so I opened my issue of the Washington post online this morning keen to discover if Issa's hearings had uncovered malfeasance.....(thats at http://www.washingtonpost.com Fate )
Not so much.

About all that seems to have come from the self aggrandizing Hicks

Hicks had his grievances with how events in Benghazi were handled, but his gripes were about bureaucratic squabbles rather than political scandal

Dana Milbank

is that Rice may have gone beyond the exact wording of the CIA brief she was given.. For which she seems to have paid a political price as Kerry is Secretary of State now, and not she..
.
And Hicks seems to be a little bitter about being past over in recent state department appointments...

State Department disputes diplomat’s charges of retaliation

http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/nat ... ml?hpid=z2

Still and all, the question that RayJay raised was probably best covered by Jon Stewart last night.
The reason Fox can't understand why people aren't prematurely outraged IF there was a cover up.
Is because other people hear them say IF an awful lot. With no evidence.
And these hearings have provided nothing.. Probably because there ain't anything of substance there.

I'd link you to the Daily Show for your own view of this but my link is geo locked to Canada's Comedy Network and you'll want Comedy Central...

Yes, the Comedy Network is where you get your hard hitting facts, thanks for NOT linking it to us.

They have a better fact checking department than Fox News.

rickyp wrote:They have a better fact checking department than Fox News.

cute

is this your witty charm or is it some sort of factual statement?
I gotta believe you do think this to be true, and that is pretty sad.

rickyp wrote:so I opened my issue of the Washington post online this morning keen to discover if Issa's hearings had uncovered malfeasance.....(thats at http://www.washingtonpost.com Fate )

I get it now. You work for MSNBC, right?

From Glenn Kessler, who writes for WaPo, and whom I indirectly linked in the post just before yours:

So it is not new that there was no protest. That’s been officially well established. It is also not new that many officials knew it was a terrorist attack.

What is new is that Hicks has put a human face on previous reporting. He also disclosed he spoke directly to Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton the night of the attack, presumably relaying his conclusions.

The hearings also revealed an e-mail written by Elizabeth Jones, the acting assistant secretary for Near Eastern Affairs, in which she recounted a conversation with the Libyan ambassador on Sept. 12: “When he said his government suspected that former Gadhafi regime elements carried out the attacks, I told him that the group that conducted the attacks Ansar Al Sharia is affiliated with Islamic terrorists.”

One generally presumes that top government officials have access to classified information and firsthand accounts not available to the media. But in this case either their judgments were colored by media accounts as well — or they took advantage of the media’s reporting to obscure some politically difficult news.

So, Kessler says we knew the video played no part. Why hasn't the Administration explained why even the President was repeatedly blaming the video for two weeks after the attacks?

We didn't know that Hillary Clinton was spoken to that night. Now we know that. We still don't know what actions she or the President took that night. Well, we do know the President got a good night's sleep--after all, he had a big fundraiser to get to in Vegas the next day.

We know that the government knew immediately this was terrorism. Why did they pretend it wasn't? They even went so far as to get the "filmmaker" perp walked. Why?

Not so much.

Are you trying to say the government acted in "good faith?" Really?

About all that seems to have come from the self aggrandizing Hicks

Hicks had his grievances with how events in Benghazi were handled, but his gripes were about bureaucratic squabbles rather than political scandal

Dana Milbank

Who says he's "self-aggrandizing?" You and Dana Milbank? What glory was he seeking for himself?

Ambassador Rice spread misinformation on five Sunday morning shows. The Administration knew what she was saying was false. She also undercut the President of Libya who had just said on one morning show that it was terrorism. What she said embarrassed him and led to us not getting the cooperation from him we otherwise might have.

Calling someone a liar on national TV is a good way to get them to not help you.

is that Rice may have gone beyond the exact wording of the CIA brief she was given.. For which she seems to have paid a political price as Kerry is Secretary of State now, and not she..

Not true. The talking points were rewritten and the terrorism and AQ links deleted. The video bit was inserted. We still don't know by whom. She took the hit, but she didn't do it alone.
.

And Hicks seems to be a little bitter about being past over in recent state department appointments...

State Department disputes diplomat’s charges of retaliation

http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/nat ... ml?hpid=z2

So what? The State Department, the ones who have engaged in a cover-up, dispute his allegations, and that makes him bitter?

What if he is telling the truth?

Let me put it another way: you're going to take the word of State, who misled the American people about the nature of the attack, over him? What's his motivation?

Could it possibly be that, as a career diplomat, he was outraged by the government's misinformation campaign in light of his co-workers being murdered?

I think many people would be more than slightly miffed if they were in his situation: his friends get killed and the government lies about what happened? Probably for political reasons (too close to the election--and Obama's bragging about "Usama is dead and Al Qaida is on the run")?

Again, what's his motivation? To be subjected to ridicule and intense scrutiny?

What you are doing is like blaming the victim of a rape. You're just so politically motivated that you can't see it.

Maybe he is lying, but I see no evidence of that. On the other hand, we KNOW the government lied. They knew this was terror from the beginning.

Still and all, the question that RayJay raised was probably best covered by Jon Stewart last night.
The reason Fox can't understand why people aren't prematurely outraged IF there was a cover up.

Well, when Jon Stewart is your source of news, that explains a lot.

If you think you know it all, why is it that the military and CIA were unprepared for a 9/11 attack?

Why is it, since no one could have known how long the attack would last, the government took no steps toward sending anyone to help? It turns out that the second attack occurred many hours later. Air units--at least--could have arrived if they were sent. Why weren't they?

There are many, many unanswered questions.

But, there is one thing we know: the government knew within a couple of hours that this was terrorism, but they lied to us.

We have a right to know why.

Is because other people hear them say IF an awful lot. With no evidence.
And these hearings have provided nothing.. Probably because there ain't anything of substance there.

It's not over:

Boehner specifically urged the Obama administration to make public a set of internal emails that some lawmakers had been able to review but not keep.

One of the emails apparently showed a top State Department official saying a group affiliated with Islamic terrorists was responsible for the strike. Separate emails, though, allegedly depict the White House and State Department pressing lower-level officials to remove references to terrorism in talking points about the attacks.

Based on those talking points, U.N. Ambassador Susan Rice would go on five Sunday talk shows shortly after the attacks to claim they were triggered by protests over an anti-Islam film. Top officials would later claim the flawed assessment was based on the best intelligence at the time, but the testimony from whistle-blowers Wednesday indicated that those on the ground knew the attack was terrorism.

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2013/05 ... z2SojAODTD

There's nothing to hide, right? So, why not release the emails?

I'd link you to the Daily Show for your own view of this but my link is geo locked to Canada's Comedy Network and you'll want Comedy Central...

I'm sure of one thing: Jon Stewart is more serious about wanting the truth than you are. When he finally is embarrassed, he'll do the right thing. You'll just stop posting about Benghazi.

Fate

So what? The State Department, the ones who have engaged in a cover-up, dispute his allegations, and that makes him bitter?
What if he is telling the truth?
Let me put it another way: you're going to take the word of State, who misled the American people about the nature of the attack, over him? What's his motivation?

There's a horrible conspiracy going on right?
Your whole arguement is based on IF.....Just like Stewart says...
I assume he is telling the truth. And There's nothing much there even then...
As for his motivation.... he's pissed at being passed over for postings and he has an inflated opinion of his own abilities and contributions.. ... And I read his testimony. I dind't just watch Fox news or read Breitbart.


fate

Ambassador Rice spread misinformation on five Sunday morning shows

An American tradition since at least 2002.
(Remember Dick Cheney quoting the NY Times? a story he'd planted in the NY Times with Judith Miller? Which helped pave the way for the Iraq War?)
Rice evidently screwed up, She's paid a political and personal price, despite some in State trying to deflect and defend for her... So what? .
What else is there?

Fate

It's not over

I'm sure it will continue as a major issue on Fox....
They don't require anyhing substantive to make an issue .... They'll just keep saying "if".

Here, chew on this. I realize it's not up to Jon Stewart's standards, but you might learn something:

Hicks, the second highest ranking State Department official in Libya when the consulate was attacked on the 11th anniversary of 9/11, confirmed the following facts under oath: There were no protests outside the U.S. compound; the anti-Islamic YouTube video denounced by the administration was a “non-event” in Libya and had nothing whatsoever to do with the assault that night; Hicks’ team knew almost immediately that the attack was carried out by terrorists; and all of this information was relayed to Washington in the hours and days afterward.

Hicks is a decorated, 22-year civil service veteran, so his testimony is not easily dismissed. More importantly, it throws into stark relief the actions and public statements of the administration in the aftermath of the attack.

Here is what we know:

- On Friday, Sept. 14, at a ceremony receiving the remains of the four slain Americans, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton mentioned the video as a proximate cause of the assault and suggested a “mob” was behind the “violent acts.”

- On Saturday, Sept. 15, talking points drafted by the intelligence community were heavily edited by officials in the White House and State Department, striking passages saying that the latter had been warned of threats in the region, references to other al-Qaeda-linked attacks in Benghazi, and the suggestion that al-Qaeda-linked extremists may have participated in the attack.

- On Sunday, Sept. 16, U.N Ambassador Susan Rice now famously went on all five Sunday news shows and claimed the attack stemmed from violent protests inspired by the video. More than a month later she acknowledged no such protests took place.

- In the two weeks following the incident, President Obama himself singled out the video as a contributing factor to the attack on four separate occasions (Sept. 18 on “Late Show With David Letterman”; Sept. 20 during a forum with Univision; and twice on Sept. 25, once on the daytime talk show “The View” and again that afternoon at his speech before the United Nations General Assembly).

We also know that members of the administration went to great lengths to avoid calling the Benghazi episode a terrorist act. Despite Obama’s claim during the second presidential debate that he had called the assault an “act of terror” in a Rose Garden statement the day after it happened (a claim famously supported by moderator Candy Crowley), the truth is that the president used the phrase that day in a generic sense.

It took eight days for White House Press Secretary Jay Carney and Clinton to label the attack an act of terror. Obama was given opportunities to do the same during his Sept. 20/25 television appearances, but he declined.

We did learn at least two new, relevant facts from yesterday's testimony. One is that Beth Jones, an official in the State Department, sent an email on September 12 bluntly acknowledging terrorists participated in the attacks (“The group that conducted the attacks, Ansar al-Sharia, is affiliated with Islamic terrorists.”) The other is that Hicks said his “jaw dropped” when he heard Rice make her claims about spontaneous protests. Hicks testified that he later confronted her about the comments, and shortly thereafter he was demoted.

So, while we may not have been treated to any “bombshell” revelations Wednesday, the testimony of Thompson, Hicks and Nordstrom and a fair reading of the record leads to an obvious conclusion: The president and his administration clearly misled the public about what happened on Sept. 11, 2012.

Read more: http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articl ... z2SoodiXY4
Follow us: @RCP_Articles on Twitter

I bolded some things with the hope they might penetrate rickyp's consciousness.

rickyp wrote:There's a horrible conspiracy going on right?

No, a presidential campaign.

Your whole arguement is based on IF.....Just like Stewart says...

No. We already know the government lied. There is no "if" to it.

I assume he is telling the truth. And There's nothing much there even then...
As for his motivation.... he's pissed at being passed over for postings and he has an inflated opinion of his own abilities and contributions.. ... And I read his testimony. I dind't just watch Fox news or read Breitbart.

Good for you! I watched it.

While reading it, did you notice a "sefl-aggrandizing" nature to it? If so, please cut and paste the relevant portions.

If not, then why did you make the accusation?

fate

Ambassador Rice spread misinformation on five Sunday morning shows

An American tradition since at least 2002.
(Remember Dick Cheney quoting the NY Times? a story he'd planted in the NY Times with Judith Miller? Which helped pave the way for the Iraq War?)
Rice evidently screwed up, She's paid a political and personal price, despite some in State trying to deflect and defend for her... So what? .
What else is there?

No, I don't remember that.

But, how does that justify the Administration lying to us now? If Cheney lied, Obama can too?

That's a defense?

Fate

It's not over

I'm sure it will continue as a major issue on Fox....
They don't require anyhing substantive to make an issue .... They'll just keep saying "if".

You can't answer any of the questions I've posed, yet you keep acting as if nothing happened.

There was a campaign. Benghazi was a terror attack that caught Obama's Administration flat-footed. It was too close to the election to do anything but try to muddy the water. That's what they did.

Now they can't come clean because Hillary's future is on the line.

It's not a conspiracy any more than Watergate was a conspiracy.

Again, tell me how the Administration is being transparent?

It's dragging its feet all over the place.

Slow in approving potentially hostile witnesses:

Obama administration officials are finally letting the attorney for a Benghazi whistle-blower get a security clearance — but the clearance is at such a low level that it will probably slow the congressional probe of how the administration handled last year’s terrorist attack on the embassy in Benghazi, Libya.

Victoria Toensing represents an unnamed government official who can help explain the reaction of top government officials to the jihadi attack on the U.S diplomatic site in Benghazi and killed four Americans last Sept. 11.

The official may also be able to explain if officials rewrote intelligence reports and took other actions to minimize media coverage of the administration’s errors and the perceived role of Al Qaeda jihadis.

Read more: http://dailycaller.com/2013/05/08/fourt ... z2SpBuvbr7

It's withholding information:

Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) on Thursday warned that congressional hearings into Benghazi could create “real trouble” for the State Department and said there was a “glaring omission” in the information provided to lawmakers about the administration’s response to the deadly attack.

“I think the State Department has real trouble,” Coburn said in an interview on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe,” and suggested there was another show waiting to drop.

“Having sat on the Intelligence Committee and having seen the review of emails that went back and forth that developed the list, there’s a glaring problem there that will eventually come out, and I can’t talk about it now, but there was an omission that was given to the Intelligence Committee,” he said.

If you've got a winning hand, you play it. The Administration has a losing hand is doing all it can to stonewall the investigation.

Maybe it would do to remind conservatives what Rice said on the talk shows:

"MS. RICE: So we’ll want to see the results of that [FBI] investigation to draw any definitive conclusions. But based on the best information we have to date, what our assessment is as of the present is in fact what began spontaneously in Benghazi as a reaction to what had transpired some hours earlier in Cairo where, of course, as you know, there was a violent protest outside of our embassy– –sparked by this hateful video. But soon after that spontaneous protest began outside of our consulate in Benghazi, we believe that it looks like extremist elements, individuals, joined in that– in that effort with heavy weapons of the sort that are, unfortunately, readily now available in Libya post-revolution. And that it spun from there into something much, much more violent.

BOB SCHIEFFER: But you do not agree with him that this was something that had been plotted out several months ago?

MS. RICE: We do not– we do not have information at present that leads us to conclude that this was premeditated or preplanned.

MR. SCHIEFFER: Do you agree or disagree with [the previous guest, the president of Libya’s general national congress] that al Qaeda had some part in this?

MS. RICE: Well, we’ll have to find out that out. I mean I think it’s clear that there were extremist elements that joined in and escalated the violence. Whether they were al Qaeda affiliates, whether they were Libyan-based extremists or al Qaeda itself I think is one of the things we’ll have to determine."

The Republican Party's theory as I understand is that the Administration did not want the attack on the embassy to be labeled a terrorist attack because that would hurt President Obama's credentials for decimating Al Qaeda. Above you can see Ms. Rice not ruling out involvement in Al Qaeda and explicitly says extremists were involved in the attack. So, I guess there a lot of extremists out there that are not terrorists, right? Come on, this is hair-splitting.

There is nothing here. Even with regard to the alleged failure to respond to the attack, I can't see how the president or Secretary of State would be involved in micromanaging tactical responses to the attack. All Republicans care is that they tag either Obama or Hillary Clinton with some blame. Here is an article from the New York Time reminding people that an independent review found that lower levels of the State Department were at fault for what happened. http://mobile.nytimes.com/2013/05/09/us ... m=homepage

freeman2 wrote:Maybe it would do to remind conservatives what Rice said on the talk shows:

"MS. RICE: So we’ll want to see the results of that [FBI] investigation to draw any definitive conclusions. But based on the best information we have to date, what our assessment is as of the present is in fact what began spontaneously in Benghazi as a reaction to what had transpired some hours earlier in Cairo where, of course, as you know, there was a violent protest outside of our embassy– –sparked by this hateful video. But soon after that spontaneous protest began outside of our consulate in Benghazi, we believe that it looks like extremist elements, individuals, joined in that– in that effort with heavy weapons of the sort that are, unfortunately, readily now available in Libya post-revolution. And that it spun from there into something much, much more violent.

BOB SCHIEFFER: But you do not agree with him that this was something that had been plotted out several months ago?

MS. RICE: We do not– we do not have information at present that leads us to conclude that this was premeditated or preplanned.

MR. SCHIEFFER: Do you agree or disagree with [the previous guest, the president of Libya’s general national congress] that al Qaeda had some part in this?

MS. RICE: Well, we’ll have to find out that out. I mean I think it’s clear that there were extremist elements that joined in and escalated the violence. Whether they were al Qaeda affiliates, whether they were Libyan-based extremists or al Qaeda itself I think is one of the things we’ll have to determine."

The Republican Party's theory as I understand is that the Administration did not want the attack on the embassy to be labeled a terrorist attack because that would hurt President Obama's credentials for decimating Al Qaeda. Above you can see Ms. Rice not ruling out involvement in Al Qaeda and explicitly says extremists were involved in the attack. So, I guess there a lot of extremists out there that are not terrorists, right? Come on, this is hair-splitting.

Well done, counselor!

Let's see.

"Ms. Rice not ruling out involvement in Al Qaeda . . ."

So, Ambassador Rice is credible because she didn't rule out terrorism? Interesting.

Um, what about the other thingee: "based on the best information we have to date, what our assessment is as of the present is in fact what began spontaneously in Benghazi as a reaction to what had transpired some hours earlier in Cairo where, of course, as you know, there was a violent protest outside of our embassy– –sparked by this hateful video"

It was not "the best information" that it was a protest, related to Cairo, or sparked by the video.

Other than those three major contradictions, you almost score a point.

There is nothing here. Even with regard to the alleged failure to respond to the attack, I can't see how the president or Secretary of State would be involved in micromanaging tactical responses to the attack.

Nothing. Okay, well then, how about answering a few easy questions.

Why were there no military or CIA assets in the area?

Why was the US State Department caught flat-footed on 9/11? After the attack on Cairo?

If a President or Secretary of State is unlikely to micromanage an attack on sovereign US soil, when exactly should they micromanage it?

Oh, right. Only the Bin Laden raid. Other than that, you've almost got a point.

All Republicans care is that they tag either Obama or Hillary Clinton with some blame.

What if they deserve some of the blame?

Are you sure they did everything they could before the attack? Do you know that they had no clue that an attack on 9/11 might take place? Do you know for sure they knew nothing of the attack on Britain's ambassador? Nothing about the increase in terrorist activity in the area?

Who exactly has been held responsible for the failures of Benghazi?

Here is an article from the New York Time reminding people that an independent review found that lower levels of the State Department were at fault for what happened. http://mobile.nytimes.com/2013/05/09/us ... m=homepage

That "article" is not bathroom worthy. To wit:

A. Mr. Obama applied the “terror” label to the attack in his first public statement on the events in Benghazi, delivered in the Rose Garden at the White House at 10:43 a.m. on Sept. 12, though the reference was indirect. “No acts of terror will ever shake the resolve of this great nation, alter that character or eclipse the light of the values that we stand for,” he said. “Today we mourn four more Americans who represent the very best of the United States of America. We will not waver in our commitment to see that justice is done for this terrible act. And make no mistake, justice will be done.” He repeated similar phrasing the next day.

He did not say the attack on Benghazi was terror. Furthermore, for two weeks he continued to beat the drum that it was the video that ignited the attack.

The last q and a leads to more questions:

Q. Mr. Obama vowed last September that the perpetrators of the attack would be brought to justice. Has that happened?

A. Not yet. Libya remains a volatile and dangerous place, and the F.B.I.'s progress in investigating the attack appears to be slow. Last week, the bureau released photographs of three men it was seeking for questioning; the F.B.I. did not call the men suspects but said they “were on the grounds of the United States Special Mission when it was attacked.” No one has been charged — at least publicly — with the murder of the four Americans.

Why did it take 8 months to release pictures that the FBI had from the beginning?

Did Susan Rice contradicting the President of Libya that Sunday have any impact on our ability to get information? The President of Libya said it was terror.

See, freeman2, Rice was not JUST on CBS. She was on ABC too. It's not a pretty picture:

U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Susan Rice said the attack on the American consulate in Benghazi last week was not premeditated, directly contradicting top Libyan officials who say the attack was planned in advance.

“Our current best assessment, based on the information that we have at present, is that, in fact, what this began as, it was a spontaneous – not a premeditated – response to what had transpired in Cairo,” Rice told me this morning on “This Week.”

“In Cairo, as you know, a few hours earlier, there was a violent protest that was undertaken in reaction to this very offensive video that was disseminated,” Rice said, referring to protests in Egypt Tuesday over a film that depicts the Prophet Muhammad as a fraud. Protesters in Cairo breached the walls of the U.S. Embassy, tearing apart an American flag.

“We believe that folks in Benghazi, a small number of people came to the embassy to – or to the consulate, rather, to replicate the sort of challenge that was posed in Cairo,” Rice said. “And then as that unfolded, it seems to have been hijacked, let us say, by some individual clusters of extremists who came with heavier weapons… And it then evolved from there.”

Ambassador Christopher Stevens, along with three other Americans, were killed in Libya following the assault on the American consulate in Benghazi, on the 11th anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks. Rice said the FBI is examining the attack, saying their investigation “will tell us with certainty what transpired.”

Rice’s account directly contradicts that of Libyan President Mohamed Yousef El-Magariaf, who said this weekend that he had “no doubt” the attack was pre-planned by individuals from outside Libya.

“It was planned, definitely, it was planned by foreigners, by people who entered the country a few months ago, and they were planning this criminal act since their arrival,” Magariaf told CBS News.

http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/politics/20 ... meditated/

Counselor, you've got a loser of a case.

Well, you're the one trying to prove the case--seems like you should have evidence instead of questions. You also did not attempt to explain the difference between terrorism and extremism. The other stuff is pretty much irrelevant. You have a theory, that the Obama administration lied about the attack being terrorism for political gain, so you need to show that the Obama Administration denied that it was a terrorist attack. As you can see, Rice said that the extremists were the ones that were responsible for making the violence much worse. She also said that the extremists were either Al Qaeda, Al Qaeda or Libyan extremists (two of the three possibilities being Al Qaeda or Al Qaeda linked).

So what you are left with is trying to argue that extremists are not terrorists and that leaving open the possibility several days after the attack that the extremists involved might not have been Al Qaeda or linked to Al Qaeda was deceptive (but given that two of the options are Al Qaeda or Al Qaeda and the other is some vague referenced to Libyan extremists, the average listener would think there is a strong possibility that Al Qaeda was involved). Now that's a weak case--put that in front of a jury and watch them just roll their eyes. That's what the American people are doing right now.

It's funny how conservatives have even gotten liberal media to repeat the mistaken assertion that Rice said that the attack was due to a spontaneous protest. That's not what she said.

Feeble rebuttal.

How many times do I have to show the Administration and the President blaming the video? They did everything they could, including insulting the President of Libya, to downplay terrorism.

Only liberals can't figure out "why," because they don't want to.

Well I presented arguments and you provided an adjectival response--I''ll leave it others to judge