Archive

Did the Obama administration lie about the embassy attacks?

  • HitsRus
    Nice Joe Biden imitation boat shoes. It fits you well.


    As for Clinton....she's probably the last one to fall on her sword for him.

    As Biden emphatically stated in the VP debate...he and BHO 'didn't know'. You can't expect them to take blame and responsibility...

    He's no Harry Truman, that's for sure.
  • QuakerOats
    They realize they are going down in flames and are now grasping at straws to try and save the ship.

    And of course, this give obama someone else to BLAME. The truly inept blaming the inept.
  • se-alum
    If Hilary is going to fall on the sword, she should be removed from office. It's amazing the Dems try to play this off as no big deal, but it shows a fundamental ineptness between the State Department and the White House. What should really anger Americans, is the fact that our President thought we were ignorant enough to think a Youtube video caused this.
  • QuakerOats
    se-alum;1296369 wrote: What should really anger Americans, is the fact that our President thought we were ignorant enough to think a Youtube video caused this.
    Which shows you how ignorant and/or anti-American he really is.
  • jhay78
    Manhattan Buckeye;1296207 wrote:Hillary takes the "fall":

    http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/ticket/clinton-tells-cnn-responsibility-libya-attack-010005118.html

    So is she going to resign? When will Rice resign? Who told Rice to blame the attacks on an internet video? Who told Obama? Is this the truth or is it more damage control before tomorrow morning's (tonight most of your time) debate?

    This is the keystone cops, if Hillary wants the responsibility she should suffer the consequences.
    She didn't quite take full responsibility. She mentioned that security arrangements were made by "security professionals".
    se-alum;1296369 wrote:If Hilary is going to fall on the sword, she should be removed from office. It's amazing the Dems try to play this off as no big deal, but it shows a fundamental ineptness between the State Department and the White House. What should really anger Americans, is the fact that our President thought we were ignorant enough to think a Youtube video caused this.
    This is what it all boils down to for me. And he didn't play that narrative for a few minutes and then walk it back- he went with that for 2 full weeks, especially before the UN, and even last week Carney and some of the others didn't quite fully abandon the video/protest/riot-gone-bad theory.
  • gut
    Liberals don't really like Obama - failures, incompetence, arrogance, etc.. But they think they can win a final victory with 4 more years to create just enough new dependents to fully tilt the scales in their favor for the long-run.

    They know they are close to seizing control for the long-haul. If those two clowns (Obama/Biden) can win re-election with THAT record, then there's virtually no way the Dems will lose another Presidential election for a long, long time.
  • BGFalcons82
    gut;1296522 wrote: They know they are close to seizing control for the long-haul. If those two clowns (Obama/Biden) can win re-election with THAT record, then there's virtually no way the Dems will lose another Presidential election for a long, long time.
    Probably the most profound statement made on the OC in a long time.
  • jhay78
    gut;1296522 wrote:They know they are close to seizing control for the long-haul. If those two clowns (Obama/Biden) can win re-election with THAT record, then there's virtually no way the Dems will lose another Presidential election for a long, long time.
    Yes, but according to many on this site, that would just bring us one step closer to libertarian utopia.

    After all, Obama=Romney=Marx=Stalin=Hitler=Chairman Mao=Reagan=all Democrats=all Republicans.
  • Belly35
    Is the national media monitoring to OC and what I comment about?

    At 7:12 I used the term “jumping on the sword” about Hillary and now the national media is using it … OC being monitored? Could it be that the government is listening to Belly also? :laugh:
  • gut
    I'm not sure I see it as a career killer that others do. She is clearly not re-upping for 4 more years as SecState, anyway, and perhaps she is contemplating "retirement" all together. But certainly she has a chance in 2016 with 4 more years of Obama vs, potentially, no chance with Romney.
  • Abe Vigoda
    We went to the transcript, and the president has a point. On September 12, the day after the attack, in the Rose Garden, Obama condemned the attack and said, "No acts of terror will ever shake the resolve of this great nation." In the days since, some have parsed Obama's remarks and argued he didn't say the Benghazi attack was specifically an act of terror. However, given the overall context of his comments, it seems a fair conclusion that he was including the attack in the "acts of terror" that he said would never shake American resolve.

    However, in the days that followed, the White House spokesman and the U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations suggested that the attack seemed to have taken advantage of a demonstration over an American-made video that disparaged Islam.

    On Sept. 13, White House spokesman Jay Carney said, "The protests we're seeing around the region are in reaction to this movie. They are not directly in reaction to any policy of the United States or the government of the United States or the people of the United States."

    The next day, a State Department spokeswoman said, "We are very cautious about drawing any conclusions with regard to who the perpetrators were, what their motivations were, whether it was premeditated." But she ended with this: "Obviously, there are plenty of people around the region citing this disgusting video as something that has been motivating."

    On Sept. 16, five days after the attack, Susan Rice, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations said, "We do not have information at present that leads us to conclude that this was premeditated or preplanned."

    On Sept. 20, Carney told reporters, "It is, I think, self-evident that what happened in Benghazi was a terrorist attack. Our embassy was attacked violently, and the result was four deaths of American officials."

    But that same day, Obama told an audience at a town hall meeting, "What we do know is that the natural protests that arose because of the outrage over the video were used as an excuse by extremists to see if they can also directly harm U.S. interests."

    It wasn’t until Sept. 21 that everyone in the administration as a whole stated publicly that the attack was planned and executed by a terrorist group.

    Our ruling

    Romney said it took the president 14 days before he called the Libya attack terror.

    In fact, Obama described it in those terms the day after the attack. But in the days that followed, neither he nor all the members of his administration spoke consistently on the subject. There were many suggestions that the attack was part of demonstrations over an American-made video that disparaged Islam.

    We rate the statement Half True.
    Update:

    After we published this item, we heard from readers that the president called the attack "an act of terror" two more times -- on Sept. 13 in Colorado and Sept. 14 in Nevada.

    "As for the ones we lost last night: I want to assure you, we will bring their killers to justice," Obama said at a campaign event in Nevada. "And we want to send a message all around the world -- anybody who would do us harm: No act of terror will dim the light of the values that we proudly shine on the rest of the world, and no act of violence will shake the resolve of the United States of America."

    So as we noted in our original item, Romney is off the mark as it relates to the word "terror." But Obama contributed to the administration's mixed message when he spoke at the Univision Town Hall event on Sept. 20. A questioner asked: "We have reports that the White House said today that the attacks in Libya were a terrorist attack. Do you have information indicating that it was Iran, or al Qaeda was behind organizing the protests?"

    Here is Obama’s reply:

    "Well, we’re still doing an investigation, and there are going to be different circumstances in different countries. And so I don’t want to speak to something until we have all the information. What we do know is that the natural protests that arose because of the outrage over the video were used as an excuse by extremists to see if they can also directly harm U.S. interests."

    So although Obama acknowledged the uncertainty, he emphasized the inflammatory video and the protest as contributing factors in the attack.

    By mentioning the video, Obama drew attention away from the possibility that the attack had been a planned assault. This lies at the heart of the dispute over what Obama and his administration were saying in the days after the attack. The president had the chance to be more complete and direct in Florida, but the administration was continuing to focus on the response to the video.

    Just four days earlier, Ambassador Rice downplayed the possibility that the attack was premeditated. The president’s words did not correct that impression.

    So while Obama did use the word "terror," there is also some truth to Romney's point that it took many days for the administration to fully characterize the attack as the work of a terrorist group. So we're still rating this Half True.

    http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/article/2012/oct/18/sorting-out-truth-attack-libya/
  • Heretic
    Belly35;1296757 wrote:Could it be that the government is listening to Belly also? :laugh:
    lol...wouldn't surprise me! Do you occasionally see dudes in black suits lurking around the perimeter, occasionally emphatically talking into walkie-talkies?
  • QuakerOats
    obama: "when four Americans get killed, it's not optimal".

    http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2219867/Barack-Obama-Benghazi-If-Americans-killed-OPTIMAL-Obamas-extraordinary-response-security-fiasco-Benghazi-massacre.html?openGraphAuthor=%2Fhome%2Fsearch.html%3Fs%3D%26authornamef%3DToby%2BHarnden%2BIn%2BWashington



    He should resign, immediately. What a complete jerk.
  • HitsRus
    If you throw out all the 'who said what when'...and just stick to the obvious, it is clear that the Obama administration took nearly 10 days to characterize the Benghazi attacks as a preplanned act of terrorism....and that's the bottom line. That Romney wasn't entirely accurate with what he said...or that the President was vague and spoke in generalities when initially talking about the attack, doesn't change that.

    Now we as Americans saw Joe Biden look into the camera and say 'trust us'....and 'we didn't know'. And we saw BHO look into the camera and say the 'buck stops on his desk'.???? So are they responsible or not? Are they competent or not. Have they been straightforward(really) or not?
    Today...an Obama surrogate...Dianne Feinstein, looked into the camera and blamed intelligence director James Clapper for putting out 'talking points' about the attack. She was careful to add..that the Pres. (paraphrase) characterized it as a 'terrorist attack in his Rose Garden speech on Sept 12.'

    Really? So the question is...Does the buck really stop at the President's desk? If it truly does....then there have been a lot of bucks acculminating there, what with Libya, Fast and Furious, Keystone and the economy.

    Maybe we can use them to pay down the deficit.
  • jhay78
    The "intelligence community told us it was a protest/riot over a video gone bad" argument is now officially in shreds:

    http://www.mercurynews.com/breaking-news/ci_21808401/cia-found-militant-links-day-after-libya-attack

    Can't wait for the next debate.
  • QuakerOats


    Mother of slain diplomat: 'My son is not very optimal, he is very dead'
  • BoatShoes
    jhay78;1299037 wrote:The "intelligence community told us it was a protest/riot over a video gone bad" argument is now officially in shreds:

    http://www.mercurynews.com/breaking-news/ci_21808401/cia-found-militant-links-day-after-libya-attack

    Can't wait for the next debate.
    Not exactly.

    http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/benghazi-attack-becomes-political-ammunition/2012/10/19/e1ad82ae-1a2d-11e2-bd10-5ff056538b7c_story.html

    The day Ambassador Rice went on T.V. the CIA memo called "Talking Points" at her disposal at the time said this:
    "The currently available information suggests that the demonstrations 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. Consulate and subsequently its annex. There are indications that extremists participated in the violent demonstrations."
    This is also from the article.
    The Benghazi flap is the sort of situation that intelligence officers dread: when politicians are demanding hard “yes” or “no” answers but evidence is fragmentary and conflicting. The political debate has focused on whether the attack was spontaneous or planned, but the official said there’s evidence of both, and that different attackers may have had different motives. There’s no dispute, however, that it was “an act of terror,” as Obama described it the next day.
    The desperation of Conservatives desperately hoping to turn this into a diabolical cover-up is shameful.
  • BoatShoes
    HitsRus;1296241 wrote:Nice Joe Biden imitation boat shoes. It fits you well.
    I don't suppose you have any evidence for that blather.
  • BoatShoes
    se-alum;1296369 wrote:What should really anger Americans, is the fact that our President thought we were ignorant enough to think a Youtube video caused this.
    Well, it appears as if CIA analysts...who do this for a living...thought "this" might've been spontaneous in relation to the protests that were about the video as well and briefed as much the day Ambassador Rice went on T.V.
  • Manhattan Buckeye
    "The desperation of Conservatives desperately hoping to turn this into a diabolical cover-up is shameful."

    If it isn't a cover-up it is gross incompetence. Which is worse?
  • jhay78
    BoatShoes;1299228 wrote: The desperation of Conservatives desperately hoping to turn this into a diabolical cover-up is shameful.
    Desperation is Candy Crowley bailing out the Prez near the end of the debate the other night.

    Desperation is Dan Rather running with forged documents to nail George W a few weeks before the '04 election.

    If it's not a cover-up, then the keystone cops are running our State Dept. and Obama's foreign policy.
  • gut
    The other thing is that whole bit was an elaborate set-up by the Obama crew to hide the lie. How else do you explain that she just happened to have the transcript, and was all teed-up for it?

    In other words, that was a deliberate attempt by Obama to take himself out of context in a way that helps him.
  • gut
    jhay78;1299265 wrote: If it's not a cover-up, then the keystone cops are running our State Dept. and Obama's foreign policy.
    That's how Romney should have shot back at Obama's "I'm offended you'd accuse me of playing politics". My apologies, Mr. President, I thought it might be something other than incompetence and negligence.

    The spin masters will be working OT trying to prep Obama with answers for the debate that try to create a miniscule gap between politics/incompetence and then shoot thru it. My guess something like choosing language/message to try to cool the region a bit while they continued gathering information to understand the situation. Something along the lines of how it was a delicate strategy based on national security info that hasn't been made public.
  • ptown_trojans_1
    As more information is coming out, it appears the truth is, like many things, somewhere in the middle.
    Apparently the IC has said the attack was not planned, but that once the crowd grew after the Cairo embassy attacks (which was caused by the video), al Qaeda elements decided to hijack the Libya embassy protests.
    That then led to the attack.
    So, the attacks and cause are a combination of many factors, that led to the perfect storm and the attack.
    Again, like most things, it is more complex than just saying Obama lied!
    It's just like all the intelligence and the run up to the Iraq war. It is more complex and nuanced.
    But, politics rules the board. Back to the regulatory scheduled bash-a-thone.
  • elitesmithie05
    The video had about 100 views the day of the attack..give it a rest already