Bergdahl's Team Leader: We Picked Up Taliban Radio Chatter Stating That Bergdahl Was Seeking to Talk to the Taliban

Outstanding.

Former Army Sgt. Evan Buetow was the team leader with Bowe Bergdahl the night Bergdahl disappeared.

"Bergdahl is a deserter, and he's not a hero," says Buetow. "He needs to answer for what he did."

Within days of his disappearance, says Buetow, teams monitoring radio chatter and cell phone communications intercepted an alarming message: The American is in Yahya Khel (a village two miles away). He's looking for someone who speaks English so he can talk to the Taliban.

"I heard it straight from the interpreter's lips as he heard it over the radio," said Buetow. "There's a lot more to this story than a soldier walking away."

Oh, in case you had any doubts, Obama's explanation as to why he's permitted to break the law on a whim is pretty weak.

Today, Caitlin Hayden of the National Security Council issued a statement outlining a new legal rationale for the administration’s position (HT: Marty Lederman]. Unfortunately, it is remarkably weak:

With respect to the separate 30-day notification requirement in Section 1035(d), the Administration determined that the notification requirement should be construed not to apply to this unique set of circumstances, in which the transfer would secure the release of a captive U.S. soldier and the Secretary of Defense, acting on behalf of the President, has determined that providing notice as specified in the statute could endanger the soldier’s life.

In these circumstances, delaying the transfer in order to provide the 30-day notice would interfere with the Executive’s performance of two related functions that the Constitution assigns to the President.... To the extent that the notice provision would apply in these unique circumstances, it would trigger the very separation of powers concerns that the President raised in his signing statement.

The biggest problem with this argument is that the 30 day notice requirement contains no exception for “unique” circumstances where the President or the secretary of defense believe that obeying it might endanger a soldier’s life. The National Defense Authorization Act and other national security legislation contain numerous provisions that can be waived in appropriate circumstances by the president or the secretary. There is no such waiver or exception in the 30 day notice requirement. If the president can get around the law anytime he or the secretary of defense believe that it might save a soldier’s life, then he could disregard almost any congressional restrictions on warmaking.

It should be noted that while this justification is deliberately wrongheaded on the law, it's complete bullshit as to the facts: The Administration has been pushing this same exact deal -- Bergdahl for the same five Taliban -- since 2012.

The idea that after two years of pushing the same deal, an additional 30 days for Congressional notification puts Bergdahl's life in additional danger, is simply a fiction postulated to further this malevolent tyrant's power.

Counter-Scandal! Here's the real scandal, according to the Left -- that a Republican helped Bergdahl's unit get in touch with the media.

See, the real scandal is that People Found Out.

posted by Ace at 04:31 PM

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