Grist For Its Fantasy Mill

Richard Cohen has most brilliantly summed up the confusion over why Republicans simply can't let go of Benghazi.

I feel about the GOP as I do about the religion of others: I don't get it. I know feelings can be strong and reason plays little part in it -- faith is faith, after all -- and this is the way I see the GOP snits about the IRS and, more pertinently, Benghazi. What are these people talking about? 

Four Americans, including Ambassador Chris Stevens, died in the 2012 attack in Benghazi, Libya -- two from mortar fire, and Stevens and another man from smoke inhalation. These deaths are a serious matter for which bureaucratic blame has already been assessed. No one can possibly think the Obama administration knew the attack was coming and let it happen. There is no proof of that. Similarly, no one can still think the White House put the brakes on a rescue attempt by the U.S. military. Again, there is no proof of that. 

So what is Benghazi? Beats me, I am tempted to say. But I recognize it as a transparent Republican attempt to provide the party's base with grist for its fantasy mill. 

Fantasy mill, indeed. Man, they really do love this stuff, don't they?

Is it possible the Obama administration fudged the nature of the attack, refusing to apply the term "terrorist"? Yes, of course. Did the White House spinmeisters put their hands all over it? Could be. But is any of this so momentous that it has required 13 public hearings and now a select House committee that will delve and delve feverishly ... for what? 

I am not sure if this rancorous partisanship is something new in American history or just the same old, same old. But I know that what I am seeing looks both petty and mean. House Speaker John Boehner talks about Benghazi with synthetic solemnity. Fox News dissects it, parsing White House talking points with the ferocious intensity of a hunting dog pointing at some prey. Benghazi, Benghazi, Benghazi. It will show ... It will prove ... It will expose ... What? What the hell are you talking about?

Indeed, what?

Fundraising Off Of Benghazi

Republicans say they want to get to the bottom of what really happened after the Benghazi attack on September 12, 2012 but what they really want to do is fundraise off the tragedy. Check out this line from the NRSC, for example.

Americans deserve the truth about Benghazi and it's clear Democrats will not give it to them. Donate today and elect a Republican Senate majority.

The NRCC is doing it as well.

So, let's see...the lives of the four Americans killed matter as much as the next campaign donation. Got it. Given that Republicans are behind the Democrats in fundraising, it's now quite clear what this latest in a serious of hearings about Benghazi is really all about.  

And I'm still trying to figure out what law was broken by the Obama administration.

The End of the Benghazi Mouthfoam

GOP Rep. Howard “Buck” McKeon, the Republican chair of the House Armed Services Committee, says he’s satisfied with how the US military and the Obama administration responded to the deadly attack on the US consulate in Benghazi, Libya that killed four Americans, including the US ambassador to Libya.The news also exonerates expected Democratic presidential nominee, and then-Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton.

“I think I’ve pretty well been satisfied that given where the troops were, how quickly the thing all happened and how quickly it dissipated, we probably couldn’t have done more than we did,” McKeon said to reporters today, as quoted by AP.

Will they finally leave it alone? Personally, I hope they keep talking about it for the next two years through both election cycles. Between their obsession with the ACA and the IRS, they are like this...

Heaven For The Gun Cult

I believe I have found the perfect place for the Gun Cult: Libya.

Libya, where hundreds of militias hold sway and the central government is virtually powerless, is awash in millions of weapons with no control over their trafficking. 

A central government that is powerless? Holy shit! Someone find me some Kleenex in which I can shoot my load!!! I'm sure now that the country is not a gun free zone violence will drop to nearly zero. Hey, maybe we can finally find out what happened at Benghazi!!

Good Words

Many Americans warmly smiled when former first lady Barbara Bush said “I love Bill Clinton.” The respect and affection between former presidents Clinton and George H.W. Bush is genuine and very American. It hearkens back to an Americanism dating back to the early republic of Jefferson and Adams, which voters would greatly value today, when political opponents collaborated with mutual respect to advance national interests. 

The mudslinging attack by Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) against Clinton is a textbook case of why Kamikaze Republicans lost national elections in 2006, 2008 and 2012. Voters are disgusted by this lowball brand of GOP politics, practiced by politicians who look mean, shallow and small against a former president who is widely liked, admired and respected. Ditto for Republicans addicted to what I recently called their “Benghazi disease,” which has left former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton towering above potential Republican opponents in polling for the 2016 presidential race. 

--Brent Budowsky, The Hill

In addition to voters being disgusted by these sorts of attacks, they also don't take a shine to the far right. The Republicans have a chance to make some real gains this year. Will they be able to resist the catnip of going full on moonbat as they have done in the past four elections?

Retractions, Please

The United States Senate has released its report on the Attack in Benghazi on September 11, 2012. Here are some key takeaways.

The late Christopher Stevens, the American ambassador, has been partially implicated for the failure of adequate security at the diplomatic compound in Benghazi. The report notes that Mr. Stevens was aware of all of the intelligence reporting on Libya, including updates on the increased risks of anti-Western terrorist attacks that had prompted the C.I.A. to substantially upgrade the security at its own Benghazi facility in June 2012.

At times, Mr. Stevens requested additional security personnel from the State Department in Washington. But the inquiry also found that in June 2012, around the time the threats were mounting, Mr. Stevens recommended hiring and training local Libyan guards to form security teams in Tripoli and Benghazi. The plan showed a faith in local Libyan support that proved misplaced on the night of the attack.

During an Aug. 15, 2012, meeting on the deteriorating security around Benghazi that Mr. Stevens attended, a diplomat stationed there described the situation as “trending negatively,” according to a cable sent the next day and quoted in the report. A diplomatic security officer “expressed concerns with the ability to defend post in the event of a coordinated attack due to limited manpower, security measures, weapons capabilities, host nation support, and the overall size of the compound.”

A C.I.A. officer at the meeting pointed out the location of approximately 10 Islamist militias and Al Qaeda training camps within Benghazi, according to the same cable. After reading the cable, Gen. Carter F. Ham, then the commander of the United States Africa Command, called Mr. Stevens to ask if the embassy in Tripoli needed additional military personnel, potentially for use in Benghazi, “but Stevens told Ham it did not,” the report said. A short time later, General Ham reiterated the offer at a meeting in Germany, and “Stevens again declined,” the report said. The same Aug. 16 cable had also promised that requests “for additional physical security upgrades and staffing needs” for the Benghazi mission would be submitted through the Tripoli embassy, but “the committee has not seen any evidence that those requests were passed on by the embassy, including by the ambassador, to State Department headquarters before the Sept. 11 attacks in Benghazi.”

The Senate reports notes that the CIA bolstered its security at the annex, located near the diplomatic compound and actually paid attention to these reports. Stevens and the people at the State Department in DC did not. The person at the State Department specifically responsible for security at diplomatic compounds was Patrick F Kennedy. Kennedy held a similar job in 1998 when two American Embassies in East Africa were bombed. Clearly, Mr. Kennedy is not capable of doing his job and should never be allowed to be responsible in such a capacity again.

Nowhere in the report do we see secret plots or cover ups that we have been hearing squeak from inside the right wing bubble. No evidence that Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama turned down additional security requests. This bloviation can be summed up quite simply as this. Sorry, folks, the president is better at foreign policy and international security than George W. Bush. Deal with it.

With this new information, I'm expecting some retractions from people who claim they can admit when they are wrong. Let's with Kevin Baker and his bullshit lying.

Now What?

Issa on defense over Benghazi statements

On Sunday, “Meet the Press” host David Gregory asked Issa to respond to The Times story, which was published online Saturday. The story also said the Benghazi attacks were “fueled in large part by anger at an American-made video denigrating Islam.”

Here is the full story from the New York Times. I wonder if there will be any retractions and mea culpas from the right wing blogsphere (I'm waiting, Kevin). After all, their investigative abilities and infrastructure is ever bit as extensive as the Times, right? Once again, never buy into right wing hysteria and witch hunts. Invariably, they are just fucking wrong.

And the bubble continues to contract..

CBS and Benghazi

I've gotten more than a few emails wondering what I thought about the CBS News-Benghazi hullabaloo so I guess I better comment about it. My reluctance stems from a now core belief not to feed the insanity inside the right wing bubble. Give them a shining example of how lying about Benghazi is rampant and they will...continue to lie about Benghazi. Why? Because they are adolescents.

Besides, I think Bill Maher did a much better job of summing it all up than I ever could.

“He told a story about Benghazi and the night the s—- went down that was very damning to Obama. And of course, Fox News and the National Review and all the right-wing outlets said, ‘Hey! You gotta watch this!’” Maher said. Maher read a tweet from the National Review’s Jonah Goldberg that said the segment “corroborates” with Fox News’s reporting. “It sure does, ‘cause it turned out to be total bulls—-!” Maher said Maher then asked why there haven’t been retractions from the conservative media who promoted the interview, after it turned out to be a false account.

It will never cease to amaze me how people get sucked into this crap purely based on their emotions and pathological hatred of the president and anyone to the left of the 1 yard line on the right side of the field.

Back To Benghazi

You don't hear much about Benghazi these days as all of the so-called "scandals" have fizzled (except inside the bubble, of course, where they are alive and well). In fact, I think most people missed this book when it came out last February as it didn't fit in with all the established narratives. From the review...

They also state that President Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton learned of the situation too late to do anything about it. I’ve dealt with the State Department and Department of Defense bureaucracies long enough to believe that. They also point out that the consulate in Benghazi was not a true consulate, but a temporary facility. Again, I buy that at face value. In addition, the unselfish heroism of CIA contractors in giving their lives to attempt to save other Americans is not disputable. They were true American heroes. The controversy is that the contractors initiated the rescue mission from the CIA compound despite the guidance of the CIA boss. 

Apparently the book lays quite a bit of the blame over security failures at the feet of the CIA. This is likely why we have not heard much about went wrong at the compound and who was responsible for both the attack and the intelligence. The CIA is very secretive to begin with and are not very keen to mea culpa.

It might be years before we find out what exactly was going on at Benghazi and with the new revelations that Ambassador Stevens may have turned down calls for extra security himself, it may even be more muddy.

How Far Should They Go?

A recent piece in the New York Times echoes what I said yesterday.

With the House set on Friday to convene the first of its hearings into the targeting of conservative groups by the Internal Revenue Service, the lessons learned from the impeachment of President Bill Clinton, which cost Republicans in elections in 1998, have been on display in recent days. Republicans took obvious pains to balance their investigatory zeal with a promise to stay committed to a legislative agenda.

“Our job is to legislate, and we’re trying to legislate things that will help create jobs in our country,” Mr. Boehner said. “But we also have a responsibility, under the Constitution, to provide oversight of the executive branch of government.”

It's going to be interesting to see if they can control themselves.

Scandals Redux

Now that all the dust has settled down from the "big" three scandals things have pretty much played out like I predicted. Conservatives don't really give a shit about the AP phone tapping flap because they hate the media anyway. Hasn't the media always been comprised of traitors and always been a threat to national security? Yes. Yes they have.So no mas on the AP shizzle.

And the IRS flap was greeted by people with a resounding ho hum. The president's approval rating has remained about the same...a little lower of a little higher depending on which outfit you are looking at. It's pretty clear at this point that the IRS was put in a really crappy position by Citizen's United and then went off the rails after that. Had Citizen's not turned out the way it did, the targeting of Tea Party groups would likely have not happened as there would not have been as much pressure to root out the tax dodgers (side note: I'll have post about Apple coming in the next few days).

Benghazi, of course, is still going strong inside the bubble even with people outside of the bubble not really caring about it all. Clearly, this is all the Right has to stop a Hillary Clinton presidency so they are getting an early jump. It continues to amaze me how tone deaf conservatives are on the priorities of voters. This simple fact was summer up recently in my Honors Civics class when students in all three blocks wondered why DC was talking so much about scandals and not actually governing. Even the libertarian kids find the continued personal attacks on the president and Democrats to be counter productive and have wondered to me many times if Republicans simply want to keep losing election after election.

Voters want to see action on immigration, the budget, and jobs. Some Republicans are getting this message and don't want to see a repeat of 1998. But far too many want to "win." That's why I say, keep it up, dudes! We'll take back a few more seats in the House and hold the Senate in 2014 followed by a Hillary Clinton presidency and full control of both houses in 2016 at this rate.

More Often

With seven million people working for the federal government, I'm surprised that we don't here more stories about government fuck ups and hare brained schemes similar to what we have seen in the last few days with the IRS and the Department of Justice. Honestly, it's fundamental sociology. Anytime you increase the number of people from 2 to 3 in any sort of situation, there are going to problems. Infighting, conspiracies, jealousy, and unlawful competition are just a few of the many problems that arise in any group of people. Imagine what sorts of issues seven million people bring to the table let alone trying to keep track of all of them. Why on earth would anyone want to be president? Simply by design, one would know very little about what goes on yet expected to take all of the blame.

This is truly the problem of "big government." Conservatives make the mistake and think that the government acts like a monolith, organized to an evil, Big Brother like perfection. That is completely false. In reality, the government is made up of hundreds of mini-kingdoms who all war with one another and behave in criminal fashion. With these latest two scandals in IRS and the Department of Justice, this fundamental truth will reveal itself.

The IRS story is the one that is really going to hurt, not just the president and the Democrats but the view of the federal government in general (as if it needed any more bad press!) Targeting only conservative groups is simply illegal and shameful. Those involved should be fired as quickly as possible but even then this one is going to linger for a long time.

The AP story will go away fairly quickly because conservatives hate the media and love national security. This whole thing was born out of desire to uncover who was leaking classified information, another thing hated by conservatives (exception: libertarians).We simply don't have enough information at this point to call for Eric Holder's head, although this fact alone would be a highly motivating principle for conservatives to stick around.

The good news for the president? I'd say this is pretty much the end of the non-scandal of Benghazi. That's not really saying much because the IRS story is going to seriously impede the immigration bill, budget talks, and a renewed look at a gun bill. Along with everyone else, I'm interested  to see what information will be uncovered over the next few weeks.

No Shit

More Benghazi Bluster

The Benghazi attacks have resurfaced again in the political world with the same ol' lines and tired reasoning. The mouth foaming about anti-Muslim videos, not using the word "terror," and not providing additional security remind us, once again, which party really embraces the credo "Do it again, only harder" (see also: the Affordable Care Act). Apparently, the Right needs a reminder again of a few key facts.

First, the attack in Benghazi was not on a US Embassy or a consulate. The official word is that it was a "diplomatic mission." In truth, it was a CIA listening station and that's why it was attacked. If you want to bitch about government secrets, that's fine but that means you can't move to crucify guys like Julian Assanges. There are secrets the government is keeping about this location and they have everything to do with why the word "terror" wasn't used and why additional security was not allowed there. The latter was also hampered by lack of funding, another fact that seems to have been conveniently forgotten.

Second, FORMER, not present, Navy SEALS were killed, along with Ambassador Chris Stevens. These men were private contractors working for the CIA. Be honest about this.

Third, this was an extremely destabilized area of the world, not on US soil. We had another attack on September 11th that was on US soil in which there was none of this "outrage" from the Right. Anyone remember that one? We've also had a few other attacks on consulates over the years that (hmmm...) were met with the sound of crickets.

Fourth, just admit that you're pissed off that the anti-Muslim video was brought into the mix because it reveals the rampant bigotry in your population of red faced miscreants. I love the "IT WASN'T THE VIDEO!!! IT WASN'T THE VIDEO!!!" screeches of desperate insecurity combined with the redirect on the president. Methinks thou protest too much...

I realize the Right is trying to find something to latch onto that will stick with the president but nothing is working. So, they keep going over the same ground because they can't find anything new. About time for another vote to repeal Obamacare, isn't it?

Hmm...

And that's the end of the mouth foaming over Benghazi...

Don't Fuck With Hilz

I can't think of a better example of the nature of the GOP these days. They don't want to solve problems. They just want to argue and "win"...something.

It's obvious to me at this point that the reason why the Right is so touchy about this is they want people to forget about that movie trailer. The last thing they need is more bad PR that shows them to be...well...what they are:) Moreover, they simply can't stand the fact that the Obama administration has done a better job on international security than they have. They have been "proved wrong." Heavens! So, it's the classic redirect and lying which result in it somehow being all Obama's fault.

Unfortunately for Ron Johnson, he found out the hard way what happens when you fuck with Hilz.

Where is the Sense?

Peter Bergen's recent piece pretty much jibes with what I have been saying all along regarding the GOP mental meltdown over Benghazi. Mr. Bergen is CNN's national security analyst and the author of "Manhunt: The Ten-Year Search for bin Laden -- From 9/11 to Abbottabad."

What is the Republican theory of the case against Rice? It appears to boil down to the idea that leading Democrats covered up the involvement of terrorists in some way connected to al Qaeda in the Benghazi attack during the run-up to the close presidential election because President Obama and others in his administration had for some time said that al Qaeda was close to strategic defeat.

I guess that's it but, again, I have to wonder...where was the outrage after 9-11? Then we had 3000 civilians killed on our home soil in the worst attack in US History. This was an attack in a massively destabilized country on a CIA listening station (not an embassy or consulate as is commonly thought) with a US Ambassador, who knew the risks, two CIA contractors and a Navy seal losing their lives. To the Right, this means that all of our women and children were raped/tortured/killed by Islamists whilst they were shitting on the flag.

Anyway, Bergen raises an interesting question, which I put to all of you..

Does this case make sense? First, you would have to accept that Obama, Rice and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton all knowingly deceived the American public about what had happened at the Benghazi consulate.

Second, it was the intelligence community, not officials at the White House or State Department, that eliminated from the talking points used by Rice after the Benghazi attack the suspected involvement of the Libyan jihadist group, Ansar al-Sharia.

That's right. How do we know this?

According to accounts of former CIA director David Petraeus' closed door testimony about Benghazi to congressional intelligence committees earlier this month, the intelligence community eliminated references to Ansar al-Sharia in the talking points so as not to tip off members of the terrorist group that the CIA believed that they were responsible for the attack.

The conspiracy therefore was not to mislead the American public but to mislead America's enemies.

Hmmm...sounds familiar, eh?

If Rice had gone beyond her unclassified talking points and said that Ansar al-Sharia was suspected to be behind the Benghazi attacks, no doubt she would now be being hounded for the unauthorized disclosure of classified information.

Exactly.

Bergen also raises a third point that isn't discussed enough.

Third, it is worth recalling that whenever there is a news event in a chaotic country on the other side of the world, first accounts about the event are often wrong. Remember the erroneous reports about another big news event last year; the death of Osama bin Laden. Initially, it was portrayed by the Obama administration that bin Laden had died during a firefight with U.S. forces in Pakistan and had used his wife as a human shield. As more accurate information subsequently came in from the field, administration officials clarified that bin Laden put up no resistance and had not used his wife as a shield. This is not conspiracy; this is the fog of war.

If the Obama administration had said, "We don't know what happened" how would that have honestly looked? McCain and his little band of pants squirters know this and they are just playing politics.

Some more great points...

It is also worth recalling that the situation in Benghazi was so chaotic and dangerous that it took three weeks for the FBI to get in to the city to investigate what had happened at the consulate. And it took even more time for the facts to emerge that the Benghazi mission wasn't really a consulate in any conventional sense, but was more of a CIA listening station and that two of the four Americans who had died in the attack weren't diplomats as initially portrayed but were, in fact, CIA contractors.

Facts, folks, are stubborn things.

I have no doubt that the witch hunt is going to continue and accusations will be flying around about cover-ups and the suffix "gate" is going to be attached to all of this. But I predict that right around that time or maybe a little after, we're going to catch some of the guys that were responsible for the attack and then the truth will come out.

And that's when McCain and the others are going to realize why the GOP keeps losing elections.