Posted on 05/13/2013 7:21:20 AM PDT by Kaslin
What were Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton thinking? Why did they keep pitching the line that the 9/11/12 Benghazi attack that killed Ambassador Christopher Stevens and three other Americans started as a spontaneous protest against an anti-Muslim video?
One possible explanation is confusion. There was such an attack on our embassy in Cairo earlier that day that fit that description.
When Hillary Clinton on Sept. 14 talked of a "mob" and "violent attacks" over the caskets of the Americans slain in Benghazi, she could have been referring to the attacks in Cairo. In that case, she would not exactly be lying, as many have charged.
But she would have been misleading people, quite possibly intentionally. We know that she assured one victim's father, Charles Wood, that "we're going to prosecute that person that made the video."
Not entirely successfully, by the way. "I knew she was lying," Woods said after the House committee hearing on Benghazi last week.
It's hard to escape the conclusion that Clinton was knowingly attempting to mislead. She certainly knows the difference between Cairo and Benghazi.
And it's undisputed that Gregory Hicks, the No. 2 man in our Libya embassy, reported that it was an "attack" on Sept. 11. That was the word he heard in his last conversation with Chris Stevens.
It's undisputed as well, after testimony at the House committee hearing last week, that Beth Jones, acting head of State's Near Eastern Division, emailed on Sept. 12 that "the group that conducted the attacks, Ansar al-Shariah, is affiliated with Islamic terrorists."
That email went to Clinton counselor Cheryl Mills and State Department spokesman Victoria Nuland, among others. You may remember Mills as one of the lawyers defending Bill Clinton in his impeachment trial.
On Sept. 15, the day after Clinton's assurances to Woods, State Department and White House officials prepared talking points for members of Congress and for Ambassador to the U.N. Susan Rice, who was scheduled to go on five Sunday talk shows the next day.
Who chose Rice as the administration's spokesman? As Barack Obama said after the election, when she was reportedly under consideration to be the next secretary of state, Rice had "nothing to do" with Benghazi.
Selecting which officials go on the Sunday talk show is a White House function. Either the president or someone who had good reason to believe he was reflecting his wishes selected someone who was out of the loop on the issue.
The expectation must have been that she would say exactly what she was told -- and would not betray any inconvenient facts known to those in the loop like Clinton.
The Weekly Standard's Stephen Hayes got hold of the series of Sept. 15 emails in which White House and State Department officials prepared the talking points.
Deleted were references to warnings State received before Sept. 11 of Ansar al-Sharia and al-Qaida-linked attacks in Benghazi. Nuland describes these as "issues ... of my building leadership."
The final talking points said "the currently available information suggests that the demonstration in Benghazi were spontaneously inspired by the protests at the U.S. Embassy in Cairo and evolved into a direct assault against the U.S. diplomatic post and subsequently its annex." Rice went on TV and parroted the line.
That was refuted by Hicks. The video was a "non-event" in Libya, he told the House committee. And he testified that he was chastised by none other than Mills for briefing Republican Rep. Jason Chaffetz without a lawyer present.
The FBI did not find time to interview Hicks. But State did find time to yank him out of his job and give him a desk job he regards as a demotion.
Obama continued to attribute the Benghazi attack to a protest against a video on Sept. 18 ("Letterman"), Sept. 20 (Univision) and Sept. 25 ("The View" and the United Nations).
There were obvious cynical political motives for attempting to mislead voters during a closely contested presidential campaign.
Obama did not want his theme of "Osama is dead, al-Qaida is on the run" to be undercut by an Islamist terrorist attack on our ambassador.
Clinton did not want her department's denial of pleas for additional security in Libya to become known.
But maybe they were also trying to deceive themselves. Which may be even more disturbing.
The video lie was for the American public.
I’m sure there was some highly ‘classified’ lie tailor made for Romney - one that made him feel ‘in’... and made him drop the subject...
And another lie for Military brass - all puffed up with self importance and concerns about cushy jobs after retirement...
Yeah, the twerps knew... the lies were well thought out... My guess is the CIA helped with the ‘video’ clip lie... or maybe it was some dem PR firm... YouTube knows how the numbers came in - they went from almost nothing to hundreds of thousands in minutes.. YouTube would have a record of the lie if some member of the MSM called them...
Hey Washington Post - you still there?
Michael Barone has a mind like a steel trap.
Lie now, get reelected and then deal with "it" later was Obama's directive to Hillary.
The two felons actually paid a hollywood producer to film an infomercial to air in Islamic countries apologizing for their famous “the video did it” claim. They aired it all over Islam about a week after Benghazi. They paid millions to pedal the story they knew was a lie.
They only care about winning an election. Lying is the liberal/progressive way of life.
Probably just filled with immense hubris that, based on past experience, the MSM would continue to carry their water on ANY LIE they might choose to put out there.
“Did Clinton and Obama Believe Their Benghazi Baloney?”
Of course they did. They both suffer from GCS — “George Costanza Syndrome” — “It’s only a lie if you think it is a lie.”
That is getting a bit off the topic of election lies....but...
For example , say the police are investigating a crime.... and say you are the suspect....they can tell you all the lies they want to get you to confess, or plea, or give up evidence... and still use it in court against you.
But you lying to police in the same context is illegal.
“The presidents job was to win the election, that’s what he is supposed to do” - Geraldo Rivera, regarding Benghazi
Answer: They have lied so often that they have lost the capacity to discriminate between truth and falsehood.
"He is known for being the principal author of The Almanac of American Politics, a reference work concerning US governors and federal politicians, and published biennially by National Journal. The Almanac has been called "definitive and essential for anyone writing seriously about campaigns and Congress." - Wiki you know who.
Why did they continue to lie?
Simple enough once you remember Hillary’s an attorney. She’s not very good at it, but she is an attorney and she thinks like one.
It’s your standard two bit attorney trick.
By repeating a lie that is so obviously a lie only an idiot would believe it, you can make people believe something else which also isn’t true.
People will believe what they want to believe although it isn’t true.
In this case they repeated the attack was a “spontaneous” response to a protest in Egypt so people would repeat over and over there was no connection to the protest and the attack.
They want people to believe the “spontaneous” lie was a lie created in response to the attack.
In reality the “spontaneous” lie was created before the attack.
The attack was planned then they planned the protest in Egypt to create the spontaneous lie.
At the very minimum the Obama adm. had to know about the attack months in advance in order to create the “spontaneous” lie.
Since the “spontaneous” lie is so outrageous no one above the level of idiot would believe it, we’re back to cheap attorney tricks again.
Projection. Accuse someone else of being guilty of what you have done.
Since everyone agrees the attack was planned, go back and listen to Hillary’s comments after the attack and see if you can figure out from what Hillary said, exactly who Hillary was planning on blaming it on.
Once you learn how to listen to a two bit attorney they will tell you everything you want to know.
Hillary’s no exception.
It wasn’t confusion. If it was confusion, they could have cleared up the confusion in a later statement. It was an effort to cover up their roles before the election.
No, they didn’t believe it...but they expected the low-information voters to believe it, and so far their bet appears to be holding.
Michael Barone, apologist for Big Government. If these hacks are this devious, they aren’t worth a bucket of warm spit and should be brought up on corruption charges.
They started out trying to lay a trap to snare Israel in. It blew up in their faces when Woods and Doherty disobeyed direct orders to stand down.
Ping
Hard for me to keep up with all the details.
Was Gregory Hicks physically located in Tripoli at the time of the attack?
Of course they were lying knowingly. As Mesta Machine just said, it was their freaking plan! Defeatists make the mistake of thinking that just because people are evil, they’re also geniuses. These people are evil, but they also ain’t too smart.
No there wasn't.
The protests and attack in Cairo weren't about that stupid 'video.'
Brian Lilley: The MSM is lying about the muslim riots
Interviews on the streets of Cairo. 'Video' had nothing to do with protests and attack.
They don’t need to believe it. They just need others to (continue to)believe it.
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