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Richard Cohen: The GOP’s unhinged Benghazi fixation
New York Daily News ^ | 05/13/2014 | Richard Cohen

Posted on 05/13/2014 1:22:42 PM PDT by presidio9

Tuning the car radio some weeks back, I heard the President denounced as a moron. I was shocked. I had reached some right-wing talker and he was carrying on about something Barack Obama had recently said — that he worries more about a nuclear attack on New York than he does about Russia. The radio guy declared that the president had given terrorists an idea. He apparently forgot that the notion of attacking New York had already occurred to them.

-SNIP-

I feel about the GOP as I do about the religion of others: I don’t get it.

-SNIP-

No one can possibly think the Obama administration knew the attack was coming and let it happen.

-SNIP-

ETC.

(Excerpt) Read more at nydailynews.com ...


TOPICS: Crime/Corruption; Editorial; Foreign Affairs; News/Current Events; Politics/Elections; War on Terror
KEYWORDS: benghazi; foxnews; richardcohen
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Comment #21 Removed by Moderator

To: mylife

LOL.

Now I can read in peace!


22 posted on 05/13/2014 1:40:23 PM PDT by miss marmelstein (Richard Lives Yet!)
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To: presidio9

Iran Contra. A short history of leftwing phoney scandals.


23 posted on 05/13/2014 1:40:38 PM PDT by RginTN
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Kiss that butt Dick.


24 posted on 05/13/2014 1:40:43 PM PDT by mylife
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To: mylife

Halfway through it before realizing you didn’t fix it, lol.


25 posted on 05/13/2014 1:42:38 PM PDT by miss marmelstein (Richard Lives Yet!)
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To: miss marmelstein

You are welcome.


26 posted on 05/13/2014 1:42:43 PM PDT by mylife
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To: presidio9

please recopy and paste, this time use the < pre > tag to get paragraphs.


27 posted on 05/13/2014 1:43:32 PM PDT by rawcatslyentist (Jeremiah 50:32 "The arrogant one will stumble and fall ; / ?)
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To: miss marmelstein
I can't fix the world. ☺
28 posted on 05/13/2014 1:43:33 PM PDT by mylife
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To: Dr. Thorne
No one can possibly think the Obama administration knew the attack was coming and let it happen.

Maybe. Maybe not. What cannot be argued is that the timing was inopportune coming in the midst of a presidential election and all and BO or his string pullers (prime suspect: Valarie Jarrett) made a calculated decision that the risk of casualties on the ground were worth the risk of destroying the narrative that BO had bested the terrorists.

Like Jimbo Carter, who personally downsized the scope of the Iran hostage rescue operation some 32 years earlier, he made the callous calculation that the increased risk of casualties was worth avoiding an expanded conflict.

The real fault lies with Mitt Romney because if he had simply conceded re-election to BO before the balloting took place, then there would have been no need for this cautious approach and subsequent cover-up. < /sarcasm>

29 posted on 05/13/2014 1:44:55 PM PDT by Vigilanteman (Obama: Fake black man. Fake Messiah. Fake American. How many fakes can you fit in one Zer0?)
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To: Mycroft Holmes; miss marmelstein
Thanks Mycroft. I did pick up a thing or two in 30,000 posts to FR, and agree that a lack of paragraph breaks can be confusing. It's just been so long that I posted here, and I assumed (incorrectly it turns out) that HTLM formatting was not required in the post commentary. I'll try to never let it happen again (what was I thinking?).

Under deep cover as a graduate student at perhaps the most liberal University in the United States, I have been away from FR for quite some time now. I've learned a lot about the way an intelligent and highly educated liberal east coast mind works. I believe that this article presents something of a teachable moment in that regard. I won’t speak to Mr. Cohen’s intelligence, but he would qualify, by most standards, as highly educated. I believe that he has a masters in journalism from the Pulitzer school at Columbia. He has also shown a willingness to cross the aisle on matters of foreign policy, particularly when the pertain to Israel. When he writes about terrorism, I read him, if only to hear what the other side is being told about an issue. –And that, in a nutshell, is the main issue for Conservatives when it comes to Benghazi. We are appalled at the death of four Americans, and the fact that the perpetrators are still at large. Given the duration of the attack, we wonder whether anything could have been done to save them. We recognize the White House’s response for what it was: A misuse of power in an attempt to sweep inconvenient facts under the rug so as not to allow them to influence an upcoming election. We are angered by the actions of sworn public servants to hinder subsequent investigations. But, most of all, we see this issue as a touchstone for something very wrong in today’s political marketplace: A complete breakdown in the media’s obligation to present all of the facts to their audience.

In the last three years, for obvious reasons, I went to great efforts to avoid talking about politics. I was surrounded by affable, but true-believing, liberals. I was investing a lot of time and money into an advanced degree. I could not afford to waste it arguing. Nevertheless, I cannot tell you how many times I was surprised to learn that my highly intelligent and successful professional Ivy League classmates in their 30’s and 40’s had not heard names, places and terms that I supposed were common knowledge: “Single Payer System.” “Kermit Gosnell.” “Brian Terry.” The difference between a “machine gun” and a “semi-automatic weapon.” The fact that Mitt Romney had no intention of putting GM out of business and laying off all of its workers. Or that John McCain never said he wanted to go to war with Russia over the Ukraine. Or that Paul Ryan was trying to SAVE Social Security and Medicare. “Benghazi.” Not “didn’t care” –“never HEARD.”

What became very clear to me during this time is the extent to which liberals and conservatives get their facts from very different sources. Personally, I have always disagreed with the Conservative canon on two or three important issues. Which ones they are is irrelevant. I make a point of never proselytizing here. The point, which most people here are very aware of, is the liberal tendency to form opinions without having all the facts. It seems that we have become so politically divided in this country that virtually everyone who cares about politics gets all of their information from entertainment news shows (like FOX and MSNBC) or simply entertainment (like Comedy Central and the major networks).

We know that journalism appeals to a disproportionate share of young liberals. There is a liberal culture in media, and that probably will never change. We live in a center-right nation that gets its news from people that it disagrees with. That was the inspiration behind FOX, and the reason why it is the #1 rated cable news channel. Unfortunately, somewhere in the last decade, (I would say it was during the first Obama campaign), liberals on other networks began to assess their ratings correctly: They finally understood the reason behind the fact that 1/3 of the nation preferred to get their news from people they agreed with, and decided to write them off in favor of the other third. In doing this, they put themselves into competition with themselves for the liberal base. At that point, they decided to trust FOX, and only FOX, to present one side of the story.

Liberals who watched the news used to hear views, news, and opinions about things that they didn’t care about because journalists took their jobs seriously. Now they get a steady stream of what they want to hear, and if they’re lucky, weak straw-man arguments like the ones presented in the last paragraph. Is it any wonder that they (Mr. Cohen included) have finally concluded that a political philosophy that includes geniuses like (you don’t have to agree with everything these people say, just recognize that they are among the smartest political philosophers alive today) Dr. Ben Carson, Charles Krauthammer, Paul Gigot, Thomas Sowell, George Will, Laura Ingraham, Daniel Henninger, Mark Steyn, etc., is nothing but a bunch of uneducated yokels? They are working off a different script.

I suppose that I will need to turn these thoughts into a standalone vanity piece at some point when I have more time. For the moment, I will say that I have come to the conclusion that FOX is actually part of the problem. The solution is for more conservatives to get themselves hired at liberal news networks. The solution is not another network perceived as only conservative. That will only exacerbate the problem.

30 posted on 05/13/2014 1:45:56 PM PDT by presidio9 (Islam is as Islam does.)
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Comment #31 Removed by Moderator

To: presidio9

Typical liberal thinks that throwing 41 employees of the U.S. Gov to the wolves is no big deal. Someone please air drop Cohen into Benghazi with “Allah humps goats” tattooed on his forehead in Arabic.


32 posted on 05/13/2014 1:50:08 PM PDT by TigersEye ("No man left behind" is more than an Army Ranger credo it's the character of America.)
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I often wonder if UN Goons just wanted to tip over Libya for a new place to boondoggle on the beach.

Egypt is more disturbing, why overthrow a 30 year allie?

Obama is pissing in the waters of life.
Now him and Merkel are playing kissy face
I do not know what is going on , but I smell the stink.


33 posted on 05/13/2014 1:50:55 PM PDT by mylife
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To: mylife
>" Is it possible the Obama administration fudged the nature of the attack, refusing to apply the term “terrorist”?"


34 posted on 05/13/2014 1:51:30 PM PDT by rawcatslyentist (Jeremiah 50:32 "The arrogant one will stumble and fall ; / ?)
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To: kingattax; miss marmelstein
if you decide to dive in there, please take some survival gear with you.

Sorry, never heard of you. Hope whatever is bothering you personally works out for you. Whatever it was: Dude, that was (at least) two years ago. I haven't been here. Have a great day.

35 posted on 05/13/2014 1:51:36 PM PDT by presidio9 (Islam is as Islam does.)
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To: presidio9

OK, thanks for reposting. It’s too bad you had to spend so much money to learn that your fellow students and teachers were idiots. I spend very little money to visit my pals on the Upper West Side and they don’t know who Kermit Gosnell is either.


36 posted on 05/13/2014 1:51:58 PM PDT by miss marmelstein (Richard Lives Yet!)
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To: presidio9

Wha??? You never heard of me? That’s outrageous, dude! I think you’re posting to the wrong person, dude!


37 posted on 05/13/2014 1:53:32 PM PDT by miss marmelstein (Richard Lives Yet!)
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Richard Cohen has been unhinged for decades.


38 posted on 05/13/2014 1:56:12 PM PDT by Fledermaus (Conservatives are all that's left to defend the Constitution. Dems hate it, and Repubs don't care.)
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To: presidio9
Thanks for the formatting change.

I don't think Fox is a problem, or part of the problem, and I rarely watch them.

If you haven't watched Trey Gowdy's last three minute take down of the media (including those like Cohen), by all means do so and rejoice.

39 posted on 05/13/2014 1:57:02 PM PDT by Lakeshark
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There were troops 30 mins away in sigonella.
No excuse to not respond to a 9 hour siege.

http://www.defensenews.com/VideoNetwork/914072828001/Sigonella-Air-Base-takes-part-in-Libya-Air-Campaign


40 posted on 05/13/2014 1:57:45 PM PDT by mylife
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