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Obama’s ‘Blame the Video’ Fraud Started in Cairo, Not Benghazi [it was Hillary]
National Review ^ | 5/1/2014 | Andrew C. McCarthy

Posted on 05/01/2014 4:38:57 AM PDT by Servant of the Cross

The e-mail revelations and the Obama administration’s lies

Here is the main point: The rioting at the American embassy in Cairo was not about the anti-Muslim video. As argued here repeatedly (see here and here), the Obama administration’s “Blame the Video” story was a fraudulent explanation for the September 11, 2012, rioting in Cairo every bit as much as it was a fraudulent explanation for the massacre in Benghazi several hours later.

We’ll come back to that because, once you grasp this well-hidden fact, the Obama administration’s derelictions of duty in connection with Benghazi become much easier to see. But let’s begin with Jay Carney’s performance in Wednesday’s exchange with the White House press corps, a new low in insulting the intelligence of the American people.

Mr. Carney was grilled about just-released e-mails that corroborate what many of us have been arguing all along: “Blame the Video” was an Obama-administration–crafted lie, through and through. It was intended, in the stretch run of the 2012 campaign, to obscure the facts that (a) the president’s foreign policy of empowering Islamic supremacists contributed directly and materially to the Benghazi massacre; (b) the president’s reckless stationing of American government personnel in Benghazi and his shocking failure to provide sufficient protection for them were driven by a political-campaign imperative to portray the Obama Libya policy as a success — and, again, they invited the jihadist violence that killed our ambassador and three other Americans; and (c) far from being “decimated,” as the president repeatedly claimed during the campaign (and continued to claim even after the September 11 violence in Egypt and Libya), al-Qaeda and its allied jihadists remained a driving force of anti-American violence in Muslim countries — indeed, they had been strengthened by the president’s pro-Islamist policies.

The explosive e-mails that have surfaced thanks to the perseverance of Judicial Watch make explicit what has long been obvious: Susan Rice, the president’s confidant and ambassador to the U.N., was strategically chosen to peddle the administration’s “Blame the Video” fairy tale to the American people in appearances on five different national television broadcasts the Sunday after the massacre. She was coached about what to say by other members of the president’s inner circle.

One of the e-mails refers expressly to a “prep call” that Ambassador Rice had with several administration officials on late Saturday afternoon right before her Sunday-show appearances. The tangled web of deception spun by the administration has previously included an effort to distance the White House (i.e., the president) from Rice’s mendacious TV performances. Thus, Carney was in the unenviable position Wednesday of trying to explain the “prep call” e-mail, as well as other messages that illuminate the Obama White House’s deep involvement in coaching Rice. The e-mails manifest that Rice’s performances were campaign appearances, not the good-faith effort of a public official to inform the American people about an act of war against our country. Her instructions were “To underscore that these protests are rooted in an Internet video, and not a broader failure of policy”; and “To reinforce the President and Administration’s strength and steadiness in dealing with difficult challenges” (emphasis added).

Carney risibly claimed that the “prep call” was “not about Benghazi.” Instead, according to him, it was “about the protests around the Muslim world.”

Two points must be made about this.

The first involves the administration’s blatant lying. Benghazi was the only reason Rice was going on the Sunday shows. If the massacre had not happened, there would not have been an extraordinary administration offering of one top Obama official to five different national television networks to address a calamity that had happened a few days before.

Moreover, as is well known to anyone who has ever been involved in government presentations to the media, to Congress, to courts, and to other fact-finding bodies, the official who will be doing the presentation is put through a “murder board” preparation process. This is a freewheeling session in which the questions likely to be asked at the presentation are posed, and potential answers — especially to tough questions — are proposed, discussed, and massaged. The suggestion that Rice, less than 24 hours before being grilled by high-profile media figures, was being prepped on something totally separate and apart from the incident that was the sole reason for her appearance is so farfetched it is amazing that Carney thought he could make it fly.

The second point brings us full circle to Egypt.

Why would Carney claim, with a straight face, that Rice was being prepped “about protests around the Muslim world”? Because, other than Benghazi, the “protest around the Muslim world” that Americans know about is the rioting (not “protest,” rioting) at the U.S. embassy in Cairo a few hours before the Benghazi siege. When Benghazi comes up, the administration — President Obama, Hillary Clinton, Susan Rice, Jay Carney, et al. — loves to talk about the Cairo “protests.” Why? Because the media, and thus the public, have bought hook, line, and sinker the fraudulent claim that those “protests” were over the anti-Muslim video. Obama & Co. shrewdly calculate that if you buy “Blame the Video” as the explanation for Cairo, it becomes much more plausible that you will accept “Blame the Video” as the explanation for Benghazi — or, at the very least, you will give Obama officials the benefit of the doubt that they could truly have believed the video triggered Benghazi, despite a mountain of evidence to the contrary.

You see, the Benghazi fraud hinges on the success of the Cairo fraud. If you are hoodwinked by the latter, they have a much better chance of getting away with the former.

But “Blame the Video” is every bit as much a deception when it comes to Cairo.

Thanks to President Obama’s policy of supporting the Muslim Brotherhood and other Islamic supremacists in Egypt, post-Mubarak Cairo became a very hospitable place for jihadists. That included al-Qaeda leaders, such as Mohammed Zawahiri, brother of al-Qaeda emir Ayman Zawahiri; and leaders of Gama’at al-Islamia (the Islamic Group), the terrorist organization led by the Blind Sheikh — Omar Abdel Rahman, the terrorist I convicted in 1995 for running the jihadist cell that bombed the World Trade Center and plotted to bomb other New York City landmarks.

In the weeks before September 11, 2012, these jihadists plotted to attack the U.S. embassy in Cairo. In fact, the Blind Sheikh’s son threatened a 1979 Iran-style raid on the embassy: Americans would be taken hostage to ransom for the Blind Sheikh’s release from American prison (he is serving a life sentence). Other jihadists threatened to burn the embassy to the ground — a threat that was reported in the Egyptian press the day before the September 11 “protests.”

The State Department knew there was going to be trouble at the embassy on September 11, the eleventh anniversary of al-Qaeda’s mass-murder of nearly 3,000 Americans. It was well known that things could get very ugly. When they did, it would become very obvious to Americans that President Obama had not “decimated” al-Qaeda as he was claiming on the campaign trail. Even worse, it would be painfully evident that his pro–Muslim Brotherhood policies had actually enhanced al-Qaeda’s capacity to attack the United States in Egypt.

The State Department also knew about the obscure anti-Muslim video. Few Egyptians, if any, had seen or heard about it, but it had been denounced by the Grand Mufti in Cairo on September 9. Still, the stir it caused was minor, at best. As Tom Joscelyn has elaborated, the Cairo rioting was driven by the jihadists who were agitating for the Blind Sheikh’s release and who had been threatening for weeks to raid and torch our embassy. And indeed, they did storm it, replace the American flag with the jihadist black flag, and set fires around the embassy complex.

Nevertheless, before the rioting began but when they knew there was going to be trouble, State Department officials at the embassy began tweeting out condemnations of the video while ignoring the real sources of the threat: the resurgence of jihadists in Muslim Brotherhood–governed Egypt, the continuing demand for the Blind Sheikh’s release (which underscored the jihadists’ influence), and the very real danger that jihadists would attack the embassy (which demonstrated that al-Qaeda was anything but “decimated”).

The transparent purpose of the State Department’s shrieking over the video was to create the illusion that any security problems at the embassy (violent rioting minimized as mere “protests”) were attributable to the anti-Muslim video, not to President Obama’s policies and patent failure to quell al-Qaeda.

Because there was a kernel of truth to the video story, and because the American media have abdicated their responsibility to report the predominant causes of anti-Americanism in Egypt, journalists and the public have uncritically accepted the notion — a false notion — that the video caused the Cairo rioting. That acceptance is key to the administration’s “Blame the Video” farce in connection with the lethal attack in Benghazi.

At about 10 p.m. Washington time on the night of September 11 — after they knew our ambassador to Libya had been murdered and while the siege of Benghazi still raged — Secretary of State Clinton and President Obama spoke on the telephone. Shortly afterwards, the State Department issued a statement from Secretary Clinton blaming the video for the atrocity in Benghazi. That was the beginning of the fraud’s Benghazi phase — the phase Susan Rice was prepped to peddle on nationwide television. But it wasn’t the beginning of the fraud.

Secretary Clinton’s minions at the State Department had started spinning the video fraud hours earlier, in Egypt. The sooner Americans grasp that, the sooner they will comprehend the breathtaking depth of the president’s Benghazi cover-up.


TOPICS: Crime/Corruption; Government; News/Current Events; Politics/Elections
KEYWORDS: 20120909; 20120911; 2014election; 2016election; alhasanni; alhassani; andymccarthy; benghazi; benghazicoverup; benghaziemails; benrhodes; blindsheikh; bloodonhillaryhands; cairo; cairoembassy; demagogicparty; egypt; election2014; election2016; fourdead; jaycarney; libya; marklevin; mattlee; mehdialhassani; memebuilding; partisanmediashill; partisanmediashills; prepcall; riceprepcall; susanrice; tweets; victorianuland; video; videomeme; videomyth
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At about 10 p.m. Washington time on the night of September 11 — after they knew our ambassador to Libya had been murdered and while the siege of Benghazi still raged — Secretary of State Clinton and President Obama spoke on the telephone. Shortly afterwards, the State Department issued a statement from Secretary Clinton blaming the video for the atrocity in Benghazi. That was the beginning of the fraud’s Benghazi phase — the phase Susan Rice was prepped to peddle on nationwide television. But it wasn’t the beginning of the fraud.

Secretary Clinton’s minions at the State Department had started spinning the video fraud hours earlier, in Egypt. The sooner Americans grasp that, the sooner they will comprehend the breathtaking depth of the president’s Benghazi cover-up.

1 posted on 05/01/2014 4:38:58 AM PDT by Servant of the Cross
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To: Servant of the Cross
Look at the date, names and timing.
Who are gonna believe?

The corrupt- and MSM-protectors of the undocumented First Moslem by Fraud
..... or your own eyes?


2 posted on 05/01/2014 4:41:15 AM PDT by Diogenesis
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To: Servant of the Cross
For Hillary (and 0bama), it's not the crime, it's the COVER UP. [actually, when four people die due to your dereliction, it's the crime too.)
3 posted on 05/01/2014 4:41:39 AM PDT by Servant of the Cross (the Truth will set you free)
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To: Servant of the Cross

Any bets on what the outcome of all this will be? I am betting “nothing”. Maybe some hearings (always hearings) and then back to Sterling or whatever stupid story the MSM decides is important.

This government makes me sick. Every day something else comes out showing how corrupt it really is and nothing is done by anyone. Discouraging.


4 posted on 05/01/2014 4:43:40 AM PDT by ilovesarah2012
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To: Servant of the Cross

What they never ask is “ Why was Rice put out there and not someone else” She had nothing to do with it.


5 posted on 05/01/2014 4:45:53 AM PDT by DainBramage
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To: ilovesarah2012
Any bets on what the outcome of all this will be? ... Maybe some hearings (always hearings) ... This government makes me sick.

I'm with you sister. On every word. Just damn.

6 posted on 05/01/2014 4:46:01 AM PDT by Servant of the Cross (the Truth will set you free)
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To: Servant of the Cross

My tag line says it all.


7 posted on 05/01/2014 4:46:55 AM PDT by elengr (Benghazi betrayal: rescue denied - our guys DIED - treason's the reason obama s/b tried then fried!)
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To: DainBramage
What they never ask is “ Why was Rice put out there and not someone else” She had nothing to do with it.

Because everyone knows why ... and it can't be permitted to be uttered. She was born with two physical attributes that made her the most sympathetic spokesperson (and insulated her from being questioned too deeply or risk being accused of non-politically correct thought or behavior)for the BIG LIE.

Even better that she had nothing to do with it at all.

8 posted on 05/01/2014 4:50:35 AM PDT by Servant of the Cross (the Truth will set you free)
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To: Servant of the Cross

Is easy to understand the report ... Bookmark and Thank You.


9 posted on 05/01/2014 4:53:11 AM PDT by no-to-illegals (Scrutinize our government and Secure the Blessing of Freedom and Justice)
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To: ilovesarah2012

I never thought I could feel worse about the US Government than I did with Jimmah Carter in the White House.

Man, was I wrong. I am sickened and disgusted. This stuff is intolerable.

America has been stained by these traitors forever because so far they have gotten away with crimes.


10 posted on 05/01/2014 4:54:38 AM PDT by dforest
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To: elengr
Four Dead In BENGHAZI




11 posted on 05/01/2014 4:56:20 AM PDT by Servant of the Cross (the Truth will set you free)
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To: Servant of the Cross

I find it amazing that all of this was done to help in re-election. The Presidential election is the only thing this Administration has ever worried about. Its immigration policies are aimed at the long-term goal of ensuring it doesn’t have to worry in the future.


12 posted on 05/01/2014 4:58:06 AM PDT by Pearls Before Swine
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To: ilovesarah2012

The outcome for Hillary Clinton is certain...she will never be president.


13 posted on 05/01/2014 5:04:32 AM PDT by Hotlanta Mike ("Governing a great nation is like cooking a small fish - too much handling will spoil it." Lao Tzu)
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To: Servant of the Cross

Hillary Benghazi Clinton. Hillary Benghazi Clinton. Hillary Benghazi Clinton. Hillary Benghazi Clinton. Hillary Benghazi Clinton. Hillary Benghazi Clinton. Hillary Benghazi Clinton. Hillary Benghazi Clinton. Hillary Benghazi Clinton. Hillary Benghazi Clinton. Hillary Benghazi Clinton. Hillary Benghazi Clinton. Hillary Benghazi Clinton. Hillary Benghazi Clinton. Hillary Benghazi Clinton. Hillary Benghazi Clinton. Hillary Benghazi Clinton. Hillary Benghazi Clinton. Hillary Benghazi Clinton. Hillary Benghazi Clinton. Hillary Benghazi Clinton. Hillary Benghazi Clinton. Hillary Benghazi Clinton. Hillary Benghazi Clinton. Hillary Benghazi Clinton. Hillary Benghazi Clinton. Hillary Benghazi Clinton. Hillary Benghazi Clinton. Hillary Benghazi Clinton. Hillary Benghazi Clinton. Hillary Benghazi Clinton. Hillary Benghazi Clinton. Hillary Benghazi Clinton. Hillary Benghazi Clinton. Hillary Benghazi Clinton. Hillary Benghazi Clinton. Hillary Benghazi Clinton. Hillary Benghazi Clinton.


14 posted on 05/01/2014 5:20:52 AM PDT by E. Pluribus Unum ("The more numerous the laws, the more corrupt the government." --Tacitus)
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To: Servant of the Cross

Important to read this to the end, as the motivations and the reality aren’t clear until the end.


15 posted on 05/01/2014 5:32:30 AM PDT by G Larry (Which of Obama's policies do you think I'd support if he were white?)
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To: Servant of the Cross

What video do I blame after I hang these traitors from the tree of liberty?


16 posted on 05/01/2014 5:40:48 AM PDT by longfellow (Bill Maher, the 21st hijacker.)
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To: Servant of the Cross

Great article! Thanks for posting.


17 posted on 05/01/2014 5:42:55 AM PDT by TruthShallSetYouFree (Jay Carney: The (Benghazi) emails weren't about Benghazi.)
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To: maggief

I am having trouble finding anything on one of the persons this e-mail went too. Who is Mehdi alhassani?


18 posted on 05/01/2014 6:01:36 AM PDT by crosslink (Moderates should play in the middle of a busy street)
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To: crosslink

Mehdi Alhassani currently serves as Special Assistant to the Deputy National Security Advisor. Prior to that, he served in multiple capacities on the President’s Campaign, Obama for America, from the early days in Iowa and ending the campaign in Minnesota. He has completed a Fulbright Scholarship in Amman, Jordan and is a Magna Cum Laude graduate of the Honors Program at the Elliott School of International Affairs.


19 posted on 05/01/2014 6:07:06 AM PDT by Help!
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To: All
Mmmmmm.....I just can't wait to see what Me-First Hillary's gonna do to resurrect herself from this debacle.

Hillary's been dangerously exposed. But she has a way of bouncing back. CBS will suckup and give her 2-3 segments to explain it all away. For sure CBS will give Hill ample airtime so that she emerges pure and virginal for 2016.

Who can forget Obama and Hillary's love fest on CBS' 60 Minutes?

Obomba hustled Hillary on 60 Minutes to gaze in adoration,
after Hill's arrogant dismissal of the Benghazi massacre before
Congress.

I thought sure Obama was gonna give 'er a B/J on broadcast tv.......he was THAT grateful.

============================================

Maybe the Clintons will even do their Holy Family Act?

The "Holy Family".

20 posted on 05/01/2014 6:12:23 AM PDT by Liz
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