Thursday, May 09, 2013
Benghazi Hearings
I watched a good bit of the House Oversight Committee hearings on Benghazi yesterday. They were riveting. High ranking career diplomats testified, under oath, that the attacks on the Benghazi were terrorist attacks, that there was never any question that they were demonstrations in response to the Mohammed video, that attempts on the ground to come to the aid of the Benghazi consulate were thwarted from much higher up, that a coverup was put in place immediately following the America deaths, and that those who did not participate received angry calls from the administration and suffered retaliation. But an even more important story is that the "mainstream media" still finds this not really newsworthy. New York Times did manage to do a half decent job of covering some highlights this morning, but the MSM reaction is largely either to dismiss this as a witch hunt by Republicans or as a confusing story of conflicting claims on which good people can reasonably differ... both positions are deeply dishonest.
But really there's nothing here. For example, Washington Post's "Fact Check" assures us:
I gather that this comment from NYT must be interpreted in the same fashion.
If the testimony did not fundamentally challenge the facts and timeline of the Benghazi attack and the administration’s response to it, it vividly illustrated the anxiety of top State Department officials about how the events would be publicly portrayed.
Well, the testimony did fundamentally change the facts and timeline of the administration response. But then NYT doesn't claim it didn't, it just says if it didn't...using a construction that says there was no change but later can be twisted to include the possibility there was.
I think the hearings confirm two things. 1) the current administration, including the president and the former Secretary of State, are enemies of the United States, pursuing their own power and own agendas, and 2) the MSM is far more interested in running interference for the, for political reasons, than in reporting news.
The media is working to protect a corrupt administration that is trying to fundamentally change America. This is very dangerous.
Update: I suppose that by now everyone knows that the CIA has been smuggling arms to Syria, and has heard that Ambassador Stevens' trip to Benghazi might have been irelated.
But really there's nothing here. For example, Washington Post's "Fact Check" assures us:
The administration also has come under fire for repeatedly pointing to an anti-Muslim video as the source of the protests, and thus by implication the attack in Benghazi. We covered a lot of this in our extensive timeline on Benghazi statements, but it is worth noting that in many cases, a direct line between the video and the attack was never quite connected; it was simply implied.
Here, for instance, is Clinton speaking at the transfer of remains ceremony on Sept. 14:
“This has been a difficult week for the State Department and for our country. We’ve seen the heavy assault on our post in Benghazi that took the lives of those brave men. We’ve seen rage and violence directed at American embassies over an awful Internet video that we had nothing to do with. It is hard for the American people to make sense of that because it is senseless, and it is totally unacceptable.”
Note that Clinton never really combines the Benghazi attack and the video, but leaves them as separate elements. It was clearly carefully written — a fact we confirmed with an administration official.
Yeah, right. It's astounding WaPo "Fact Check" can print this kind of BS and still have even a shred of public credibility. Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, and Susan Rice all repeatedly claimed that the video was responsible for the attack, and there's ample evidence that they knew this was not true. I gather that this comment from NYT must be interpreted in the same fashion.
If the testimony did not fundamentally challenge the facts and timeline of the Benghazi attack and the administration’s response to it, it vividly illustrated the anxiety of top State Department officials about how the events would be publicly portrayed.
Well, the testimony did fundamentally change the facts and timeline of the administration response. But then NYT doesn't claim it didn't, it just says if it didn't...using a construction that says there was no change but later can be twisted to include the possibility there was.
I think the hearings confirm two things. 1) the current administration, including the president and the former Secretary of State, are enemies of the United States, pursuing their own power and own agendas, and 2) the MSM is far more interested in running interference for the, for political reasons, than in reporting news.
The media is working to protect a corrupt administration that is trying to fundamentally change America. This is very dangerous.
Update: I suppose that by now everyone knows that the CIA has been smuggling arms to Syria, and has heard that Ambassador Stevens' trip to Benghazi might have been irelated.
