Here’s the real Benghazi scandal. In an interview on CNN, Congressman Jason Chaffetz (R-UT) says the following:
I think what we’re going to hear is that we didn’t meet the basic, minimum standards required for a facility such as the one we had in Benghazi. And the request for more security personnel went unheeded, unanswered, and consequently, you know, you have the death of four Americans. We [have to] make sure that that doesn’t happen again in Libya. But we also [have to] make sure it doesn’t happen in other places around the world…. We [have to] get at the truth, but thus far it’s been a slippery attempt to try to get the truth because the White House and the Obama administration’s been very slow in giving us the facts.
Later, in the very same interview, he is asked “Is it true that you voted to cut the funding for embassy security?” Chaffetz responds:
Absolutely. Look we have to make priorities and choices in this country. We have… 15,0000 contractors in Iraq. We have more than 6,000 contractors, a private army there, for President Obama, in Baghdad. And we’re talking about can we get two dozen or so people into Libya to help protect our forces. When you’re in touch economic times, you have to make difficult choices. You have to prioritize things.
17 Comments
15,000 contractors for a fake war.
There are those who given a computer are incapable of sending and e-mail. Perhaps with smart phones that is no longer true.
I don’t watch cable news, so… does this issue still exist in the real world? I haven’t heard the word Benghazi anywhere except this website in months. I’m sure IK is reacting to something, but the American population is past this, right?
Republicans in the House have just voted to open up a big new investigation into Benghazi.
And of course, fundraising letters were sent out to their base.
Did all those republican presidents called attacks other than terrorist attacks? Did they give political narrative and talking points to Federal employees?
To help you answer, I think yes, specially George Bush Jr, he used these attacks to show why his policies needed to be continued. For Obama, due to perception that he is weak, he had to do opposite.
So from non-partisan point of view, I just see republicans using/abusing what goes in their favor and attack democrats, and democrats doing the same. There is no doubt in my mind that Obama administration did things to make sure his election does not get affected, similarly republicans do not care much about 4 dead americans other than scoring political points.
The reason I think you are making a false equivalence is that Republicans have abandoned reality in their spree to attack Obama. They attack him for any reason, or for no reason at all.
Did Democrats attack Dubya for the people who were killed at embassy attacks during his administration? Did they keep doing it for two freaking years?
Yes, the Democrats (rightly) attacked Dubya for the war in Iraq, and in response the Republicans (and Fox News) attacked Democrats for being unpatriotic and even treasonous. I see little equivalence.
Also, do you really think that there is perception that Obama is weak, or is it propaganda?
the difference is no American casualties in those attacks, plus no cover up with the White House lying to the public about being a demonstration for 2 weeks when they knew it was terrorist attack.
Iron Knee, as Anna said, Bush did not cover it up with excuse of some unrelated demonstration, he called those things what they were.
I do not think Obama is weak, just has different priorities in world, he takes on smaller guys (civilians mostly) rather than going into wars with big guys (second part is wise, first one is just evil)
According to the NY times the CIA changed the talking points. Sure, the white house may have played a part in this as well but we’ve had so many hearings into this for several months and nothing as come out of it. Even the biggest Obama hater should admit there are more pressing issues for the republicans to look into.
As for Bush and his administration not covering up stuff have you people been living under a rock since the early 90’s? The iraqi invasion went from something necessary to destroy WMD’s to saving Democracy. At the cost of billions of dollars and thousands of lives. No cover up!!????
http://www.cnn.com/2014/05/06/opinion/kohn-benghazi-gop/
Jonah, no cover up on terrorist acts, of course Iraq war (or other wars) were for dubious goals.
Anna your information is completely wrong. 17 Americans died in the 1983 Beirut embassy bombings. 9 Americans were killed in Riyadh (listed on the picture above). I don’t know where the perception came from that diplomats dying is a new thing, and sadly it isn’t even that rare.
There is nothing but hypocrisy when Fox and the God at large rail against the bad handling of the post-attack talking points after being wholly complicit in a war that killed over 1000 times as many Americans. Which, as noted by other commenters, was a war pursued based on lies and manufactured evidence.
My phone corrected GOP to God. I’m not sure what to make of that.
You need a new phone?
Hassan, why are you specifically tied up about covering terrorist attacks? If anything it sounds like you are saying that this is similar to 9/11 the president should have declared it similar to 9/11 and should have invaded a few islamic countries, leading to the death of more americans’s and civilians and a ton more drone bombings than what’s already going on.
Jonah, no I am saying that government should not covered the reality that it was planned terrorist attack due to fear on election consequences. And the point that people are missing (because being hyper partisan), people should be able to criticize Obama, Susan Rice all that were involved without being told that republicans are bad, or what one batch of republicans did 10-20 years ago. It is very easy to point the hypocrisy of other party (both sides do that).
No Jonah, what I think Hassan is trying to say is if Obama’s PR team had just come out and said the embassy was attacked by a terrorist action, than their would be no reaction. Question perhaps, but none of this. However, they said it was the result of a popular uprising over a video.
That being said, I do believe the right is over the top, but with an election on he horizon what else would you expect when haven’t got a record to show. It’s all politics, like when cutting spending to any social welfare program or the sequestration cuts would lead to old people and infants dying of starvation. Both groups are guilty of using irrational arguments to further their political causes.
The left demonized Bush, who I truly believe just like Obama, does love his country and tries to do what they fell is best. And just like Bush received poor information and relied on bad advice from a manipulator in Cheney, Obama too has relied on poor counsel and it has cost him. I think if all president’s would listen to more then their closest advisors they’d make some better decisions. Like when Obama makes a speech from his heart and not a political message he does a terrific job. We need more of that.
There have been countless hearings and thus far where is the proof that the white house deliberately lied about Benghazi being a terrorist attack? In my opinion, the republicans were right to question the white house motives and they held hearings to find out what happened and as far as I know from what I’ve read, there was indeed confusion regarding the true cause of the attack. This would be an outrage if there hadn’t been a 100 hearings held over this already without an outcome. I don’t recall the democrats demanding hearing after hearing and wasting the tax payers money during the bush years. Yes there was plenty of outrage from the democrats and quite rightly so since a lot of previous lives were lost and while 4 lives is no less important the situations are not equivalent in any sense. Quite frankly, as a tax payer I would rather that congress not spend an additional minute on a hearing that is going to achieve nothing but probably increase the air time of blowheards on cable tv.
As for whether the white house is guilty, all the evidence points to that not being the case. Anyone who thinks otherwise has just not looked at the evidence and has made up his/her mind well before looking at the evidence.
Rather than demanding that the white house be made accountable for saying what could very well have been the truth, maybe everyone who is outraged should be demanding better security at the overseas consulates and should be calling their local rep to ensure that the proper funds are being allocated. That would be a better use of our time in my humble opinion.
I can’t disagree. I think the republicans are grasping for political straws. The worst case is Obama and the white house were fed mis-information from below like Bush, but on whole lot smaller scale. I think just like you stated, they investigated and found no real evidence that the white house was leading the mis-information. I think if they investigated Bush’s Whitehouse on the Iraq saga they’d have found he wasn’t driving the train either. Bush’s blunder was much worse then Obama’s, but these are just politically driven at this point. Bush never apologized to my knowledge, so I don’t know why they think Obama should.