Benghazi : A Scar on America Because Obama Put Re-election above Duty

Defense Secretary Leon Panetta came off very badly in the Benghazi report : "[N]o asset was ever ordered to respond to Benghazi and the decisions made -- and not made -- coupled with a lack of urgency in Washington, DC, delayed the response even, in some instances, with an ambassador missing." ~~~~~ In 2013, Panetta said nothing could have gotten to Benghazi in time : "The reason is because armed UAVs, AC-130 gunships, or fixed-wing fighters with the associated tanking, armaments, targeting and support capabilities were not in the vicinity of Libya and because of the distance, would have taken at least 9 to 12 hours if not more to deploy. This was, pure and simple, a problem of distance and time." ~~~~~ But, Gowdy told America in his Tuesday press conference : “The mortar attacks could have taken place at 7:15 a.m. or 9:15 a.m. or even at lunch time on the twelfth. Because at the time those two Americans were killed, not a single wheel of a single US military asset had even turned toward Libya.” ~~~~~ Gowdy's comments were not directed at military service personnel but at Panetta and Clinton and their staffs. The report details military readiness stymied by orders to change clothes while Panetta, Clinton and the White House worried about offending Libya instead of ordering troop deployment. ~~~~~ The report also states that the one asset that did deploy to Benghazi was a team of CIA security officials from Tripoli, who apparently were deployed without the knowledge of Panetta or other officials. So, it was US Intelligence, often Obama's scapegoat for his own errors, that actually tried to help their trapped fellow Americans. ~~~~~ Then-United Nations Ambassador Susan Rice has been severely criticized by Americans for her appearances on Sunday talk shows after the attack, calling the assaults spontaneous. But the comments also irritated officials inside the State Department, who had not been asked to help her prepare. Rice’s remarks, officials said, appeared to be divorced from reality. The report offers this account of emails among senior Libya desk officers and other State officials : “I think Rice was off the reservation on this one." / "Off the reservation on five networks!” / “[White House] very worried about the politics. This was all their doing." ~~~~~ Of course, the underlying reason was political -- leading Obama/Clinton/Panetta to lie about a video and the impossibility of deploying troops to save an American diplomatic compound in a very unstable Libya. Obama was in a tight re-election campaign. Polls showed GOP candidate Romney ahead. Libya was dangerous because it refuted Obama's campaign claim that terrorism was defeated. This may be why repeated calls for greater security by US diplomats and US Intell in Libya were ignored by Hillary. Romney pointed out the Obama "error'' in suggesting terrorism was on its knees. And, then came the political nightmare, Benghazi -- al-Qaida linked islamic terrorists with mortars and rockets killed US Ambassador Chris Stevens and three other Americans, the diplomatic compound and annex were burned and sacked -- how to reply without making Obama a one-term President. The cover-up was cooked up in a White House meeting of Obama, Clinton, Panetta and WH senior advisors. The story would be that an anti-Moslem video set off a spontaneous protest. They already knew this was a lie. But, no troops were deployed until they were satisfied they had saved Obama. The result was that no troops got to Benghazi until the compound was a smoldering ruin and four Americans were dead. NOBODY has been able to show that this is not the reality of Benghazi. ~~~~~ Dear readers, Trey Gowdy told reporters on Tuesday : “I am at peace that we have more information than the other committees had, and we could have had more had we had just a tiny bit of cooperation from the other side.” Hillary Clinton's long ago answer : "What difference does it make." It makes a difference because "the attacks remain a scar on the United States," says a Supplement by two Republicans on the House Committee. Tomorrow.

Benghazi : Hllary's Behavior "Absolutely Morally Reprehensible"

Benghazi has stalked Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton since 2012, becoming synonymous with political scandal -- the Obama/Clinton Watergate. Many believe the Obama administration turned a blind eye to Benghazi security, failed to come to the attack victims' aid and then misled the public afterward. ~~~~~ Benghazi has also become a major political problem for Hillary Clinton. Donald Trump has pounded her “bad judgment” and insistence that the violence was in protest to an anti-Moslem YouTube video that was the source of protests elsewhere in the Moslem world. But, the Benghazi attacks were planned and carried out by a member of a radical islamist militia. Hillary's email to daughter Chelsea and phone call to the Egyptian prime minister within 24 hours of the attack make clear she knew the video had nothing to do with it. Yet, she persisted in blaming video-inspired spontaneous protests when speaking to Americans and to victims' families, telling lies when the fact is that diplomatic security agents in Libya unanimously testified “there was no protest” at the compound. ~~~~~ The Benghazi committee report rips Clinton for not acting on repeated warnings about growing extremism in Benghazi and elsewhere in Libya after the Hillary-championed, American-led ouster of Moammar Qaddafi : “It is not clear what additional intelligence would have satisfied either [Undersecretary of Management Patrick] Kennedy or the Secretary in understanding the Benghazi Mission compound was at risk -- short of an attack. The intelligence on which Kennedy and the Secretary were briefed daily was clear and pointed -- Al Qa’ida, al Qa’ida like groups, and other regional extremists took refuge in the security vacuum created by the Libya government and its inability to take command of the security situation.” ~~~~~ On Monday, Trey Gowdy, Benghazi Select Committee Chairman, accused the Obama administration of deliberately deceiving his panel : “Whatever the administration is hiding...it's well past time the [State] Department stops stonewalling.” The Benghazi committee has for over a year tried to obtain records from the State Department without success -- among them are emails from senior aides to then-Secretary of State Clinton, some of her emails, and additional records from an Accountability Review Board analysis of the Benghazi attacks. In addition, the White House has stonewalled the committee’s efforts to get answers about President Obama’s activities the night of the September 11, 2012, attacks. Republicans say this obstruction is Obama's effort to hide key facts. ~~~~~ Gowdy refused to accuse Clinton of wrongdoing during a Tuesday press conference, saying his charge was to find the truth about the Americans killed in Benghazi. His refusal to call Hillary culpable is also a result of his habitual caution as a prosecutor. But, while he is being criticized, Gowdy gave us the facts. And, two other committee members, Mike Pompeo and Jim Jordan, had no reservations about Clinton's culpability. They released an additional 48-page supplement amply criticizing Clinton. Pompeo called her behavior “absolutely morally reprehensible.” ~~~~~ Dear readers, committee Democrats attempted to undercut the report on Monday, by releasing their rebuttal and many interview transcripts a day early. And, despite all facts and findings to the contrary, Hillary was predictable : "the committee had to today report it found nothing -- nothing -- to contradict the conclusions of the independent accountability board or the conclusion of the prior, multiple congressional investigations carried out on a bipartisan basis in the Congress.” NO. The report attacked the Accountability Review Board created by the State Department to investigate Benghazi. Clinton senior staff were deeply involved in the ARB's formation and edited a draft of its final report, the committee said : “The decisions to deviate from longstanding processes raise questions about the ARB’s independence, thoroughness, and therefore the fullness of their findings of accountability." More tomorrow.

Hillary's State Department Worried about Military Attire instead of Deployment while Benghazi Was Under Attack

The House Select Committee on Benghazi provides new details about the fatal 2012 attack in an 800-page report released Tuesday that criticizes the Obama administration and, separately, Hillary Clinton. According to those who had an advance review, the report does not fundamentally alter the understanding of the September 11, 2012, attacks that killed four Americans, including US Ambassador to Libya Chris Stevens. ~~~~~ The report includes new facts : (1). Ambassador Stevens was in Benghazi with the aim of erecting a permanent diplomatic post to replace the temporary one that came under fire. (2). Military orders appear to have been lost or misinterpreted on their way down the chain, about which responsibilities fell to the Pentagon and to the State Department and who -- if anyone -- needed to be evacuated. The report states : “The response to the attacks suffered from confusion and misinformation circulating between the agencies, underscoring that no one effectively took charge of the US government’s response.” (3). The report criticized the Pentagon, saying it did not move with enough urgency. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta ordered US forces to deploy between 6 and 7 p.m. ET. The attack had begun at 3:42 p.m. ET. Yet, the report said : "...nearly two more hours elapsed before the Secretary's orders were relayed to those forces. Several more hours elapsed before any of those forces moved." During that time the White House held a two-hour interagency meeting to discuss forces deployment and exchange information. The report says Panetta believed his orders were clear, to "deploy the identified assets immediately," not "order the preparation to deploy or the planning to deploy or the contemplation of deployment." In any case, only an unarmed drone reached the diplomatic compound during the attack. (4). Because of State Department worries about Libyan reaction to uniformed US troops in Benghazi, a US Marine platoon changed into and out of their uniforms four times as they waited to be deployed. The commander of a Marine Fleet Anti-Terrorist Security Team platoon testified to the committee : "There was also some talk of whether or not we could carry our personal weapons." (5). The Libyan forces that eventually evacuated the surviving Americans from the CIA annex were in fact former loyalists of deposed strongman Moammar Qaddafi, and not militia groups with a relationship with the US. ~~~~~ The State Department's fuss over uniforms is an example of the danger inherent in political correctness. In Benghazi, it allowed four Americans to be killed and an entire US diplomatic compound to be destroyed by islamic terrorists. Representative Mike Pompeo, a Republican member of the committee, said Tuesday the committee was never able to understand why the Marines were ordered in and out of uniform. However, Pompeo told Hugh Hewitt there was a "big debate" among worried State Department officials who didn't want it to look like it was an invasion of Libya : "They were hypersensitive....Somehow, they had this idea that a big American force in uniform would present some risk that the Libyans would protest, because we were invading their country. And there was this debate...about what the appropriate attire was for going to rescue Americans while our embassy was burning and mortars were falling in Benghazi." ~~~~~ Dear readers, the committee report release realizes a key goal of Chairman Trey Gowdy -- it has been made public before the party nominating conventions next month, preventing the appearance that the committee was inserting itself into the campaign season. Gowdy released a statement Tuesday : “Now, I simply ask the American people to read this report for themselves, look at the evidence we have collected, and reach their own conclusions. You can read this report in less time than our fellow citizens were taking fire and fighting for their lives on the rooftops and in the streets of Benghazi.” Trey Gowdy has done his job. Tomorrow -- the report's political implications.

The Bad News and Questions about Hillary's Secret Email Server Keep Coming

The Wall Street Journal reported in early June that the FBI investigation into Hillary Clinton's private email setup includes messages sent on a less-secure government network that discussed specific CIA drone strikes in Pakistan. The WSJ says many of the 22 emails the State Department refuses to release because of national security concerns date back to 2011 and 2012 and deal with these strikes. According to the WSJ, an agreement between the CIA and the State Department made the CIA give notice to US diplomats before carrying out an enemy strike. And, says the WSJ, these messages "found their way from the field in Pakistan to the US ambassador there, and then to Clinton's aides in Washington." Some of the messages were forwarded to Clinton's non-secure email. The WSJ says the emails were sent on what's called the "low side," a less-secure government network used for unclassified material. None of the messages contain "CIA," "drones," or specific information about each strike, sources told the WSJ, but they contained enough information for all parties to make a decision on whether to go ahead with the strike. The WSJ article says officials told it no evidence exists to suggest that intelligence officials in Pakistan intercepted the messages. ~~~~~ Then, we learned last week that the IT expert responsible for Hillary Clinton’s private email server refused to answer any substantive questions during a 90-minute deposition in a Judicial Watch FOIA lawsuit. Bryan Pagliani stated his name, said three times that he understood procedural rules of the under-oath interview, but otherwise declined to say a single word when asked 130 questions, other than to plead his Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination : “On advice of counsel, I will decline to answer your question in reliance on my rights under the Fifth Amendment to the United States Constitution.” Pagliano’s reliance on the Fifth Amendment was expected, having been announced by his lawyers in a notice to the court. But it will reflect badly on Clinton, whom the judge has said could be forced to answer questions herself, because Pagliano’s refusal to talk means that key details about her email system remain unexplained and she may be asked to explain them. ~~~~~ JW lawyers also questioned Pagliano’s repeated reliance on the Fifth Amendment, talking among themselves during the interview about how he might be trying to protect himself : “To raise a Fifth Amendment privilege, there must be a reasonable basis for it, and it must be appropriate, not just for purposes of obstructing the deposition. We'll reserve [the right] to go back to the court and to compel [answers] if we deem that it is appropriate." JW said it may ask the court to decide if the privilege "has been properly asserted.” Unlike the use of the Fifth Amendment in criminal cases, its use in civil cases may be used by opposing counsel to draw negative inferences about the witness. Pagliano received only limited immunity in the FBI Clinton email investigation. In court filings ahead of his deposition, Pagliani's lawyers and the Justice Department refused to state the terms of the agreement or say how he might be assisting the FBI investigation, warning that the limited nature of his deal could leave him open to prosecution for incriminating information he divulged outside any immunity-protected sessions. The federal court in the FOIA case ruled last week that Pagliano's immunity deal could remain secret. ~~~~~ Dear readers, AP also disclosed on Friday that Hillary failed to turn over a copy of a key message involving problems caused by her use of a private home-based email server. The State Department confirmed this. AP says the damaging disclosure makes it unclear -- despite Clinton's repeated assurances that "all" work-related emails were turned over to State -- "what other work-related emails may have been deleted by the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee." In the November 2010 email, Hillary wrote : “I don’t want any risk of the personal being accessible.” Tomorrow -- Hillary's secret meetings.