Today's Rich Lowry column in Politico is worth reading... especially as Barkerized... but beyond that I use part of it to "out" the kind of dishonest journalism we've seen rife from the moment the American media decided to tackle (or rather mangle) the story of story of Benghazi:
* * * * * *
On “Fox News Sunday” last weekend, White House aide Dan
Pfeiffer was asked about President Barack Obama’s whereabouts the night of the
Sept. 11 attack in Benghazi.
This was the night when we lost our first ambassador in
30 years, and when three other Americans were killed in an attack that lasted
all night long...
* ALL NIGHT LONG! ALL NIGHT LONG! ALL NIGHT LONG! ALL
NIGHT LONG! ALL NIGHT LONG! ALL NIGHT LONG! ALL NIGHT LONG! ALL NIGHT LONG!
...at multiple locations within the eastern Libyan city.
* AT MULTIPLE LOCATIONS! AT MULTIPLE LOCATIONS! AT
MULTIPLE LOCATIONS! AT MULTIPLE LOCATIONS! AT MULTIPLE LOCATIONS! AT MULTIPLE
LOCATIONS! AT MULTIPLE LOCATIONS! AT MULTIPLE LOCATIONS!
Since the president is commander in chief, one would
think where he was and what he did during such an event would be of obvious
public concern.
* UNDERSTAND, MY FRIENDS... THESE ARE THE KEY POINTS!
THIS IS WHY I'VE BEEN SAYING FROM THE BEGINNING THAT PRESIDENT OBAMA HAS BLOOD
ON HIS HANDS!
* ALSO UNDERSTAND, FOLKS... THESE KEY POINTS ARE KEY
POINTS THAT THE "OBAMA-WING" OF THE MEDIA WOULD RATHER YOU NEVER
FOCUS UPON... NEVER EVEN THINK OF! CASE IN POINT: A PROPAGANDA PIECE WHICH RAN
IN YESTERDAY'S WASHINGTON POST:
"At 9:42 p.m. Sept. 11, 2012, as violent anti-American demonstrations unfolded across the Middle East and North Africa over an anti-Islam video made in the United States, a group of armed men attacked the U.S. diplomatic compound in the eastern Libyan city of Benghazi, killing Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens and three other Americans."
* YEP... THAT'S THE WASHINGTON POST'S VERSION. AND
INDEED, IN ONE FORM OR ANOTHER, THAT'S THE VERSION THE MAINSTREAM MEDIA HAS
FOCUSED ON. AND WITH GOOD REASON (IF THE REASONING IS TO "PROTECT" PRESIDENT
OBAMA)! AFTER ALL... IF WE STOP AT "THE PRESIDENT WAS NOTIFIED" AND
THEN LEAVE IT THERE... NO FURTHER FOCUS ON THE PRESIDENT'S ACTIONS OR INACTIONS
OTHER THAN REPORTING THAT OBAMA TOLD HIS THEN-SECRETARY OF DEFENSE PANETTA TO
(PARAPHRASING) "DO WHATEVER NEEDS TO BE DONE" NEED BE GIVEN!
* FOLKS... YOU CAN READ THE WP ARTICLE FOR YOURSELVES.
IT'S BASICALLY A HEAVY-HANDED ATTEMPT TO PLACE THE BLAME FOR "MISINFORMATION"
ON THEN-CIA DIRECTOR PATRAEUS AS A WAY OF PROVIDING COVER FOR OBAMA AND
CLINTON... BUT MAKE OF IT WHAT YOU WILL. MY POINT IN BRINGING IT UP ISN'T TO
HIGHLIGHT WHAT IT REPORTS, BUT RATHER WHAT IT DELIBERATELY DIDN'T REPORT -
NAMELY THE ABOVE RICH LOWRY POINTS!
* AND NOW... CONTINUING WITH THE LOWRY PIECE...
Pfeiffer [answered the question concerning] the
president’s location - and specifically whether he was in the Situation Room -
[as] “a largely irrelevant fact.”
* FRANKLY... HAD I BEEN THE ONE QUESTIONING PFEIFFER... I
WOULD HAVE AT THAT POINT LOST IT...
If it is so unimportant, why not simply tell us?
(It’s not as if we haven’t heard largely irrelevant
information before. Humor us. Then everyone can judge the value of the fact for
himself.)
Obama’s actions and non-actions on that terrible night
are a blank spot in his presidency. We simply don’t know much about them. And
the White House has always been perfectly content to leave it that way.
We know [President Obama] was meeting with Defense
Secretary Leon Panetta and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Martin
Dempsey on an unrelated matter at 5 p.m. Washington time when he learned of the
attack.
(In congressional testimony, Panetta said he had no
contact with the president or the White House after that point.)
* PANETTA SAID HE HAD NO CONTACT WITH THE PRESIDENT OR
THE WHITE HOUSE AFTER THAT POINT...
* PANETTA SAID HE HAD NO CONTACT WITH THE PRESIDENT OR
THE WHITE HOUSE AFTER THAT POINT...
* PANETTA SAID HE HAD NO CONTACT WITH THE PRESIDENT OR
THE WHITE HOUSE AFTER THAT POINT...
Dempsey said he didn’t hear from the president either.
* DEMPSEY SAID HE DIDN'T HEAR FROM THE PRESIDENT
EITHER...!
* DEMPSEY SAID HE DIDN'T HEAR FROM THE PRESIDENT
EITHER...!
* DEMPSEY SAID HE DIDN'T HEAR FROM THE PRESIDENT
EITHER...!
(Dempsey did stipulate that “his staff was engaged with
the national military command center pretty constantly through the period,
which is the way it would normally work.” Fine, but one wonders: What is the
standard operating procedure when a U.S. ambassador goes missing and is killed?)
* NO! NOT "FINE," RICH! THIS IS ANYTHING BUT
FINE! THIS IS NO-NAME-NO-BLAME BULLSHIT...!!!
* ONE... MORE... TIME...
This was the night when we lost our first ambassador in
30 years, and when three other Americans were killed in an attack that lasted
all night long...
* ALL NIGHT LONG! ALL NIGHT LONG! ALL NIGHT LONG! ALL
NIGHT LONG! ALL NIGHT LONG! ALL NIGHT LONG! ALL NIGHT LONG! ALL NIGHT LONG!
...at multiple locations within the eastern Libyan city.
* AT MULTIPLE LOCATIONS! AT MULTIPLE LOCATIONS! AT
MULTIPLE LOCATIONS! AT MULTIPLE LOCATIONS! AT MULTIPLE LOCATIONS! AT MULTIPLE
LOCATIONS! AT MULTIPLE LOCATIONS! AT MULTIPLE LOCATIONS!
Next, we know that the president talked to Secretary of
State Hillary Clinton at 10 p.m. when the assault that killed Chris Stevens and
State Department computer expert Sean Smith was over but the mortar attack that
killed two former U.S. Navy SEALs at another facility hadn’t yet taken place.
* WHEN THE ASSAULT THAT KILLED CHRIS STEVENS AND SEAN
SMITH WAS OVER... BUT... BUT, BUT, BUT... THE MORTAR ATTACK THAT KILLED TWO
FORMER SEALS AT ANOTHER FACILITY HAD NOT YET TAKEN PLACE...!!!
* OH... AND SPEAKING OF MISSING PERSONS... WHERE WAS THEN-SECRETARY
OF STATE HILLARY CLINTON DURING THIS ALL NIGHT ATTACK...?!?! WHERE WAS SHE AND
WHAT WAS SHE DOING PRIOR TO THE PRESIDENT'S PHONE CALL? WHERE WAS SHE AND WHAT
WAS SHE DOING FROM THE MOMENT SHE GOT OFF THE PHONE WITH THE PRESIDENT...?!?!
* FOLKS... THIS STINKS TO HIGH HEAVEN!
What about the rest of the time? Pfeiffer assures us that
the president kept “in constant touch that night with his national security
team and kept up to date with the events as they were happening.”
(Commander-In-Chief Obama must have experienced the
loneliness and responsibility of command during all his unspecified phone calls
with unspecified national security personnel from an unspecified location until
unspecified hours of the night.)
(*SMIRK*)
* IT'S NOT FUNNY, FOLKS... IT'S NOT FUNNY AT ALL.
When the White House has a good story to tell, we hear
about it. As Boston Herald columnist Michael Graham points out, the president
has been in constant evidence responding to the Moore, Okla., tornado. The
White House blog on Wednesday informed us, among many other things, that the
president spoke to Mayor Glenn Lewis and Gov. Mary Fallin “to reiterate that he
had directed his administration to provide all available resources to support
the response led by the governor and her team.”
The Osama bin Laden raid will be one of the most
documented episodes of his presidency. Immediately after killing bin Laden,
Obama gave a long, detailed interview to “60 Minutes.” He talked about what
information the CIA first brought him about bin Laden’s location and what orders
he gave in response; when the planning began and how it proceeded; how involved
he was in multiple meetings in the Situation Room; every nuance of his thinking;
the dynamic of the debate among his advisers; the mood in the Situation Room
during the operation... and on and on.
In the case of Benghazi, the military maintains that
nothing could have been done to save the lives lost that night...
* NOT THE MILITARY COMMANDER ON THE GROUND WHO REACTED
WITH RAGE TO THE "STAND DOWN" ORDER HE RECEIVED FROM... umm...
UNIDENTIFIED HIGHER AUTHORITY.
* FOLKS... DEMPSEY IS A POLITICAL GENERAL. MULLENS AS
WELL. I FEAR THE TOP BRASS OF OUR MILITARY IS FILLED BY BUREAUCRATS IN
UNIFORM... BUREAUCRATS WHO FEAR THAT THEIR MILITARY CAREERS AS WELL AS
POST-MILITARY CAREERS WILL BE DERAILED SHOULD THEY PUBLICLY GO AGAINST THE
OBAMA PARTY LINE. IT'S NOT IDEOLOGICAL AS SUCH... NOT FOR MOST AT LEAST I'M
GUESSING... NOR EVEN "PARTISAN" PER SE. NOPE... I'M SIMPLY ASSUMING
HUMAN NATURE AND THE REALITIES OF HOW ONE "PLAYS THE GAME" AT THE TOP
OF THE PYRAMID.
But no one could say how long the attack in Benghazi
would last or if there would be follow-on attacks in Tripoli. An engaged
commander in chief would have been coordinating with his military and prodding
it to see if it could do more, faster to respond to an attack that resulted in
a national humiliation.
* FOLKS... WE'VE BEEN OVER THIS A BILLZILLION TIMES! EVEN
IF WE DIDN'T HAVE U.S. FORCES CLOSE ENOUGH TO RESPOND (WHICH I DON'T BELIEVE
WAS TRUE), WE HAVE ALLIES IN THE REGION WHOM WE COULD HAVE AND SHOULD HAVE
REQUESTED IMMEDIATE "BOOTS ON THE GROUND" AID FROM. AGAIN... WE'VE
BEEN OVER THIS.
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