- The Benghazi consulate terrorist attack and cover up.
- The use of the IRS to hamper, harass, and intimidate American citizens and organizations that held political opinions contrary to the Obama administration’s positions and opinions.
- The unauthorized and secret confiscation of confidential telephone logs of Associated Press news reporters by the Obama Justice Department.
Any of these scandals by themselves is indicative of a government that is out of control and at war with its own citizens. It is pretty obvious and certain that when the smoke settles on these three scandals, we will see that there were blatant attacks on citizens’ Constitutional rights for the sole benefit of political gain.
Every American who cherishes freedom, regardless of their political interests and passions, should be disgusted and insulted by these activities that were executed within the halls of Washington government. The audacity of their actions and the feeble excuses and cover ups in response to these scandalous events evoke the image of Nixon and the sorry tale of Watergate and subsequent impeachment.
The stories on these three scandals are exploding so quickly that it is taking some time to get a handle on how far reaching and wretched they are. Until I can get a coherent grasp on everything for summary in this blog, I am going to use the insights of people with far more experience than myself in the next three days to set the groundwork on bad these scandals are.
The first scandal that we will cover today is the lies, cover up, and deceit as they relate to the Benghazi consulate terrorist attack back in September. The best person I found to summarize what is going on is Thomas Sowell and the May 14, 2013 opinion piece he put out entitled, "Lies About Libya," which is reproduced below.
Mr. Sowell is an American economist, social theorist, political philosopher, and author. He is currently the Rose and Milton Friedman Senior Fellow on Public Policy at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University. I have found all of his previous writings on politics and economic matters to be insightful, well thought out, and usually correct even if his correct conclusions were almost always at odds with the American political class.
After his thoughts, I pose some questions of my own that need to be answered so that the four brave Americans who died as a result of this demonstration’s foul ups, cover ups, and possibly illegal activities are not forgotten.
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Lies About Libya
By Thomas Sowell
Tuesday, May 14, 2013
There can be honest differences of opinion on many subjects. But there can also be dishonest differences. Last week's testimony under oath about events in Benghazi on September 11, 2012 makes painfully clear that what the Obama administration told the American people about those events were lies out of whole cloth.
What we were told repeatedly last year by the President of the United States, the Secretary of State, and the American ambassador to the U.N., was that there was a protest demonstration in Benghazi against an anti-Islamic video produced by an American, and that this protest demonstration simply escalated out of control.
This "spontaneous protest" story did not originate in Libya but in Washington. Neither the Americans on duty in Libya during the attack on the consulate in Benghazi, nor officials of the Libyan government, said anything about a protest demonstration.
The highest American diplomat on the scene in Libya spoke directly with Secretary of State Hillary Clinton by phone, and told her that it was a terrorist attack. The president of Libya announced that it was a terrorist attack. The C.I.A. told the Obama administration that it was a terrorist attack.
With lies, as with potato chips, it is hard to stop with just one. After the "spontaneous protest" story was discredited, the next claim was that this was the best information available at the time from intelligence sources.
But that claim cannot survive scrutiny, now that the 12 drafts of the Obama administration's talking points about Benghazi have belatedly come to light. As draft after draft of the talking points were made, e-mails from the State Department pressured the intelligence services to omit from these drafts their clear and unequivocal statement from the outset that this was a terrorist attack.
Attempts to make it seem that Ambassador Susan Rice's false story about a "spontaneous protest" was the result of her not having accurate information from the intelligence services have now been exposed as a second lie to excuse the first lie.
Despite Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's loudly proclaimed question "What difference, at this point, does it make?" the difference is between an honest mistake and a calculated lie to deceive the American people, in order to win an election.
Barack Obama's election campaign oratory had proclaimed the death of Osama bin Laden as an accomplishment of his administration, as part of a general defeat of Al-Qaeda and other terrorists. To admit that these terrorists were still in action, and strong enough to kill an American ambassador and three other Americans in a well-coordinated military style attack, would be a politically devastating admission during the election campaign.
Far better, politically, to come up with a story about a protest demonstration that just got out of hand. This could be presented as an isolated, one-time event, rather than part of a continuing pattern of terrorism by groups that were still active, despite President Obama's spin suggesting that they were not.
The problem with telling a lie, or even a succession of lies, is that a very small dose of the truth can sometimes make the whole thing collapse like a house of cards. The State Department's own foreign service officer Gregory Hicks was in Libya during the attack, so he knew the truth. When threats were not enough to silence him, it was then necessary to try to discredit him.
After years of getting glowing job evaluations, and awards of honors from the State Department for his work in various parts of the world, Mr. Hicks suddenly began to get bad job evaluations and was demoted to a desk job in Washington after he spoke with a Congressman about what he knew. The truth is dangerous to liars.
The Obama administration's excuse for not trying to get help to the Americans in Benghazi while they were under attack — namely, that it would take too long — is as shaky as its other statements. A small fighting unit in Tripoli was ready to get on a plane to Benghazi when they were ordered to "stand down." Other fighting units located outside of Libya are designed precisely for fast deployment — and nobody knew how many hours the attack would last.
But it will take more investigations to determine who gave the order to "stand down," and why. How many new lies that will generate is another question.
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Nice job of putting a ribbon around scandal number one of the Obama administration. I would add the following questions that need to be answered for the sake of the families who unnecessarily lost loved ones in the attack:
- Why was nearby U.S. military help not sent to rescue the two dozen or so consulate employees and workers during the seven hour terrorist siege?
- Who gave the direct order to nearby military resources to “stand down” and not rescue the consulate people?
- Who decided to not blame terrorists for the attack even though it was known almost immediately that this was a terrorist attack and instead manufacture a fictional story that some lame ant-Islam YouTube video caused the attack?
- Did U.S. ambassador to the UN Susan Rice know she was lying about the cause of the attack when she made the rounds on Sunday morning political talk shows with the inane YouTube story?
- Why were high ranking military personnel, who had military responsibility for that area of the world, quickly relieved of duty after the attack? Was it because they disagreed with the stand down order not to save those in need?
- Was this consulate operation actually a covert and illegal CIA front to illegally run guns to Syrian rebels without Congressional approval?
- Was this a botched kidnapping plot between Obama and the Muslim Brotherhood to eventually swap the kidnapped U.S. ambassador with the so-called blind Arab sheik, who is currently in a Federal prison, as part of a political ploy to make Obama look strong going into the November elections, a ploy that was fouled up by two brave Navy Seals on site doing their jobs and ignoring any stand down orders?
- Why were ineffective local people hired to as security guards to protect a U.S. consulate building in one of the most violent places in the world?
- Why were repeated requests for additional security refused for months ahead of the attack by the highest officials in the Federal government, especially the State Department?
- How could State Department procedures be so screwed up and the ambassador so weakly defended that the fatally wounded U.S. ambassador was taken to a local hospital by local Libyan citizens?
- Did the President actually leave the situation room in the White House during the attack, retire to the living quarters of the White House, not inquire about the situation during the seven hour siege, and promptly leave for a campaign fundraising event in Las Vegas the next day while the ruins of the consulate still burned?
- Why were State Department whistle blowers intimidated and demoted for telling the truth about the attack and who is responsible for attempting to suppress the truths they could and should tell?
We will get back into this swill in a little while as we disseminate additional reports but thank the words of Dr. Sowell for putting things into a concise summary of the lies. Until then, please do not forget the faces of those that died for no reason in Benghazi and help everyone seek answers and justice for their families:
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