Benghazi hearing thread
[BUMPED UP]
Say what you will.
More details here
Also, see Bryan Preston’s live-blogging of the hearings.
UPDATE: Preston summarizes the hearings here. He points out that the timing was bad, but I disagree. I don’t think the timing, or the hearings’ length, or anything else of that sort mattered in the least. Why? Because the MSM is determined to minimize this, and always was determined to minimize it.
I truly don’t know what it would take to break though that barrier. We’ve had information right from the start that should have raised a million red flags—and that would have, if a Republican had been in charge. If Republicans had been in charge we would almost have heard of nothing else since September 11, 2012.
But they weren’t, and we didn’t, and we won’t. And if the American people don’t care, I don’t think there’s anything that can be done to make them care.
Some Democratic protectors.
Ms. Norton
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eleanor_Holmes_Norton
She is a member of the Congressional Progressive Caucus and the Congressional Black Caucus.
Elijah Cummings:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elijah_Cummings
Cummings is a member of the Congressional Progressive Caucus. He served as Chairman of the Congressional Black Caucus during the 108th United States Congress.
Mr. Tierney
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_F._Tierney
Tierney, described as “an unwavering liberal” by CQ’s Politics in America, has consistently high approval ratings from Democratic and liberal interest groups such as Americans for Democratic Action, and low approval ratings from conservative groups such as the American Conservative Union.
First two witnesses apparently gave heartfelt emotional testimony.
From Yahoo News: “Eric Nordstrom, a former regional security officer in Libya, teared up and his voice broke as he told the packed committee room that he wants the full story to come out. “It matters,” he said. “It matters.”
Damn right it matters — if not for a nation somnolent, obtuse, and corrupt, then for the historical record.
Committee chairman Issa apparently invited the authors of the State Department-commissioned independent probe into the tragedy, Tom Pickering and Mike Mullen, to testify and they refused. Craven little shit bastards.
Again from Yahoo News:
Rep. Elijah Cummings, the panel’s top Democrat, used his opening statement to offer a rebuttal of what he denounced as “irresponsible allegations” that the administration withheld military assets that might have made a difference. He accused Issa of suggesting a high-level “conspiracy” grouping top military officers who have testified that the Pentagon did everything it could.
“I am not questioning the motives of the witnesses,” Cummings said. “I am questioning the motives of those who want to use their statements for political purposes.”
So the motives of the witnesses may indeed be for the truth to come out but better the truth stay hidden than the administration, State, the Pentagon, the CIA take political hits should the truth be politically damaging. Has there ever been as duplicitous a congregation in American history as the present Democratic Party?
And Anderson “scoop” Cooper and the rest of MSM will spend the entire week with cameras trained for 24 hours on a house in Cleveland, interviewing neighbors of Ariel Castro. And Americans will stare at the front of that chamber of horrors until the Benghazi hearings are over with. 90% of Americans will know every detail about how many barbeques he attended, while the same percentage will not even recognize the word Benghazi.
Any deposition requires a court reporter, a defending attorney, and a chance for the deposed to read the transcript and add amendments to his previous testimony. Hick’s just stated there was no reporter and he was not given the opportunity to review his testimony. He also stated some deponents were not represented.
Incredible that at this high a level that the basic rights and process was denied.
Chaffetz is givin em hell.
I like this guy.
Since “Death Is A Part Of Life” all one can say is “What difference does it make?”
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2013/05/08/dem_congressman_at_benghazi_hearing_death_is_a_part_of_life.html
Death is a part of life!
Elijah Cummings strikes again.
Fuck term limits and age requirements. Minimum IQ requirements.
In all likelihood, there won’t be any immediate result from the hearings. But in 2014? And if Ted Cruz runs in 2016 and so does Clinton? Oh yeah. The hearings will be used to good effect then.
I’m not sure what I was hoping for today. The press/media/Dem establishment is completely beholden to naked power without truth or justice. And their supporters right along with it. I’m glad these guys had a chance to speak on the record. I hope it deep-sixes Hillary’s ambitions at the very least. But as a nation, I think we’re already lost. It’s all very sad.
Sad indeed. Apparently Sharyl Attkinsson’s Twitter feed stopped abruptly a few minutes into the hearings. Sounds like CBS walked her out of the building.
I am so stunned and depressed about the way things have deteriorated in this country — the numbness and the dumbness. I’m not a conspiracy-monger, but I honestly wonder if they’re putting something in the water.
Here’s what I get from these hearings and all that has gone before:
1. The proper level of security for Benghazi was not supplied. Although this decision may have been made lower down, the ultimate responsibility for this lies with Hillary Clinton, the SOS.
2. The DOD and DOS were both caught off guard on 9/11, a day when they should have had forces on standby for just such an attack.
That both were caught off guard indicates dereliction of duty. They can say there was no intelligenece indicating the need for extra precautions on that particular 9/11. No, but we know these Islamic terrorists put great importance on historic dates. To know your enemy is to be prepared.
3. The Whitehouse, CIA, DOD, and DOS all knew this was a premeditated terrorist attack by 9/12. Yet they chose to say it was due to a violent demonstration triggered by an anti-Islam video. The reason for this coordinated effort at subterfuge isn’t clearly known. However, most pundits are opining that it was because Obama wanted it to appear that his administration had completely neutralized the threat from Islamist terrorists. (Osama bin Laden is dead, General Motors is alive!) I agree with the pundits, but it would be nice to get it from the mouth of the person who authorized the Susan Rice talking points.
4. The investigation by Pickering and Mullen (ARB) was careful not to consider top level decision making. Additionally, it appears that nothing has been done to make sure this never happens again.
5. Obama swore we would get the criminals (not terrorists) that carried out the attack. It’s eight months later and the FBI seems to have done little or nothing to make that oath come true. Another example of why it’s a lousy idea to judicialize the War on Terror.
There was an area of politically damaging testimony, and it was the second-in-command (Hicks?)’s testimony re there being no protest, re instant State Dept knowledge that there was no protest, and re his own shock and shame at Susan Rice’s comments.
Combined with Stephen Hayes’ revelation of the edited talking points for Rice: the Hicks testimony presents a problem for an Obama and a Hillary who continuously claimed the video was the motive. Obama and Hillary made this claim to the parents of the murdered. Obama made this claim to the U.N., during Presidential debates, and during the campaign.
The POTUS might be forced to explain why he misled the American public. I am with PJ Media’s
Roger Simon: Benghazi is a worse Presidential scandal than Watergate.
An aside:
A separate bit of Hick’s testimony amounted to: we State Dept. personnel in Tripoli fled, but we fled bravely. I am so proud of my fellow State personnel for fleeing Tripoli so bravely.
Irritating.
BHO, HRC, and Panetta all have a great deal of explaining to do. The senate hearing where HRC pounded her fists and screeched “Was it because of a protest or was it because of guys out for a walk one night and decided they’d go kill some Americans? What difference — at this point, what difference does it make?” was a sorry affair with McCain pretending to be hardboiled but showed her complete deference . The House needs to subpoena everyone in the administration involved in this coverup and conduct the investigation in a manner similar to a prosecuting attorney in a murder trial. Oh, and they also need to investigate the ARB, in particular Pickering and Mullin need to explain their ‘investigative’ coverup.
Let the Hunger Games begin.
…if a Republican had been in charge. If Republicans had been in charge we would almost have heard of nothing else since September 11, 2012.
The mask hasn’t just slipped, it’s completely off. What we see is that to Dems political scandals are nothing but political opportunities. And it confirms what I’ve always believed, going all the way back to the grand daddy of them all in 1973. Watergate was a political coup far more than anything else.
mizpants, holmes: me too.
Parker-
McCain is a disgrace. If the republicans and this investigation are to go anywhere, they need to keep him as far away from a microphone as possible. With a few exceptions, for example Ted Cruz, the whole lot of them are more like an ivy league fraternity than a body of serious legislators. Policy and the country’s best interests take a back seat to their club rules.
But.. I’m not sure Boner will be much better if an investigation is convened. All the MSM need to do is run a few negative stories, crank out a push poll showing the public thinks the republicans are bullies, and he’ll fold like a deck chair.
I’m being my usual cynical self, but it seems the worse the offense by this administration, the harder the media work to excuse them of it, and turn it back on the republicans. Unless some of them break ranks and recognize they’re setting the table for more dead bodies, this thing will just be another racist attack on their guy. But I don’t think they care how many people are killed in the name of protecting this fraud from criticism, much less resignation.
Some of the innocently ignorant, the emotional libs, will have to go to some really dark places to support their guy and their votes and their views.
Places they would never have thought of themselves being.
And none of them, not one, will hesitate an instant.
Mrs Whatsit, mizpants, holmes:
Me three. Sad indeed.
Stuart-the-man has a nice follow up on Ben Rhodes:
http://stuartschneiderman.blogspot.com/
Oddly, I am a bit hopeful, if Tearful John holds up.
This is in NO way comparable to Watergate. It is a zillion times worse. Then, the Repubs joined in the clamor for truth; today the wretched Dems don’t care.
If Mitt had been worth a piss, he would have seized this and won. Even if the MSM stonewalls-as it is and will- the word will get out. Joe and LaJuan and Jose Sixpack won’t stand for US grunts being wasted like stray dogs. And if they do, the country’s done, been done.
I will check with my liberal housekeeper tomorrow.
Don Carlos:
Romney should have seized this.
But he would not have won.
Ace had two terrific posts today, both concerning the media:
Washington Post Breaks Benghazi Scandal Wide Open
CBSNews Bigs Fret That Sharyl Attkisson is Coming “Dangerously Close to Advocacy”
Both are worth reading in their entirety. An excerpt:
No question about it, the media are the enemy, and possibly our most dangerous enemy.
Not to put too fine a point on it, but when the SHTF, they will be legitimate targets.
Want to see the other side’s disgusting spin:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/05/08/benghazi-hearing_n_3240750.html
“No question about it, the media are the enemy, and possibly our most dangerous enemy.”
This is beyond question, the MSM is the primary enemy of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.
“Not to put too fine a point on it, but when the SHTF, they will be legitimate targets.”
If/when the caca meets the rapidly oscillating blades; focus on the target and the front sight. If you can’t put 5 rounds in a 2 inch circle at 200 yards wait until you can see the whites of their eyes. 😉
“Want to see the other side’s disgusting spin”
It was/is an incompetent coverup. I used to be more tolerant, but 4 dead in Benghazi swept my tolerance away. Now I visualize maggot bloated bodies twisting in the wind, so shall it come to pass. The left does not realize they are rushing towards a confrontation where they can not prevail. I shall shed no tears of pity or compassion. Let the Hunger Games begin.
http://directorblue.blogspot.com/2013/05/red-alert-action-required-benghazi.html
Some good thoughts and expression of outrage.
Sorry to disagree, Neo. But Romney didn’t seize Benghazi. Sure he was better than Hussein, but that’s not saying much in a positive vein. That Mitt did not seize Benghazi exemplifies why he lost against a malicious, mealymouthed conniver. Mitt took punch after dirty punch, kept smiling, shook his head to clear the cobwebs, and seldom punched back…no way to win a fight.
If you don’t fight in the ring, the fight fans won’t like you either. If you lose fighting hard, you’ll win a lot of fans despite your defeat.
Mitt doesn’t have a lot of fans.
Don Carlos:
Who said that Romney did seize Benghazi? Perhaps you need to read my comment again. I said he should have done so, not that he did. He most definitely did not, which was very disappointing to me.
However, that’s not why he lost. The people who voted for Obama would not have cared about Benghazi in the least.
Two points:
I was dismayed, but probably not surprised, to hear the convoluted process required to reach a decision for action. It goes to the Under -secretary, then to the deputy level, then to some committee, then to the person who exercises command authority. (That is a fictional description of the process that I heard; but a reasonably accurate reconstruction of the number of steps and levels that were presented in testimony.).
Secondly, and most importantly, the most basic tenet of operational response was ignored; and has not been discussed. We have heard over and over that any military response was hours away. Well, in the world that I knew, that response would have been launched the moment that trouble was evident. The fact that they had hours to fly, gave the command authority ample time to recall them if that turned out to be the ultimate decision. That is the manner that any operational decision maker, I should say any competent operational decision, maker, would have reacted. I repeat, the concept is so basic, that it is sickening to hear the excuses.
How it must cheer our enemies to know how little rapid response capability and how few assets we have in that arena–North Africa and Southern Europe.
How they must laugh to hear that a response group ready to board a plane was forced to stand down. The plane did leave and fly to Benghazi.
We would never send an ambulance somewhere without an emergency medical technician, even if there was a chance it would be too late. If you don’t send the trained people, you guarantee they will be too late.
Ben Ghazi? who he?
The liberal asshats know the answer to the old riddle: “If a tree falls in the forest and no one hears it, does it make a sound?”
Liberal Asshat: “What tree?”
The guns of justice are empty in America, when it comes to Leftist politicians, and they have been empty for a long time. Now the bastards know it.
Good for Issa for making an attempt, but I agree with Preston that it should have been spread over several days. Drip, drip, drip. . . .
And See-BS’s “news” site has the story, far down on the page, with scare quotes around the word “whistleblowers.”
Nice.
Lastly, I don’t believe the weak tea excuse that HRC wanted Stevens to open a branch embassy/consulate in Benghazi. Whisky tango foxtrot? Srsly? He was raped to death, then we see the pictures of the crowd of Muslim fanatics dragging him through the streets, nearly dead, and the Admin tells us they were “trying to help him get to the hospital”??? Mogadishu all over again.
One other thing: lost in all this is the Egyptian Christian man who made the video to protest the — Massacres — of the Coptic Christians at the hands of the moslems.
I saw the video: did any of you watch it? He merely dramatized [first] the slaughter of innocent Christians by the moslems; then he dramatized the life of Mohammed as told by the koran. Didn’t make any of it up. Granted, he did it in a satirical way, and the production values were poor, but the IMPORTANT thing is that Christians are being slaughtered over there, and this one man who protested it is Still In Jail: not all the BS about production values.
IOW, he’s a religious and political prisoner, shades of the Soviet Union. Funny how no one ever mentions his name. He has been stuffed into Hussein’s memory hole.
Christians are still dying at the hands of the moslems around the world. What grounds are they using to hold this guy? The “Free Mumia” crowd will march in the streets and cheer for their cop-killer scum, but this man? Who hoped to awaken SOMEBODY to the horrors of islam? Yeah, we gotta understand them.
Well said, Beverly.
Barry: Talk Radio aka Rush, Levin and maybe Hannity routinely say that the producer that made the video is still being held on a parole violation. Granted it isn’t a lot, but he is remembered. Otherwise he is a “disappeared” person to the MSM.
There are others that have felt the backlash for not towing the “party” line. I think there were 3 generals/ admiral that were removed from their commands shortly afterwards. I only remember the one case, where the DOD lap dogs said this admiral had used “profane language” in public and was removed. Yes that sounds like a valid reason to me/sarc. There is some speculation that in each of these cases when they were told to “stand down” they chose principles and honor over politics.
Will we ever have that type of person in politics again? One can only pray.
Due to other obligations, I missed a lot of the news last evening, so was hoping to catchup this a.m. BUT, even Drudge and Fox have NOTHING on the hearings posted. Whiskey Tango Foxtrot?! Indeed.
And if the American people don’t care, I don’t think there’s anything that can be done to make them care.
You know what might make them care? If the information were actually presented to them. Instead the MFM stonewalls, obfuscates and lies. People don’t think this is important because they’ve been told that it’s not important by people they, um, trust. Yeah, that in of itself is a bad sign for this country.
The people for Obamaca and the Left, never did care about whether Americans died or not. That was true in 2003 for Iraq and it is still true. Recognizing the true face of one’s enemies is a requirement to victory.
The US, however, neither knows their enemies nor do they know themselves. They are strategically crippled now a days.
The American people will begin to care when their hearts are allowed by 100 WACOs. Only when people suffer, do they start thinking about changing the present and future of the world. Not until then.
Without hate in their hearts for evil, people have no motivation to sacrifice for any common goal. After all, evil promises life long welfare, free young girls to have sex with and export in porn for profit while also getting abortion profits.
Neo – this is pretty obvious, but I will say it anyway. The American people don’t care because they rely on the media to tell them what to care about. Public opinion isn’t necessarily what people know themselves, it’s what they’ve been conditioned when to care about it.
When unemployement was 4% under Bush I, the media convinced the public the economy was on the brink of disaster and nobody had a job.
Gun control, gay marriage, and immigration reform are naturally at the bottom of the average American’s list of things to worry about, but if the media talk about every day, and tell them it’s things like “this is a probem that affects thousands of Americans”, they will eventually poll at the top of the list. They may not know anything about those important topics, but the response is properly conditioned.
I don’t know about anyone else here, but I can’t count the times in a week where I say something to somebody about something i think is of common interest or would be, and I get the response “where did you hear that?” “I haven’t heard that”. And then it’s quite difficult to get intelligent people to simply take interest in it – because they haven’t heard it before.
The media not only decides what to report, they have conditioned people to believe it’s only important if they talk about it. B.F. Skinner is probably laughing somewhere.
Neo- You are arguing as a lawyer would. I did not say that he was charged with not seizing Benghazi.
I said he did not seize it, should have, as one symptom of why he lost. But you want to blame the stupids who succumbed to Hussein’s blandishments, apparently: He would have lost even if he’d seized Benghazi. Sorry– You cannot prove a negative.
Don Carlos: I think you may still be misunderstanding what I’m saying.
I did not say that YOU said that he “was charged with not seizing Benghazi.” My point is that I AGREED with you that he should have gone after Benghazi more, I didn’t disagree.
You and I do disagree, however, on what effect it would have had. On that we are disagreeing on a matter of opinion, because neither of us has a way of knowing what the result would have been. But from all of my observations and talks with people I know who are neither on left or right but who could (at least theoretically) have gone either way in this election, the reason they didn’t vote for Romney came through loud and clear. Almost all were in agreement, and their reasons also agreed with what the polls said, and those reasons had nothing whatsoever to do with Benghazi, about which they could not have cared less and still do not care in the least. Nor did it have to do with the amount of fight Romney had, nor anything of the sort. It had to do with the 47% remark and the fact he was perceived by them as not caring about or understanding the little people, and that they thought Obama did care about them.
This seems to have been the major swing point for the election. It seems absurd to me (Obama? Care???) but that’s the way it was.
I believe that Romney saw the handwriting on the wall with respect to Benghazi. The Candi Crowley debate delivered a pretty powerful message that he was not going to get traction; so he put his emphasis elsewhere.
Too bad; but that was the situation. Six months after the election, and with all that has come out, it is still a struggle to get the media, and the masses, to focus.
But, some will continue to knock Romney for not achieving the impossible. It is cheap and easy.
One final thought. I said during the campaign that there would be hell to pay if Conservatives could not bring themselves to support Romney. I stand by that. “You reap what you sow”, is not a cliche; it is a truism.
Speculsting about a negative election outcome is speculation, pure and simple.
What is not speculation is the fact that Mitt dropped the Benghazi ball. A fact.