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Senate report: Attacks in Benghazi could have been prevented

Okay. I think they tried to play a risky game and got burned, which appeared predictable given the events preceding the attack. After all, who would think that an attack on Americans might occur on 9/11 in the middle east? Anyway, we'll see how it turns out, if it does actually turn into something in which people shoulder responsibility. I have my doubts given the obfuscation up to this point.

From my view, the issue of contention isn't that some decisions went bad, security wasn't provided for properly, and 4 Americans died as a result. Yeah, it's not good, but sometimes it happens, and I'm glad that lessons learned are going to be incorporated so as not to happen again.

It's the handling of the matter after the attack that I have a serious problem with.

Both reports (Senate and House) clearly state that the President and the administration both knew before the attack and again within hours after the attack started, that it was 2 terrorist groups associated with Al Qaeda.

This ran afoul of the Obama campaign narrative that Al Qaeda was beaten down into irrelevancy.

It must have been perceived as a threat to Obama’s reelection chances, so what’s the tactic employed to mitigate this? Blame it on a YouTube video. Doesn’t matter that both the administration and the President already knew that the attack wasn’t a spontaneous demonstration, I mean really, how does someone spontaneously lug a mortar from wherever it was in the field to within range of an embassy? In a city?

So Rice, who wasn’t in the loop, was offered up to the media alter of the Sunday talking head shows to continue the YouTube narrative.

Carney continues to proffer up that narrative for the attack from his White House Press Secretary’s podium, for consumption and distribution to the electorate by the White House Press Corp.

As late as Obama’s address to the UN, the proffered narrative was a spontaneous demonstration caused by a YouTube video.

All this to obscure the truth of a significant event, a significant terrorist attack, to influence the upcoming presidential elections that November.

We already know that this president and this administration has little reservations about lying to the American public of matters of importance to the public. Seems that would include lying to the American public in order influence the results of a presidential election as well.

This, more than anything else, Obama and this administration needs to be held to account for.

When the President and his administration take on the role of distorting the truth for political gain, how close are we really to the famed and reviled ‘Ministry of Truth’?

So, “What difference does it make now?” Plenty. Not only now, for the remained of this administration, but also for future presidents and future administrations, and frankly, for the future of the nation as well. Are the electorate to be continued to be lied to? Continued to be manipulated for favorable and desired election results? Continued to led from the truth of the matter rather than to the truth of the matter?
 
From my view, the issue of contention isn't that some decisions went bad, security wasn't provided for properly, and 4 Americans died as a result. Yeah, it's not good, but sometimes it happens, and I'm glad that lessons learned are going to be incorporated so as not to happen again.

It's the handling of the matter after the attack that I have a serious problem with.

Both reports (Senate and House) clearly state that the President and the administration both knew before the attack and again within hours after the attack started, that it was 2 terrorist groups associated with Al Qaeda.

This ran afoul of the Obama campaign narrative that Al Qaeda was beaten down into irrelevancy.

It must have been perceived as a threat to Obama’s reelection chances, so what’s the tactic employed to mitigate this? Blame it on a YouTube video. Doesn’t matter that both the administration and the President already knew that the attack wasn’t a spontaneous demonstration, I mean really, how does someone spontaneously lug a mortar from wherever it was in the field to within range of an embassy? In a city?

So Rice, who wasn’t in the loop, was offered up to the media alter of the Sunday talking head shows to continue the YouTube narrative.

Carney continues to proffer up that narrative for the attack from his White House Press Secretary’s podium, for consumption and distribution to the electorate by the White House Press Corp.

As late as Obama’s address to the UN, the proffered narrative was a spontaneous demonstration caused by a YouTube video.

All this to obscure the truth of a significant event, a significant terrorist attack, to influence the upcoming presidential elections that November.

We already know that this president and this administration has little reservations about lying to the American public of matters of importance to the public. Seems that would include lying to the American public in order influence the results of a presidential election as well.

This, more than anything else, Obama and this administration needs to be held to account for.

When the President and his administration take on the role of distorting the truth for political gain, how close are we really to the famed and reviled ‘Ministry of Truth’?

So, “What difference does it make now?” Plenty. Not only now, for the remained of this administration, but also for future presidents and future administrations, and frankly, for the future of the nation as well. Are the electorate to be continued to be lied to? Continued to be manipulated for favorable and desired election results? Continued to led from the truth of the matter rather than to the truth of the matter?

The lies are all out for every one to see. I don't care that forces weren't well disposed to respond. You try. They didn't even do that - just walked away and declared it over. Our people deserve better - even a failed attempt is better than no attempt at all. This rankles me more than anything else surrounding this event. I hate to say it, but I'm used to the lies. I am not used to Americans abandoning Americans, and I never will be.
 
There have been arguments to the effect that Obama didn't know, couldn't have known, and was thus not accountable for the result. Perhaps not here - I haven't read all the threads associated with this event here, and I don't intend to. The point is that if Obama is not responsible, and Wiseone seems to be making that point in post #4, then who in the hell is? I want a name of the Cabinet level person who made the policy decision regarding Benghazi because they are they only ones with the power to do that beside the president himself. So if it's not Obama...The effort has been to spread the responsibility so thin and so far as to not hold anyone accountable for anything, and claim is was a systemic failure. That's unacceptable.

And that would likely be true that he didn't or couldn't have known everything, which is why he should hold people accountable. Acknowledging that doesn't mean he can't be held accountable for his choices for the job or how he handled it. And no, Wiseone was not saying Obama wasn't responsible. He was clearly addressing the hyperbole that comes too often with Obama critics.

And yes, you can discuss a failure to hold anyone accountable. That would make much more sense than what most these threads devolve into.
 
And that would likely be true that he didn't or couldn't have known everything, which is why he should hold people accountable. Acknowledging that doesn't mean he can't be held accountable for his choices for the job or how he handled it. And no, Wiseone was not saying Obama wasn't responsible. He was clearly addressing the hyperbole that comes too often with Obama critics.

And yes, you can discuss a failure to hold anyone accountable. That would make much more sense than what most these threads devolve into.

Why, thank you. I may discuss other things as well, though maybe not in this specific thread. I have a feeling it'll be in the news for some time to come.
 
Why, thank you. I may discuss other things as well, though maybe not in this specific thread. I have a feeling it'll be in the news for some time to come.

Though it will likely never reach the level of what many Obama critics want it to reach.
 
The bigger point is do not overturn a regime that is an ally against Salafist or AQ groups/ Qaddafi for all his faults, warned that if we overthrew his regime ,
the country would be a terrorist state. More exactly:

For years, Mr. Gaddafi warned of radical Islamists bubbling below the surface in north Africa. Repeatedly, he proclaimed himself a “stalwart of stability.”

Through imprisonment and violence, the jihadists were suppressed, starved of influence and resources

Before he was overthrown and killed, Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi warned jihadists would conquer northern Africa

During the dying days of his four decade rule, Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi cast an ominous prophecy.
If his regime fell, jihadists would subjugate northern Africa, inflicting widespread violence and terror.

Mr. Gaddafi declared in a speech weeks before NATO began its military intervention in Libya:

Al-Qaeda considers all the people to be infidels,”

“They deem all people their enemies. They know nothing but killing.”

The Islamists would pour in from Afghanistan, Algeria, and Egypt, he warned, saying, “These are beasts with turbans.”

http://news.nationalpost.com/2013/01...rthern-africa/
 
He and other folks should be held responsible, things like "Agencies not communicating with each other" which prevented intelligence from being shared and perhaps prevented the State Department from having as much warning about these attacks as it should have is exactly where we should be looking and holding people responsible, President not excluded.

But the idea that Obama, less than two months before an election, would literally make a decision to "let" four Americans die because for God knows what reasons is just plain silly. I use the word 'let' because I'm trying to especially highlight the argument that it was a specific conscious decision on his part to not save these people when it was in his power. It makes no sense whatsoever from either a pragmatic standpoint, again what looks better 2 months before an election a heroic save or 4 deaths, or a human standpoint that any human would just four guys die because he's that much of an asshole.

:shrug: well, because the administration refuses to release what the President was doing at the time, or fully describe for us what he knew and when he knew it, we don't really know if he made any decisions during the attack. Given the stand-down of the rescue efforts, however, it seems likely that someone with the authority to impose their decision over both the State and the Defense Departments made the calculation that the possibility that the facility could hold out was greater than the risk of a potential blackhawk-down style scenario. We just don't know who that person was because for some reason the Administration decided to instantly clamp as much silence on those who partook in the events as possible while going on television and deliberately lying to the American people by claiming it was a youtube video when they knew that was not correct.

So someone made these decisions. We've learned that the "youtube video" narrative got added by White House aids over the (muted) objections of the CIA and against the advice of the SecDef and JCoS. Whether they were acting with or without direction is unknown (because, again, the Administration refuses to release the particulars), however, I'd be willing to accept that White House aids in the middle of an election were more concerned with that election than they were with getting the Benghazi story right. In that case, those aids should be identified and fired (though no one has). But White House Aids don't have the authority to stand-down Tier-One Special Mission Units.
 
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Who made the decision to ignore the Ambassador's cables?
 
I'm a critic. I'm sure we have plenty to talk about.
I agree humbolt, there is plenty to talk about. Problem is, the talking is going nowhere. I'm sick and tired of everyone dancing to the tune of "political correctness", including many Republicans. Lies abound everywhere on this issue and accountability should include names. Conservative politicians had better wake up and take control of some of these issues or they can forget about 2014 and 2016!
 
I agree humbolt, there is plenty to talk about. Problem is, the talking is going nowhere. I'm sick and tired of everyone dancing to the tune of "political correctness", including many Republicans. Lies abound everywhere on this issue and accountability should include names. Conservative politicians had better wake up and take control of some of these issues or they can forget about 2014 and 2016!

I want people named, too. The general line from the administration once the first lie was uncovered has been that the "system" malfunctioned. That's a complete line of BS in order to avoid culpability. I don't want the people responsible in government in any role at all, ever. That includes Mrs. Clinton.
 
It begins with former Secretary of State Clinton.
 
If anyone's head should roll for this terrible tragedy it is the wicked witch from the west Hillary and further proves how unqualified she is to be POTUS.
 
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I quite agree.

As for the no names, I'm sure the parties know who they are. And Hillary does have a major role in that. I seem to recall she even stated that herself. So I don't think this is shocking.

I do find this important: The report found no evidence of the kind of political coverup that Republicans have long alleged.

I think it was pretty obvious they were at least downplaying the attack as much as possible before the presidential election. Wouldn't you agree? In that context, it at least wasn't treated with the seriousness it deserved from the administration.
 
I agree humbolt, there is plenty to talk about. Problem is, the talking is going nowhere. I'm sick and tired of everyone dancing to the tune of "political correctness", including many Republicans. Lies abound everywhere on this issue and accountability should include names. Conservative politicians had better wake up and take control of some of these issues or they can forget about 2014 and 2016!

If they continue to obsess over this non-issue and continue to try to make a mountain out of something that is nothing more than an unfortunate incident at an American outpost in a war-torn country, rather then focus on real policy, they will continue to come across as non-substantive buffoons and most certainly will lose in 2016. The problem with Republicans is they are good at creating scandal, but no nothing about how to identify and prosecute one.
 
FOX Report
mentioned tonight was the absurd "blame the building" scenario as Krauthammer put it.

"State Dept." but absolutely no-one is mentioned. Like there is this entity that runs itself, with absolutely no-one in charge or even there.

Shape-shifting blameless unaccountable ghosts at Foggy Bottom.

Feinstein even came out yestersay and specifically defended Hillary, who wasn't even mentioned..

(asides from the attack was caused by the video, which is patently false - known in the first few minutes it WAS a terror attack)


This was entirely political-Obama was in the middle of the campaign and was saying AQ is on run.

Except they werent, and on 9/11 they killed our ambassador and the heros who tried to save him.

For political expediency, the Obama administration tried to paint this as another issue.

That really happened, and those people really died, on 911, by AQ.

But remember, its a fake scandal-because liberals say so. ;)

Lets see how this seems in 2 years...
 
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I think it was pretty obvious they were at least downplaying the attack as much as possible before the presidential election. Wouldn't you agree? In that context, it at least wasn't treated with the seriousness it deserved from the administration.

Seems subjective. I certainly saw a lot about it, and many responded. How much is the right amount?
 
If they continue to obsess over this non-issue and continue to try to make a mountain out of something that is nothing more than an unfortunate incident at an American outpost in a war-torn country, rather then focus on real policy, they will continue to come across as non-substantive buffoons and most certainly will lose in 2016. The problem with Republicans is they are good at creating scandal, but no nothing about how to identify and prosecute one.

Upside's preferred response to Benghazi I guess should be something along the lines of:

'yeah, 4 people died, including the ambassador....so what? got any pie left?'
 
I think it was pretty obvious they were at least downplaying the attack as much as possible before the presidential election. Wouldn't you agree? In that context, it at least wasn't treated with the seriousness it deserved from the administration.

Absolutely! Finding evidence of a political coverup is almost impossible when those responsible continue to lie. Even if a whistleblower came forward, it would be his word against theirs, unless he had documentation.
 
I truly believe this attack was worse then Watergate. At least no Americans died in Watergate...........
 
This is where our efforts should be focused, addressing actual problems, this is fair and good criticism. I just hope there's none of that "Obama let them die" bull****.

[video]http://content.jwplatform.com/previews/1ghbAnxt-OwlNfjNX[/video]

Sen McCain has plenty to say about that.
 
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