Posted on 11/20/2012 9:05:26 AM PST by SeekAndFind
Meet James Clapper --- the latest fall guy for the White House on Benghazi. After last week's hearings in Congress showed that the talking points from the CIA had been changed to eliminate the mention of terrorism, Washington erupted into a whodunit. CBS reports today that the culprit has been found ... sort of:
CBS News has learned that the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (DNI) cut specific references to "al Qaeda" and "terrorism" from the unclassified talking points given to Ambassador Susan Rice on the Benghazi consulate attack --- with the agreement of the CIA and FBI. The White House or State Department did not make those changes. ---
However, an intelligence source tells CBS News correspondent Margaret Brennan the links to al Qaeda were deemed too “tenuous” to make public, because there was not strong confidence in the person providing the intelligence. CIA Director David Petraeus, however, told Congress he agreed to release the information — the reference to al Qaeda — in an early draft of the talking points, which were also distributed to select lawmakers.
“The intelligence community assessed from the very beginning that what happened in Benghazi was a terrorist attack.” DNI spokesman Shawn Turner tells CBS News. That information was shared at a classified level — which Rice, as a member of President Obama’s cabinet, would have been privy to. …
The head of the DNI is James Clapper, an Obama appointee. He ultimately did review the points, before they were given to Ambassador Rice and members of the House intelligence committee on Sept. 14. They were compiled the day before.
Note that this report doesn’t pin the blame on Clapper himself. It instead locates the change in Clapper’s “office,” allowing for a rather non-specific assignment that makes almost no sense at all. Are we to believe that a Clapper aide overruled David Petraeus’ assessment of Benghazi? If so, on what basis?
The report also states that the reason for the redaction was because the link to AQ was “too tenuous.” However, the presence of mortars and RPGs, as well as coordinated fire and attack strategies in play, made it clear “almost immediately” to Petraeus and others in the CIA that this was much more than a spontaneous demonstration run amok. That made the YouTube video explanation rather “tenuous” too, no? And yet that stayed in the talking points while terrorism got excised.
This explanation seems even more tenuous than the previous stories coming from the White House. If Petraeus knew “almost immediately” that this was an act of deliberate terrorism and included that in his talking points, then we need an explanation of who in the “office of the DNI” removed that explanation, and why — more than just the “too tenuous” excuse here that turned out to be totally wrong — and whether they got pressured to do so.
It is astonishing and terrifying that Clapper still works for the Federal Government in any capacity.
Attention James Clapper, your bus is ready to leave......be under it.
At least he can go back to making those on/off lights.
There are friends. We would not want to offend them in any way. There not terrorists. Americans are the ones to blame for suppressing them for so long. Signed SOCIALIST ANTI AMERICAN DEMOCRAT certified member of the HIDE THE DECLINE PARTY.
Bathhouse Barry's Marxist regime is full of incompetent idiots — very dangerous for America and the world.
Clapper is the guy who said at a hearing thet the Muslim Brotherhood was “largely secular”.
He is a mole if there ever was one.
Oh, please. It was an Obama appointee - if Bush was in power, they wouldn’t say it was the DNI and not the Whitehouse, they would say it was done by the “administration”.
DISMANTLE the “Office of the Director of National Intelligence (DNI)”.
BIG GOVERNMENT IS CRONY SOCIALISM
DEFUND, DISMANTLE, DEPOPULATE.
OK assume thisto be trip.. Who added the video story?
“The Taliban is on the inside of the building” Eric Nordstrom to Congress Oct 10, 2012
“The Taliban is on the inside of the building” Eric Nordstrom to Congress Oct 10, 2012
I don’t care if Bob the janitor came in and made the changes. Obama knew it was terrorists and he sent his UN Ambassador (surely an expert in these matters) out to lie for him. He’s just a dirty little money-grubbing Democrat grifter, and the sooner everyone wakes up to that fact, the fewer dead Arabs there’ll be and more money left in the public treasury.
Right - - but it still doesn’t explain WHO authorized the false meme that the terrorist attack was the result of the “video”... It would have been very simple & straightforward for the administration to simply state (for example) that “organized extremists” took down the diplomatic mission, and omit any reference to a “video” - - but they didn’t - - and there was a reason for this - - and a reason for repeating this lie over and over again for weeks...
Did David “The Axe” Axelrod or “Baghdad Bob” Gibbs weigh in on the issue of what talking points were to be used in the run up to the election, bolstering the “GM is alive, UBL is dead” montra?
Clapper is a DUMB BAG OF ROCKS!! He is PERfect FOR A gOVERNMENT JOB!!
“...links to al Qaeda were deemed too “tenuous” to make public, because there was not strong confidence in the person providing the intelligence...”
On the other hand, the “insulting video” story was based on rock solid evidence from operatives in the field...(/sarc off)
Ha! I knew it. I have been suggesting that it was James Clapper who concocted the “false narrative” regarding the video protest, as well as the idea to blame it on the CIA and Petraeus.
Clapper is Petraeus’ boss and is the man who demanded Petraeus’ resignation. There was an article linked by Drudge about how disliked Petraeus was in the Obama intelligence community, and about how they disliked working for him.
My guess is that Clapper was in the White House situation room on 9/11 with Panetta and the rest. When Panetta said that top generals and security people made the decision not to send help to Benghazi. I think that he meant after they had advised Obama to issue the stand down and go to bed.
If you listen to Obama’s statements, he always says top security officials issued the reports, he never said that the reports came from the CIA. He meant Clapper, who is over the CIA.
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