Benghazi Biopsy

[_Kevin Graham]

Newsweek:

Benghazi Biopsy: A Comprehensive Guide to One of America’s Worst Political Outrages

Moussa Koussa.

That is the name of the “classified source” in an old email from Hillary Clinton released last week by Republicans purportedly investigating the 2012 attack on the American consulate in Benghazi, Libya. Under the instructions of the Benghazi committee’s chairman, Republican Representative Trey Gowdy of South Carolina, Koussa’s name was blacked-out on the publicly issued email, as Republicans proclaimed revealing his identity would compromise national security. The media ran with it, saying Clinton had sent classified information through her personal email account.

But the CIA never said the name was secret. Nor did the Defense Intelligence Agency or the FBI. No, Koussa’s role as an intelligence source is about as classified as this column. He is the former intelligence chief and foreign minister of Libya. In 2011, he fled that country for Great Britain, where he provided boodles of information to MI6 and the CIA. Documents released long ago show Koussa’s cooperation. Government officials have openly discussed it. His name appears in newspapers with casual discussions about his assistance. Sanctions by the British and the Americans against Koussa were lifted because of his help, and he moved to Qatar. All of that is publicly known.

But, as they have time and again, the Republicans on the Benghazi committee released deceitful information for what was undoubtedly part of a campaign—as Kevin McCarthy of the House Republican leadership has admitted—to drive down Clinton’s poll numbers. Republicans have implied—and some journalists have flatly stated—that Clinton was reckless and may have broken the law by sending an email that included thirdhand hearsay mentioning Koussa’s name. The reality is that the Republicans continue to be reckless with the truth.

The historical significance of this moment can hardly be overstated, and it seems many Republicans, Democrats and members of the media don’t fully understand the magnitude of what is taking place. The awesome power of government—one that allows officials to pore through almost anything they demand and compel anyone to talk or suffer the shame of taking the Fifth Amendment—has been unleashed for purely political purposes. It is impossible to review what the Benghazi committee has done as anything other than taxpayer-funded political research of the opposing party’s leading candidate for president. Comparisons from America’s past are rare. Richard Nixon’s attempts to use the IRS to investigate his perceived enemies come to mind. So does Senator Joseph McCarthy’s red-baiting during the 1950s, with reckless accusations of treason leveled at members of the State Department, military generals and even the secretary of the Army. But the modern McCarthys of the Benghazi committee cannot perform this political theater on their own—they depend on reporters to aid in the attempts to use government for the purpose of destroying others with bogus “scoops” ladled out by members of Congress and their staffs. These journalists will almost certainly join the legions of shamed reporters of the McCarthy era as it becomes increasingly clear they are enablers of an obscene attempt to undermine the electoral process.

The consequences, however, are worse than the manipulation of the electoral process. By using Benghazi for political advantage, the Republicans have communicated to global militants that, through even limited attacks involving relatively few casualties, they can potentially influence the direction of American elections. The Republicans sent that same message after the Boston Marathon bombing, where they condemned Obama for failing to—illegally—send the American perpetrators to Guantánamo, among other things. They slammed the president because federal law enforcement agents read the failed underwear bomber his rights after they arrested him in 2009. Never mind that federal agents did the exact same thing under President George with. Bush when they arrested the failed shoe bomber years earlier. Republicans even lambasted Obama when he spoke about ISIS decapitating journalists, saying the president did not sound angry enough.

But there is an enormous difference between politicizing tragedy and using the levers of government to achieve that goal. Put simply, the transformation of the Benghazi attacks into a political drama now serves as one of the most dangerous precedents in American history, one whose absurdity and irrationality can be seen just by reviewing the past. This single Benghazi committee has been “investigating” the attack for longer than Congress conducted inquiries into Pearl Harbor, 9/11, Iran-Contra, Watergate and intelligence failures in Iraq.

Worse still, Congress convened 22 hearings about the 9/11 attack that killed almost 3,000 citizens working in the World Trade Center in downtown Manhattan; this week, Congress will be holding its 21st hearing about an attack that killed four people working in Libya, with many more sessions left to come. Do Republicans actually think that terrorists killing four agents of the government who willingly assumed the risks of residing in one of the most dangerous places in the world is more important than terrorists murdering 3,000 unsuspecting civilians who were working at their offices in New York City?

In fact, no previous assault on a diplomatic outpost has received this kind of relentless expression of congressional outrage. There weren’t investigations that were anything on this scale about the attack on the U.S. Embassy in Beirut in 1983 (63 killed), on the U.S. Embassy annex northeast of Beirut in 1984 (24 killed) or on the U.S. Embassy in Sanaa, Yemen, in 2008 (18 killed). Republicans didn’t believe these exact same scenarios that took place under Republican presidents merited similar zeal to dig down to some unexposed, imaginary “truth.”

In fact, Benghazi was just one of 21 major assaults on an American diplomatic facility in the last 20 years; the personnel murdered there were among about 90 other Americans hired by the government to work in diplomatic outposts who were killed in terrorist attacks from 1998 through 2012, according to a State Department report. Apparently, their killings—like the deaths of thousands of Americans at Pearl Harbor and in the World Trade Center—were seen as less important than murder of four people in a North African country in the midst of a government overthrow.

'Anybody but Hillary'

One important point has been universally acknowledged by the nine previous reports about Benghazi: The attack was almost certainly preventable. Clinton was in charge of the State Department, and it failed to protect U.S. personnel at an American consulate in Libya. If the GOP wants to raise that as a talking point against her, it is legitimate.

The earlier reports—two from the Senate, one from an independent board and six from the Republican-controlled House—were released before the 2014 election; after that, the House voted to form a special Benghazi committee, with the expectation that it would drag out its work until shortly before the 2016 election—four years after the armed assault took place. Despite all the work that has already been done investigating the attacks, the Benghazi committee has demonstrated that its members either have not read the reports or do not care about the conclusions they reached. Its members ask questions of witnesses that have already been answered—again and again. In fact, some of the questions that Republicans say have yet to be addressed have answers that are so well known they already appear on the Wikipedia page about the Benghazi attacks, sourced to the previous government reports.

Despite the repeated claims by Gowdy that he is objective, the conclusions he will reach are already clear; he publicly stated them before the committee was formed in May 2014. In November 2012, Gowdy released a statement proclaiming as fact that the Obama administration “intentionally misled the American people” about the Benghazi attack. About a year later, in September 2013, he put out another press release in reference to Benghazi, stating, “If you can’t trust the information your government is giving you, how can you trust your government on any issue?” Eight months afterward, he was appointed to run the Benghazi committee, and in apparent disregard of his previous publicly issued conclusions, announced, “My goal is to conduct an inquiry that is rooted in fairness.”

But to fully understand how political this latest Benghazi investigation has become, look at the records. Since March, the committee has issued almost 30 press releases related to Clinton; only five have been put out on every other topic combined. Then there is the committee’s interim report from this past May. The word Obama—who cannot run for commander-in-chief again—is not mentioned. Neither is the word president. Or Ansar al-Sharia, the group suspected of engineering the attack. White House makes only 13 appearances. Imagine an investigation on 9/11 that did not mention Al-Qaeda, Osama bin Laden or President Bush; that is what has been done with the Benghazi committee’s first public report.

It gets worse. The name Ahmed Abu Khatalla, the man arrested as the mastermind of the attack, shows up once. The word terrorist appears only 10 times. As for references to Clinton, the leading candidate for the Democratic nomination? Those show up 36 times in just 13 pages, an astonishing number given that the word Benghazi appears only 38 times. But the winner for the most mentions is the 39 references to emails from Clinton and the State Department. Clinton and her emails are referenced 49 percent more than the location where the attack took place and 197 percent more than the word terrorist.

This rampant politicization of the Benghazi tragedy has delighted Republican voters in an offensive and inappropriate way, given that the issue is about the murder of Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens and the three other brave Americans killed in Benghazi. At a recent GOP rally I attended, a speaker declared herself to be “Benghazi truth-seeking” in the same sentence in which she referenced gun rights, abortion, illegal immigration and other top conservative political issues. Political lapel buttons for candidates were sold right alongside others referencing Benghazi.

Online stores for political merchandise have entire sections committed to Benghazi. The most common items: buttons. Those manufactured before the 2014 election had Obama’s face or name alongside accusations of a cover-up while the new ones reference only Clinton. The latest political buttons contain phrases like “Anybody but Hillary Because Benghazi,” and “Hillary 2016: Remember Benghazi?” One has a drawing of devil-horned Clinton with the words “The Beast of Benghazi” emblazoned underneath. Others are simply ghoulish, with dripping blood and grave sites. (Benghazi buttons sold before the 2014 election frequently used the symbol of the Obama campaign with pools of blood pouring out; now the blood is shown on Clinton.) I couldn’t find any that criticize the terrorists who murdered Americans; I found only two in memory of the fallen. Then there are the bumper stickers calling Clinton “The Butcher of Benghazi,” or saying “People Died, Hillary Lied,” “Benghazi: Hillary’s Only Accomplishment,” “Hanoi Jane, Benghazi Hillary” and other phrases.

Nothing like this happened after 9/11. Yes, there were scores of buttons and bumper stickers with words on them like “We Will Never Forget” and “America Salutes Its Fallen Heroes.” These were intended to unify the country and honor those who had died; in a widespread search, I could find none showing the blood of the murdered splattered on anyone in the Bush administration.

The Republicans’ unseemly delight in Benghazi has even spread to political fundraising. There is the Stop Hillary PAC, which broadcast an ad about Clinton and Benghazi. The Virginia GOP held a “Beyond Benghazi” fundraiser where donors had to pay $75 to attend and $5,000 to sponsor the event. A blog post before the 2014 election by the National Republican Senate Committee stated, "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."

But by far the most egregious examples of Republicans trying to raise money on the backs of the dead was by the National Republican Congressional Committee, the official GOP group that works to elect Republicans to the House. In a blog post on its fundraising website, the NRCC told supporters, “House Republicans will make sure that no one will get away from Gowdy and the Select Committee.’’ The NRCC also sent out an email that contained a link that led to part of the NRCC’s site with a URL that ended with the words “Benghazicoverup-contribute.” That page directly sought money for the committee’s political efforts under the words “You’re now a Benghazi Watchdog. Let’s go after Obama and Hillary Clinton.” Beneath that, and directly next to the suggested contribution levels, was a photograph of Clinton and Obama surrounded by the sentences “Benghazi Was a Coverup. Demand Answers.”

Secrets, Lies and Sidney Blumenthal

Trey Gowdy was demanding answers: What is the definition of unsolicited?

At a hearing in June, the Benghazi committee‘s questioning of Sidney Blumenthal, a longtime associate of Hillary Clinton, had dragged on for hours. Republicans had yet to ask him a single question about the attack or anything related to it, although as the Democrats on the committee established quickly that morning, Blumenthal had never been to Libya and knew nothing about the assault. In fact, more than eight hours would pass in the hearing before a Republican asked anything about Benghazi.

They did, however, spend an enormous amount of time on Blumenthal’s outside work and email communications with Hillary Clinton. According to people who have seen the transcript of the hearing—which the Republicans have refused to release—Gowdy’s opening inquiries were off-topic, bizarre and totally political. He asked Blumenthal many questions about a series of articles posted on Media Matters, a liberal website, that proved embarrassing to his friend, Republican Representative Jason Chaffetz of Utah. One post said Chaffetz had attacked Clinton and Obama about Benghazi although he had voted to cut funding to the State Department for security at diplomatic outposts. Gowdy asked Blumenthal if he wrote the articles, commissioned them, edited them or read them. He inquired about his relationship to Media Matters, Democratic political commentators and organizations connected to the Democratic Party.

Eventually, Gowdy’s questions turned to emails that Blumenthal had sent to Clinton. The former secretary of state had said publicly that they were unsolicited emails from an old friend. In question after question, Gowdy grilled Blumenthal about the definition of unsolicited. The meaning of the word, Gowdy proclaimed, was “unwanted”—yet Clinton had clearly made statements in her emails that she appreciated Blumenthal’s input. The congressman persisted with his incorrect definition to prove Clinton lied about a topic unrelated to Benghazi until Blumenthal’s lawyer suggested looking up unsolicited in the dictionary (it means “not requested,” as the Democrats later pointed out). Gowdy immediately moved on to another topic unrelated to the Benghazi attack.

The hearing was littered with other irrelevant questions. Gowdy and his staff asked Blumenthal more than 50 questions about the Clinton Foundation, the charitable organization established by Bill Clinton and where Blumenthal had worked. Republicans also asked more than 45 questions about David Brock, who operates Media Matters and other related groups, and over 160 questions about Blumenthal’s relationship and contacts with the Clintons.

Nine hours of questioning achieved nothing in advancing the investigation into the Libyan terrorist attack, since Blumenthal had no firsthand knowledge related to Benghazi; the closest he had come to providing information to Clinton about the area was by forwarding a report written by Tyler Drumheller, a long-retired CIA officer who had been head of the European division for clandestine operations.

So what was Blumenthal doing in front of the committee? A former White House aide to President Clinton, he had not been in government for more than 14 years. Blumenthal also had plenty of contacts from his years as a journalist—including Drumheller, whom he had mentioned in a few stories for Salon. He was a friend of Hillary Clinton and—like scores of civilians and former government officials before him—he provided information he believed to be important to the former secretary, who then passed any of it she considered worthwhile to her staff for review. Henry Kissinger, former secretary of state under Richard Nixon, played the same role for the Bush administration in the lead-up to the Iraq War. Robert Murphy, a former American diplomat, provided similar information to Kissinger during his years with Nixon. In fact, Nixon himself frequently reached out to then-President Bill Clinton to offer analysis and information. Former journalist and think tank veteran Michael Ledeen has funneled his thoughts and details of things he had learned to numerous Republican administrations and brokered introductions with people overseas. A conservative think tank scholar used his contacts to set up a meeting between senior Pentagon officials with the Bush administration and two former member of the Iranian government in December 2001. One White House official with the Bush administration even reached out to me in 2002 for information about Osama bin Laden’s financial network. (As a journalist, I was required to decline the request.)

In other words, there was nothing unusual about someone like Blumenthal directing his analysis and information to Hillary Clinton. Had the secretary instructed Blumenthal to stop providing potentially valuable intelligence, it would have been not only likely unprecedented but also bordering on incompetence.

The only point in subpoenaing Blumenthal to testify was for the Republicans to traffic in Benghazi-related conspiracy theories, including one explicitly stated on Sunday by a member of the Benghazi committee, Representative Mike Pompeo of Kansas. In an appearance on Meet the Press, he said Clinton had “relied on Mr. Blumenthal for most of her intelligence” on Libya. Gowdy, in a letter he made public on October 8, made the same statement

Think about that for a moment. Either Pompeo and Gowdy were being completely disingenuous, or irrationally believe that Clinton (who was cleared to review any classified intelligence developed by the State Department, the CIA and other agencies throughout government) instead decided to make decisions based primarily on information from a man who had never been to Libya.

Andrea Mitchell, NBC’s longtime diplomatic correspondent who hosted the program, responded quickly to Pompeo’s assertion. “That is factually not correct,” she told Pompeo. “No, it is absolutely factually correct,” Pompeo responded.

“Relied on Mr. Blumenthal for most of her intelligence?” Mitchell repeated. “I cover the State Department. That is just factually not correct, and I've been as tough on this issue as anyone.”

But that was not the only fantastical conspiracy theory about Blumenthal. In the October 8 letter, Gowdy claims that Blumenthal was a primary driver for the establishment of a no-fly zone over Libya based on an email he sent to Clinton in February 2011, more than a year and a half before the Benghazi attack. Gowdy fails to mention a relevant fact: This was hardly Blumenthal’s idea. Diplomats who had defected from the tyrannical government of Muammar el-Qaddafi, then the Libyan leader, were calling on the United Nations to impose a no-fly zone. So had Libya’s ambassador to the U.N. Britain and France were already drafting a resolution to put in place a restricted area where aircraft would be forbidden to fly. Within days, Republican Senator John McCain announced his support for the idea, and Mitch McConnell, the Senate Republican leader, said it was worth considering. But in the world of the Benghazi committee, none of these voices—major Western governments allied with the United States, the analysis of ambassadors and Libyan government exiles, and the input of American senators—were as important in making a such critical decision as an email from Blumenthal.

After ignoring the history of the no-fly zone debate, Gowdy then makes the most incredible accusation of all: that Blumenthal was using his (imaginary) role as Clinton puppet master to impose a no-fly zone so that he could make money. In the October 8 letter, Gowdy wrote that Blumenthal was pushing for war in Libya to profit from his financial stake in a company called Osprey Global Solutions. At the time, Osprey was attempting to arrange a contract to provide humanitarian assistance including housing, medical clinics and schools in five sites.

But once again, Gowdy’s assertions are false. David Grange, a retired Army major general who is president and chief executive of Osprey, says Blumenthal had no stake in his company at all. In fact, Grange says he has met Blumenthal only once, for no more than 15 minutes. While Blumenthal may have played a small role brokering efforts by a third party consultant to facilitate the humanitarian assistance project, he had no contract to obtain any money, according to an executive from another corporation involved in the proposed deal. While there may have been an unpromised possibility that Blumenthal could have obtained a finder’s fee, this executive says, nothing was ever paid to anyone. In the end, Grange says, Osprey “didn’t make a dime” from its efforts, in large part because the situation in Libya was so chaotic; it was impossible to determine who had the authority to sign an agreement.

Ever since Blumenthal gave his testimony, he, his lawyer and Democratic members of the committee have been demanding that the transcript be made public. That document would reveal the sham of the committee, the fact that Republicans cared more about articles in Media Matters than about the Benghazi attack. It would, according to people who have seen it, prove critically embarrassing. An agreement was reached to have a vote on releasing the transcript at the next business meeting of the committee. But Gowdy canceled the meeting. More than 100 days have passed; no business meetings that would allow for the testimony to be released have been scheduled or held.

Manipulating the Press

The Benghazi committee’s secrets go well beyond what Blumenthal had to say. Unlike almost every congressional committee investigation in history, the Republican congressman has insisted that much of the relevant questioning be conducted behind closed doors. Even when directors of the CIA appear before Congress, unclassified portions of the statements and questioning occur in public, while classified information is delivered in private.

[_ajax18]

What I find ironic is that it really wasn't necessary for the Obama administration to lie about the Behghazi terrorist attacks and blame them on a YouTube video to win the 2012 election. Most Democrats didn't need to hear that Al Quaeda was on the run to convince them to vote for Obama. Just keep the welfare flowing and the border open and Democratic victory was a certainty. I'm not sure why they felt the overwhelming need to cook up this tale about the youtube video but they did. And now that it's been clearly shown that this story was a lie, most voters remain unswayed.

[_Kevin Graham]

There was no lying dumbass. Benghazi hoopla was admitted to be a political stunt to hurt Clintons campaign and nothing more. But it backfired because she is exposing these asshats for the clowns they really are. Even the talk radio gurus admit the hearings are helping not hurting her.

[_Kevin Graham]

This pretty much sums up the whole "She lied about their motivation" BS.


According to the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, from 11 months ago:

After reviewing hundreds of pages of raw intelligence, as well as open source information, it was clear that between the time when the attacks occurred and when the Administration, through Ambassador Susan Rice, appeared on the Sunday talk shows, intelligence analysts and policymakers received a stream of piecemeal intelligence regarding the identities/affiliations and motivations of the attackers, as well as the level of planning and/or coordination. Much of the early intelligence was conflicting, and two years later, intelligence gaps remain.

Various witnesses and senior military officials serving in the Obama Administration testified to this Committee, the House Armed Services Committee, and the Senate Armed Services Committee that they knew from the moment the attacks began that the attacks were deliberate terrorist acts against U.S. interests. No witness has reported believing at any point that the attacks were anything but terrorist acts.

Along those lines, in the Rose Garden on September 12, 2012, President Obama said that four "extraordinary Americans were killed in an attack on our diplomatic post in Benghazi," and said that: "[ n ]o 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."

However, it was not clear whether the terrorist attacks were committed by al-Qa'ida or by various groups of other bad actors, some of who may have been affiliated with al-Qa'ida. Early CIA, NCTC, Denver International Airport, and CJCS intelligence assessments on September 12th and 13th stated that members of AAS and various al-Qa'ida affiliates "likely," "probably," or "possibl[y]" participated in the attacks.

Democratic Staff Report, Results Of Interviews Conducted By The House Select Committee On Benghazi:

The evidence obtained by the Select Committee confirms previous accounts that the information being gathered in the aftermath of the attacks--and intelligence assessments of that information--continued to change throughout the week. For example, although initial reports claimed that Ansar al-Sharia was responsible for the attacks, the group later disavowed responsibility.

[...]

Later that afternoon, Secretary Clinton had a call with the Egyptian Prime Minister Hesham Kandil regarding the events in Cairo and Libya. The notes from that call indicate that the Secretary relayed information consistent with reporting at the time: "We know that the attack in Libya had nothing to do with the film. It was a planned attack--not a protest." The notes also indicate that she acknowledged that Ansar al-Sharia reportedly claimed responsibility for the attacks: "Your [sic] not kidding. Based on the information we saw today we believe the group that claimed responsibility for this was affiliated with al Qaeda."

Fox News, Special Report with Bret Baier, 6/18/14

HILLARY CLINTON: This was the fog of war. You know, my own assessment careened from, the video had nothing to do with it -- it may have affected some people, it didn't affect other people. And I think the conclusion to draw, because we were not just monitoring what was happening in Benghazi once it began to unfold, but remember we had a very dangerous assault on our embassy in Cairo that same day, which was clearly linked to that video. So I was trying to make sense of it. And I think that the investigations that have been carried out basically conclude, we can't say that everybody was influenced and we can't say that everybody wasn't. But what the intelligence community said was spontaneous protest, and that is what, at the time, they thought.

In her book, Secretary Clinton explained that she personally changed views several times that week about the possible motivations of the attackers, whether there was a protest, and whether the attacks were preplanned:

Hillary commented on this in her book:

What about the attack in Benghazi? In the heat of the crisis we had no way of knowing for sure what combination of factors motivated the assault or whether and how long it had been planned. I was clear about this in my remarks the next morning, and in the days that followed administration officials continued to tell the American people that we had incomplete information and were still looking for answers. There were many theories-- but still little evidence. I myself went back and forth on what likely happened, who did it, and what mix of factors--like the video--played a part. But it was unquestionably inciting the region and triggering protests all over, so it would have been strange not to consider, as days of protests unfolded, that it might have had the same effect here, too. That's just common sense. Later investigation and reporting confirmed that the video was indeed a factor. All we knew at that time with complete certainty was that Americans had been killed and others were still in danger.

Again, no evidence of any "lying" going on. Though I doubt the facts will do anything to move the small minds over at Brietbart and the rest of the Right Wing peanut gallery.