part to make sure that nobody will water down the final report. The committee sending the letter will prevent them from tampering with the report, that's one of the reasons why they sent it."
In response to multiple requests for comment, a spokesman with the DHS OIG on Tuesday afternoon denied the report was being deliberately delayed.
"We have completed our independent review, which was requested by Congress, and are currently in the final stages of preparing the final report of investigation," spokesman Bill Hillburg said. He said DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano would be briefed in the "next few days," and Collins and other lawmakers after that.
Press Secretary Carney's statement, on April 23, came well before the DHS investigation was complete, but ruled out any wrongdoing by White House advance staff.
"There have been no specific, credible allegations of misconduct by anyone on the White House advance team or the White House staff," Carney said at a press briefing. "Nevertheless, out of due diligence, the White House Counsel's office has conducted a review of the White House advance team, and in concluding that review, came to the conclusion that there's no indication that any member of the White House advance team engaged in any improper conduct or behavior."
The White House did not return FoxNews.com's request for comment on Tuesday afternoon.
DHS spokesman Matt Chandler said on Tuesday that Napolitano's office had not yet received the report. He added: "Furthermore, the OIG is independent and solely and separately determines the timing of its reports. I would refer you to the OIG for further questions."
Edwards said during congressional testimony on May 23 that he hoped to have the initial report on the Cartagena incident completed by July 2. "We plan to interview Special Agent in Charge Paula Reid, who had on-site responsibility for the Secret Service's Cartagena detail," Edwards said. "We also plan to interview (Secret Service) Director (Mark) Sullivan. We will review the Secret Service's report on its internal investigation as soon as it becomes available. Contingent upon our receipt of that report, our goal is to complete the first phase of our review and report our findings by July 2nd."
Multiple high-level officials, including current and former Secret Service agents, have told FoxNews.com that they believe Sullivan has essentially covered up White House involvement in the scandal, while publicly skewering agency employees who were involved.
Secret Service spokesman Ed Donovan said his agency "has been completely cooperative with inquiries from DHS OIG on all matters related to the investigation of events that transpired in Cartagena."
Thirteen Secret Service agents, including one female agent, were investigated for their alleged involvement with prostitutes at Cartagena hotels on the night of April 11 and early morning of April 12, in advance of Obama's arrival on April 13 for a Summit of the Americas meeting.
A dozen members of the military were also investigated for alleged misconduct during the same visit, as were two DEA agents who were alleged to have had conduct with prostitutes at an apartment maintained by the agency in Cartagena.
All but a few of the 13 Secret Service agents have retired, resigned, or are on administrative leave and have had their clearances suspended pending revocation hearings or appeals. Last week, two of the agents were notified by their attorneys that their security clearances had been officially revoked.
One of two supervisors had his clearance revoked and is appealing the revocation; the other supervisor retired.
A number of other agents initially sent home from Colombia and investigated were brought back on the job after saying during polygraph examinations that they did not know the women in their rooms were prostitutes. Those back on the job have been reassigned to other divisions of the Secret Service.
Contact Jana Winter at jana.winter@foxnews.com
FoxNews.com's Judson Berger contributed to this report.
Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2012/09/19/probe-may-cite-white-house-advance-team-involvement-in-prostitution-scandal/#ixzz26xqLdtWg
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http://www.businessinsider.com/white-house-secret-service-scandal-colombia-2014-10
Obama aide in scandal before election cover upo
BBOOOMMOMMM
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The Cartagena-Hooker Cover-Up
By Jonah Goldberg - October 11, 2014
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In news that must have left my friends at the New York Post — never mind the gang at The Daily Show – with a renewed confidence that ours is a just and beneficent God, the White House has been caught covering up a scandal involving a Cartagena hooker.
The phrase “Cartagena hooker” alone is a mellifluous gift to ink-stained wretches everywhere, but the revelation that the White House reassigned the alleged client of the aforementioned Andean call girl to the State Department’s office of “Global Women’s Issues” is the sort of flourish Tom Wolfe or Chris Buckley wouldn’t dare attempt as satire.
Let us back up for a moment. Two years ago, the Secret Service was humiliated in a terrible scandal. Agents sent to prepare for a presidential trip to Colombia availed themselves of the local service industry, as it were. The local cops were called in when one agent refused to compensate a woman for services rendered, contradicting ancient advice about the oldest profession: You don’t pay for the sex; you pay for the hooker to leave. Hats off to the Cartagena constabulary for their diligence in enforcing contract rights. Ten agents lost their jobs.
On April 23, 2012, then–White House press secretary Jay Carney said there were “no specific, credible allegations of misconduct by anyone on the White House advance team or the White House staff.”
“Nevertheless,” Carney said, “out of due diligence, the White House Counsel’s office has conducted a review . . . [and] came to the conclusion that there’s no indication that any member of the White House advance team engaged in any improper conduct or behavior.”
If the Washington Post’s exhaustive exclusive this week is to believed, that was what experts would call a lie. Secret Service investigators told the White House that Jonathan Dach also had too good a time in Cartagena. Dach, then a Yale law student, was a volunteer for the White House advance team. The lead investigator for the Department of Homeland Security – which oversees the Secret Service – says he was told “to withhold and alter certain information in the report of investigation because it was potentially embarrassing to the administration.”
One such piece of information was that Dach “was not charged for additional guest as a benefit of Hilton Honor Member.”
Membership has its privileges.
That guest, investigators found, had advertised herself as a prostitute on the Internet, complete with a photo of herself scantily clad in front of signs that read, “Summit of the Americas.” Perhaps she was just a student of international diplomacy specializing in ameliorating the deficiencies of soft power?
The lead investigator and two of his aides say they were put on administrative leave when they questioned what they believed to be a naked political cover-up.
If the allegations are true, we’re left with this question: Why did the White House go to such lengths to conceal the event? Dach broke no laws in Cartagena, the alleged tryst took place in a so-called “tolerance zone” where prostitution is legal. Surely the White House isn’t against tolerance.
There are two likely answers. The first is obvious and laid out in the Post’s reporting. The White House didn’t want a scandal in an election year. The second answer, also suggested by the report, is that while Dach was an inconsequential gnome in the White House’s massive political operation, Dach’s father, Leslie, was a big donor to the Obama campaign. A former lobbyist for Wal-Mart, Leslie Dach gave $23,900 in 2008 and worked with Michelle Obama’s “Let’s Move!” campaign.
Neither answer excludes the other, and both speak volumes about this White House’s problems. The underlying scandal is fairly minor. But if the White House would falsify records and lie to the public about this, is it really so hard to imagine that it would deceive the public – and Congress – about larger issues like, say, Benghazi? (Just this week, former Obama secretary of defense Leon Panetta told Fox News’s Bill O’Reilly that the infamous White House talking points on the attack were essentially bogus.)
But it also speaks to the seedy way Obama talks about politics generally. The president loves to denounce a cynical system where politics comes before the public good. He rails about a system where fat cats live by a different set of rules than the little guy, and money buys special treatment and access. But the way he operates runs completely counter to all that. Which is why the only person to come out of this scandal in an honorable light is the Cartagena hooker.
© 2014 Tribune Content Agency, LLC
Read more: http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2014/10/11/the_cartagena-hooker_cover-up_124264.html#ixzz3FqPmZ7nq
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http://freebeacon.com/politics/wapos-carol-leonnig-wh-spin-on-prostitution-scandal-demonstrably-false
OBAMA = BUSTED