Posted on 05/10/2013 1:44:22 PM PDT by SeekAndFind
Those who are trying to make the Benghazi tragedy into a scandal for the Obama administration really ought to decide what story line they want to sell.
Actually, by “those” I mean Republicans, and by “the Obama administration” I mean Hillary Clinton. The only coherent purpose I can discern in all of this is to sully Clinton’s record as secretary of state in case she runs for president in 2016.
That’s not a particularly noble way to use the deaths of four American public servants, but at least it’s understandable. Attempts to concoct some kind of sinister Whitewater-style conspiracy, however, don’t even begin to make sense.
The hearing convened Wednesday by Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) produced a riveting narrative of the chaotic events in Libya last September. But what was the supposedly unforgivable crime?
Did Clinton’s State Department fail to provide adequate security for the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi? In retrospect, obviously so. But the three diplomats who testified at the hearing gave no evidence that this failure sprang from anything other than the need to use limited resources as efficiently as possible.
House Republicans who voted to cut funding for State Department security should understand that their philosophy — small government is always better — has consequences. Bureaucrats have to make judgment calls. Sometimes they will be wrong.
Is the scandal supposed to be that a four-man Special Forces team was not sent from Tripoli to help defend the Benghazi compound? This is a decision that clearly still haunts and enrages Gregory Hicks, the former deputy chief of mission in Libya, who sat helplessly in the capital while Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens and three other Americans were being killed at the consulate 650 miles away.
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...
The decision not to dispatch troops was made by the military chain of command, not by Clinton or anyone who reported to her. Superior officers decided this team was needed to help evacuate the embassy in Tripoli, which was seen as a potential target for a Benghazi-style attack.
The Pentagon has concluded that the team, in any event, could not have arrived in Benghazi in time to make a difference. Hicks testified that he disagrees. It is difficult not to feel his pain. But it is also difficult, frankly, to believe that he knows more about deploying troops than do the professionals.
THE RESPONSE TO THIS SHOULD BE WHAT JONAH GOLDBERG SAID:
Even if that were true, it would still be a self-serving falsehood.
If you see a child struggling in the ocean, you have no idea how long she will flail and paddle before she goes under for the last time. The moral response is to swim for her in the hope that you get there in time. If you fail and she dies, you can console yourself that you did your best to rescue her.
But if you just stand on the beach and do nothing as the child struggles for life, saying, “Well, there’s just no way I can get to her in time,” it doesn’t really matter whether you guessed right or not. You didn’t try.
The White House and State Department insist they guessed right, as if that somehow absolves them of responsibility. They would have sent help if they could have, they claim, but they simply weren’t ready to deploy forces on September 11, the one day of the year you’d expect our military and intelligence agencies to be ready for trouble in the Middle East, particularly given that before his murder, Stevens warned of security problems in Benghazi.
But we know the administration ordered others who were willing, able, and obliged to come to the consulate’s rescue to “stand down.” They in effect told the lifeguards, “Don’t get out of your chairs.”
Here’s the other leftist spin ( and you will hear this repeated again and again ):
THERE WERE, in fact, tumultuous anti-American demonstrations taking place in cities throughout the Muslim world because of the video.
President Obama labeled the Benghazi assault an act of terror almost immediately — as Mitt Romney learned in the second presidential debate — but it was hard to imagine that the attack was completely unrelated to what was happening in Cairo, Tunis, Khartoum and Jakarta.
careful with that axe eugene
Witch hunt? Either someone misspelled the word and or it relates to Hillary.
Oh I’d say the Republicans know just where the witch is in this episode.
The ComPost, LASlimes, MSLSD, NYSlimes, etc. all have the exact same talking points...
Axelrod had a very, very long conference call with all the Media heads last night to get the messaging right.
Left for dead b/c of the election.
Is using ‘witch hunt’ politically correct? Isn’t that implying that it’s always women? There are warlocks. We no longer have all female named hurricanes. There aren’t anymore freshmen. They need to come up with a non-gender _____________ hunt. If they’re really true believers in their militant non-gender chit. I think I will write and complain...
Some Dem congressman was on Cavuto saying the same thing; that this is all about getting Hillery because she is the only person qualified to be the next president.
Problem is, this time there really are witches.
And they didn’t turn anyone into a newt - they killed them through inaction and treachery.
No, Eugene. We’ve found the witch.. the key is aiming the water bucket. Then, the witch will know what the “difference” is.
lol—just as long as somebody high up goes to jail
Tool.
Eugene. THE FOREIGNER and MRS. WHAT DIFFERENCE DOES IT MAKE did not act like AMERICANS in the BENGHAZI tragedy. No americans I know of would leave our people on their own to fight off an attack without making EVERY EFFORT to support them. The only effort these two ANTI AMERICANS made was to COVER UP their ineptitude. Stick up for them. I would expect nothing less from another anti american democrat. But let me tell you. You sound just like the fool democrats in the hearing when they made their inquiries to get to the bottom of the facts from the whistle blowers. Ah, what did you have for breakfast this morning.
Eugene Robinsons take:
Obama is black and Republicans are racists.
Axe?
Did Eugene have a question?
...and to blame these deaths on budget cuts done Republicans i.e. “smaller government” is disgusting...I think people are really sick of the R’s being blamed, Bush being blamed,Romney being blamed-and I mean the low-info people. They hear that as an excuse for everything and it is now to the point of being RIDICULOUS.
“the only person qualified to be president” that jerk congressman said? The only person! Were that true, we would be in a far worse shape then even I thought if she were the only one qualified. IMO, that .itch is not qualified to be handing out towels in the bathroom.
The ironic thing about her is I had an argument with a RINO friend yesterday who said that Hillary would have been a far better choice for president than the current POS. Two peas in the same pod IMO.
Yes, that’s what he said; I wish I could remember his name.
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