Tunisia, Egypt, Morocco and Libya crisis: Benghazi

[American Patriot]

Benghazi memo edits show State, White House involvement

Source: USA TODAY ResearchTory Hargro, Janet Loehrke, USA TODAY

Oren Dorell2:37 p.m. EDT May 10, 2013

(Photo: Spencer Platt, Getty Images)

Story Highlights

• Initial CIA assessment named al Qaeda and Ansar al Sharia and previous warnings for Benghazi.
• State Department spokewoman Victoria Nuland worried the information would hurt politically.
• The FBI and CIA didn't object, but White House official Ben Rhoades said changes should be made.

A top State Department official pressed the CIA and the White House to delete any mention of terrorism in public statements on the Benghazi terror attack to prevent critics from blaming lax security at the consulate, according to documents obtained by ABC News.


The information "goes right to the heart of what the White House continues to deny," Rep. Jason Chaffetz, R-Utah, told USA TODAY. "For eight months they denied there's any manipulation, but this continues to shed light on something that was never true."


State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki said in a statement to USA TODAY on Friday that the changes were made to prevent members of Congress from "providing more guidance to the public than the administration."


Victoria Nuland, spokeswoman for the State Department, said she was expressing the concerns of her "leadership" when she emailed that a CIA memo on Benghazi should remove references to the attacks links to al-Qaeda and CIA warnings about terrorist threats in Benghazi in the months preceding the attack.


According to ABC News, Nuland objected in an email to White House and intelligence officials that the CIA description "could be abused by members (of Congress) to beat up on the State Department for not paying attention to warnings."


The "talking points" memo on what the Obama administration should tell the public was the basis for statements made by U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Susan Rice, who appeared on talk shows five days after the Sept. 11 attack to explain what happened.


Rice insisted the attack emanated from a protest over an anti-Islam video produced in America that turned violent and that terrorism was not involved. The White House has since acknowledged the assault was a preplanned terror attack and no protest happened.


In the emails, the White House tells the CIA that State's concerns needed to be addressed. Some of the emails were originally reported on by The Weekly Standard.
Psaki, in her statement, said Nuland's office raised two primary concerns about the talking points.


"First that the points went further in assigning responsibility than preliminary assessments suggested and there was concern about preserving the integrity of the investigation," Psaki said. "Second, that the points were inconsistent with the public language the Administration had used to date – meaning members of Congress would be providing more guidance to the public than the Administration."


Danielle Pletka, vice president for foreign and defense policy at the American Enterprise Institute, said new information that came out this week shows that the Obama administration's version of what happened in Benghazi was deliberately misleading.


"The narrative about the film was a lie. The narrative that it was not al Qaeda was a lie and the notion this was an attempt to protect anyone but Barack Obama is laughable," Pletka said. "They could have nipped this in the bud on day two and there would be no investigation."


ABC News obtained 12 versions of the talking points and reviewed State Department and White House emails that seem to show that references to terrorist involvement in Benghazi were not deleted at the request of the CIA or FBI, as Obama administration officials have said.


White House Press Secretary Jay Carney told reporters in November that the talking points "reflect the (intelligence community's) best assessments of what they thought had happened." The White House and State Department input was minor, to change the word "consulate" to "diplomatic post," Carney said at the time.


The multiple edited versions tell a different story. The initial unclassified memo produced by the CIA for distribution to lawmakers and government officials -- who were to use it to address the public – said extremists linked to al-Qaeda were known to be operating in Benghazi.


"The Agency has produced numerous pieces on the threat of extremists linked to al-Qa'ida in Benghazi and eastern Libya," the initial version said, describing a string of five attacks on foreign interests since April. "We cannot rule out the individuals has previously surveilled the U.S. facilities, also contributing to the efficacy of the attacks."
The paragraph was deleted.


The initial CIA memo also said the attack appeared to have been "spontaneously inspired by the protests at the U.S. Embassy in Cairo," language that survived in the final version given to Rice. But it also said "we do know that Islamic extremists with ties to al-Qa'ida participated in the attack," and named the group Ansar al Sharia.

Nuland objected to naming the terrorist groups saying, "we don't want to prejudice the investigation."


A staffer at the White House National Security Council managing the review of the talking points wrote Nuland that "the FBI did not have major concerns with the points and offered only a couple minor changes."


After some minor edits, Nuland objected again that "these changes don't resolve all of my issues or those of my building's leadership." Ben Rhodes, deputy national security advisory in the White House, wrote on the morning of Sept. 14 that the State Department concerns should be addressed.

"We must make sure that the talking points reflect all agency equities, including those of the State Department, and we don't want to undermine the FBI investigation," Rhodes wrote, adding that the document would be worked on the next morning.


After that meeting, the CIA produced a new and final version of the memo, with no reference to al Qaeda and the known security threats in Benghazi before Sept. 11.

[American Patriot]

Maybe this IS a wag the dog thing. Activists are protesting AGAINST the Muslim Brotherhood!

Now suddenly we're worried about protests????????



Libyan activists protest against militias, Muslim Brotherhood

Published May 10, 2013

Associated Press

TRIPOLI, Libya – Hundreds of Libyan activists are protesting in three major cities, denouncing the use of force by the country's unruly militias and denouncing the Muslim Brotherhood's participation in politics.

The protesters in Tripoli, the eastern city of Benghazi, which was the birthplace of Libyan uprising, and the city of Tobrouk, accuse the Brotherhood of trying to seize power by pushing through a contentious law that would prevent officials who had served under former dictator Moammar Gadhafi from working in government.

Meanwhile Britain's Foreign Office says it is temporarily withdrawing some staff from its embassy in the Libyan capital in light of recent political unrest. Heavily armed militias have surrounded government buildings in Tripoli over the past month, blocking access to ministries to pushing the parliament to pass the Brotherhood-supported law.

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/world/2013/05...#ixzz2Sv24rIhn

[American Patriot]

OMG Bandwagon time... now that ABC has surfaced information.

Seems like everyone wants to make fun of Fox... until a Leftist media outlet says something, now the Democrats are ripped up Susan Rice.


Democrats now critical of Rice's Benghazi explanation, amid more damaging evidence

Published May 05, 2013

FoxNews.com

Congressional Democrats on Sunday distanced themselves from the Obama administration’s explanation of the Benghazi, Libya, attacks in the immediate aftermath of the fatal strikes, amid mounting evidence that suggests the information was revised to intentionally mislead Americans.

The original explanation of the Sept. 11, 2012, attacks on the U.S. outpost in Benghazi, Libya, was written by CIA officials, then revised by State Department and White House officials, according to news reports and witness testimony made available to Fox News.

Removed from the CIA's so-called talking points were references to “Islamic extremists” and Al Qaeda in Libya. And five days later, Susan Rice, U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, made the Sunday talk show rounds to say the attacks were “demonstrations” sparked by protests in Egypt over an anti-Islamic video on YouTube.

However, the video is never mentioned in the numerous talking-points drafts, according to a Weekly Standard story last week, based in part on a 43-page House report and records of official emails.

“Well, it was scrubbed,” Massachusetts Democratic Rep. Steve Lynch told “Fox News Sunday.” “It was totally inaccurate. There's no excuse for that. It was false information. And what they try to do is harmonize what happened in Benghazi with what happened everywhere else across the Middle East.”

Lynch also acknowledged the talking points were likely revised to reflect President Obama’s decry – with his re-election bid in the balance -- that “Al Qaeda is on the run.”

Maryland Democratic Rep. Dutch Ruppersberger, the top Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, also acknowledged Sunday the facts as told by Rice were wrong.

“At the time, as it turns out” the information was incorrect, he said on CBS’ “Face the Nation”

Ruppersberger, who was briefed by the CIA about the attacks in immediate aftermath, asked agency officials what congressional leaders could tell the public, according to The Weekly Standard story.

On Sunday, he also said he welcomes a House Oversight and Government Affairs Committee hearing this week in which Greg Hicks, the deputy chief of mission at the U.S. Embassy in Libya at the time of attacks, is expected to say Rice said the attacks didn’t appear to be “pre-meditated or pre-planned,” despite having information suggesting they were.

“That's what an investigation is about,” Ruppersberger told CBS. “Let's get the facts.”

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2013...#ixzz2Sv3jhtfZ

[American Patriot]

Benghazi Will Be Hillary Clinton's 2016 Whitewater

By Francis Wilkinson May 10, 2013 1:14 PM MT


It is time to come clean on Benghazi. If Hillary Clinton runs for president, it will be time to come clean on Benghazi right through to 2016. If Clinton emerges triumphant, takes the oath of office and becomes the nation's first female president, the time to come clean on Benghazi will last another four years. (In case of re-election, better make that eight.)


This will require work. Unlike Whitewater, a convoluted, shady-sounding and quite possibly greasy real-estate investment deal, Benghazi consists of a discrete event, a brief aftermath and not much of a paper trail. After all, how much paper is produced in the course of a frantic night of violence in a faraway place?


So paper production is the first order of business. We will need lots and lots of documents citing multiple sources whose large and small discrepancies in memory, perspective and testimony can subsequently be magnified, scrutinized and exploded into controversies.


The Wall Street Journal, which produced hundreds of thousands of words on Whitewater, eventually publishing a landmark five-volume series on that now curiously forgotten conspiracy, today encourages creation of a Select Committee to investigate Benghazi. How else can the nation "extricate itself from the labyrinth" of Benghazi?


It's quite possible someone somewhere in the Obama administration lied about Benghazi. It's more than certain that someone spun about it. But in order to have political staying power -- and if Clinton runs for president in three years, staying power is what's required -- it's best if Benghazi is rendered labyrinthine, impenetrable, with many questions remaining unanswered and dark suspicions lingering.


Benghazi was a tragedy. It may even have been a fiasco. But if Clinton runs for president, that won't be enough. By 2016, Benghazi must also be made a mystery.

[Malsua]

Eventually the lies get too big and one of the media smells blood on which to feast. At that point, some heretofore unknown will go under the bus and the heads will skate.

I don't think this will permit Hillary to run in 2016. Not that she was going to, but this will effectively eliminate the option. Which is a good...go retire somewhere and leave us in peace.

[American Patriot]

I have a feeling that the person that goes under the bus will be some lower level state department official who will get fried.

It won't be Hillary.

[American Patriot]

• DECLARATIONS
• May 9, 2013, 7:41 p.m. ET

Peggy Noonan: The Inconvenient Truth About Benghazi

Did the Obama administration's politically expedient story cost American lives?

• By PEGGY NOONAN
  
  
• Like this columnist

The Benghazi story until now has been a jumble of factoids that didn't quite cohere, didn't produce a story that people could absorb and hold in their minds. This week that changed. Three State Department officials testifying under oath to a House committee changed it, by adding information that gave form to a growing picture. Gregory Hicks, Mark Thompson and Eric Nordstrom were authoritative and credible. You knew you were hearing the truth as they saw and experienced it. Not one of them seemed political.

You had no sense of how they voted. They were professionals. They'd seen a bad thing. They came forward to tell the story. They put the lie to the idea that all questioning of Obama administration actions in Benghazi are partisan and low.


What happened in Benghazi last Sept. 11 and 12 was terrible in every way. The genesis of the scandal? It looks to me like this:


The Obama White House sees every event as a political event. Really, every event, even an attack on a consulate and the killing of an ambassador.


Because of that, it could not tolerate the idea that the armed assault on the Benghazi consulate was a premeditated act of Islamist terrorism. That would carry a whole world of unhappy political implications, and demand certain actions. And the American presidential election was only eight weeks away. They wanted this problem to go away, or at least to bleed the meaning from it.
Enlarge Image





Getty Images
State Department foreign service officer and former deputy chief of mission/charge d'affairs in Libya, Gregory Hicks during a hearing on Benghazi on Wednesday.



Because the White House could not tolerate the idea of Benghazi as a planned and deliberate terrorist assault, it had to be made into something else. So they said it was a spontaneous street demonstration over an anti-Muhammad YouTube video made by a nutty California con man. After all, that had happened earlier in the day, in Cairo. It sounded plausible. And maybe they believed it at first. Maybe they wanted to believe it. But the message was out: Provocative video plus primitive street Arabs equals sparky explosion. Not our fault. Blame the producer! Who was promptly jailed.


If what happened in Benghazi was not a planned and prolonged terrorist assault, if it was merely a street demonstration gone bad, the administration could not take military action to protect Americans there. You take military action in response to a planned and coordinated attack by armed combatants. You don't if it's an essentially meaningless street demonstration that came and went.


Why couldn't the administration tolerate the idea that Benghazi was a planned terrorist event? Because they didn't want this attack dominating the headline with an election coming. It would open the administration to criticism of its intervention in Libya. President Obama had supported overthrowing Moammar Gadhafi and put U.S. force behind the Libyan rebels. Now Libyans were killing our diplomats. Was our policy wrong? More importantly, the administration's efforts against al Qaeda would suddenly come under scrutiny and questioning. The president, after the killing of Osama bin Laden, had taken to suggesting al Qaeda was over. Al Qaeda was done. But if an al Qaeda offshoot in Libya was killing our diplomats, the age of terrorism was not over.


The Obama White House didn't want any story that might harm, get in the way of or lessen the extent of the president's coming victory. The White House probably anticipated that Mitt Romney would soon attempt to make points with Benghazi. And indeed he did pounce, too quickly, the very next morning, giving a statement that was at once aggressive and forgettable, as was his wont.


The president's Republican challenger was looking for gain and didn't find it. But here's the thing. More is expected from the president than mere politics. That's why we tend to re-elect them. A sitting president is supposed to be bigger, weightier, more serious than his rival.


This week's testimony from Messrs. Hicks, Thompson and Nordstrom was clarifying, to say the least.
Peggy Noonan's Blog

Daily declarations from the Wall Street Journal columnist.




Mr. Hicks, deputy chief of mission at the time of the attack, said the YouTube video was never an event in Libya, and no one in Benghazi or Tripoli saw what was happening as a spontaneous street protest. Beth Jones, the acting assistant secretary of state for Near Eastern affairs, sent an email on Sept. 12 saying: "The group that conducted the attacks, Ansar al-Sharia, is affiliated with Islamic terrorists." Mr. Hicks himself said he spoke to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton at 2 a.m. Benghazi time the day after the attack and told her it was a planned attack, not a street protest.


Still, the administration stuck to its story and sent out Susan Rice—the U.S. ambassador to the U.N., someone with no direct connection to the event—to go on the Sunday talk shows and insist it was all about a video. They sent someone who could function as a mouther of talking points, someone who was told what to say and could be relied upon to say it. Mr. Hicks said that when he saw what Ms. Rice said his jaw dropped.


All of this is bad enough. Far worse is the implied question that hung over the House hearing, and that cries out for further investigation. That is the idea that if the administration was to play down the nature of the attack it would have to play down the response—that is, if you want something to be a nonstory you have to have a nonresponse. So you don't launch a military rescue operation, you don't scramble jets, and you have a rationalization—they're too far away, they'll never make it in time. This was probably true, but why not take the chance when American lives are at stake?


Mr. Hicks told the compelling story of his talk with the leader of a special operations team that wanted to fly to Benghazi from Tripoli to help. The team leader was told to stand down, and he was enraged. Mark Thompson wanted an emergency support team sent to the consulate and was confounded when his superiors in Washington would not agree.


Was all this incompetence? Or was it politics disguised as the fog of war? Who called these shots and made these decisions? Who decided to do nothing?


From the day of the attack until this week, the White House spin was too clever by half. In the weeks and months after the attack White House spokesmen said they were investigating the story, an internal review was under way. When the story blew open again, last week, they said it was too far in the past: "Benghazi happened a long time ago." Jay Carney, the White House press secretary, really said that.


Think of that. They can't give answers when the story's fresh because it just happened, they're looking into it. Eight months later they don't have anything to say because it all happened so long ago.


Think of how low your opinion of the American people has to be to think you can get away, forever, with that.


Will this story ever be completely told? Maybe not. But it's not going to go away, either. It's a prime example of the stupidity of all-politics-all-the-time. You make some bad moves for political reasons. And then you suffer politically because you made bad moves.

[American Patriot]

And Jay the "Carney" is STILL standing here on Television lying his ASS OFF!

[American Patriot]

This administration isn't about fixing things, it's about covering their asses. Nothing more.

Benghazi emails put pressure on White House


By Paul Eckert and Mark Hosenball
WASHINGTON | Fri May 10, 2013 3:22pm EDT




(Reuters) - The Obama administration denied Republican accusations of a cover-up in last year's deadly attack in Libya, moving on Friday to defuse a renewed political controversy after a news report said memos on the incident were edited to omit references to a CIA warning of an al Qaeda threat.


ABC News reported emails between the White House, State Department and intelligence agencies about the Benghazi attack went through 12 extensive revisions and were scrubbed clean of warnings about a militant threat.


The ABC report came as Republicans in Congress have stepped up efforts to criticize the Obama administration's response to the attack by suspected Islamist militants, with a growing focus on the role of then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, a potential Democratic presidential contender in 2016.


The so-called "talking point" memos were used to prepare U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Susan Rice before she appeared on television talk shows to discuss the September 11, 2012, attack on the U.S. mission in which Ambassador Christopher Stevens and three other Americans were killed.


In one email exchange, the State Department's top spokeswoman at the time, Victoria Nuland, objected to including the CIA's reference to intelligence about the threat from al Qaeda in Benghazi and eastern Libya.


That "could be abused by members (of Congress) to beat up the State Department for not paying attention to warnings, so why would we want to feed that either? Concerned," Nuland wrote in the email obtained by ABC News.


A source familiar with the Benghazi communications said Nuland was concerned the talking points went further than what she was allowed to say during her briefings and that "the CIA was attempting to exonerate itself at the State Department's expense."


But the source said the deletion of references to al Qaeda and the CIA's warnings came after a White House meeting on the day before Susan Rice appeared on the Sunday talk shows and Nuland was not at the meeting.


The mistrust between government agencies revealed in the documents offered an unusual peek into the administration's internal rivalries and displayed a rare crack in its usual discipline about messaging and public image.


'PURE, PROLONGED POLITICAL PROCESS'


Democrats have dismissed the Republican attacks as politically motivated and they had not gained much public momentum until this week. The ABC report could draw fresh attention to the allegations, however, and give them new life.


"It's a tragedy, but I hate to see it turned into a pure, prolonged, political process that really doesn't tell us anything new about the facts," Secretary of State John Kerry, who replaced Clinton, said in a Google+ Hangout chat.


A senior administration official said there was nothing in the new documents to contradict the administration's claim the talking points were based on intelligence community assessments.


"The White House made stylistic edits to the talking points to emphasize that the investigation was ongoing as to who was responsible, to simplify certain phrasing, and to clarify that the Benghazi mission was not a consulate," the official said.


At a high-profile congressional hearing two days ago and in public statements, Republicans have renewed months-old charges the email traffic shows the administration tried to play down the Benghazi assault because it came at the height of the U.S. presidential campaign and might have made President Barack Obama look weak on national security.


Republican House of Representatives Speaker John Boehner demanded on Thursday that the administration release emails on its handling of the attack. The emails reported by ABC had been shown to Congress, but lawmakers were not given copies, officials said.


The pro-Republican Super PAC American Crossroads released a web video on Friday focusing on questions about Clinton's role in a possible "cover-up" over the evolving explanations for the incident.


"Why did she blame a video? And was she part of a cover-up?" the video asks. "Americans deserve the truth."


The Republican National Committee sent out portions of the ABC report in an email headlined "Obama's Bungled Benghazi Response."


Congressman Elijah Cummings, a Maryland Democrat on the House of Representatives Oversight and Government Reform Committee, said the Republican accusations were an attempt to damage Clinton in case she decides to run for president in 2016.


"It is so much an effort ... to harm her before she even makes a decision and then to make sure they've got some material after she decides to run for president, assuming she does," he told MSNBC.

[American Patriot]

Carney: White House Made Only ‘Non-Substantive’ Changes To Benghazi Talking Points

Igor Bobic 3:45 PM EDT, Friday May 10, 2013

White House press secretary Jay Carney said Friday that the only edit the administration made to talking points used in the aftermath of the deadly attacks in Benghazi was to a "non-substantive correction," changing the word "consulate" to "diplomatic post."


Carney also stressed that the Central Intelligence Agency was responsible for editing the talking points used by Ambassador Susan Rice.


According to documents obtained by ABC News earlier Friday, State Department officials requested changes to official talking points drafted by the CIA editing out references to terrorist groups and warnings of an attack. In particular, State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland called for references to al Qaeda to be stripped because "we don't want to prejudice the investigation."

[American Patriot]

And it's a LOT deeper... what a load of BULLSHIT!

White House Holds Secret Benghazi Briefing, Incensing Some Reporters

The Huffington Post | By Jack Mirkinson Posted: 05/10/2013 3:20 pm EDT | Updated: 05/10/2013 3:37 pm EDT











The White House found itself with another press corps controversy on its hands on Friday, after it emerged that it held a secret briefing about the Benghazi attacks with a select group of White House reporters.


Spokesperson Jay Carney was initially supposed to hold a briefing at 12:30 PM on Friday. However, ABC's Jon Karl threw a wrench in that plan when he reported that the State Department had been involved in lengthy revisions of CIA talking points about the attacks.


All of a sudden, the press briefing was pushed back to 1:45 PM. Then, Politico reported that the White House had held a secret briefing about the Benghazi developments with reporters. The site reported that, while the contents of the briefing were on "deep background," meaning that they could be used as background information in reporting, the existence of the meeting itself was off the record.


However, not all reporters were invited to the briefing. White House journalists have complained many times in the past about their level of access to administration officials. On Friday, at least one, April Ryan, made her feelings about the briefing very clear:

Big mistake!!!!!!Reporters are not happy with this off the record briefing before the briefing with a handful of the Press Corps.
-- AprilDRyan (@AprilDRyan) May 10, 2013

This off the record briefing is not a partisan issue but a matter of journalism and getting true on the record quotes for reports.
-- AprilDRyan (@AprilDRyan) May 10, 2013

I am so unsettled about this.

-- AprilDRyan (@AprilDRyan) May 10, 2013

After the Politico report, the public briefing was again pushed back, this time to 3:15 PM. Politico's Roger Simon mocked the White House's handling of events:

WH brief pushed back from 12:30 to 1:45 to 3:15 as elite press are schmoozed off the record on Benghazi. Gosh, what deft stagecraft.
-- Roger Simon (@politicoroger) May 10, 2013

When he finally started the briefing, Carney addressed the issue:

"We did, as many of you know, have a background briefing here at the White House earlier. I think 14 news organizations were represented, ranging from online to broadcast TV, print and the like. We do those periodically. We hope that participants find them helpful. I will say that no one here believes that briefings like that are a substitute for this briefing."

[American Patriot]

State Dept refuses to identify ‘leadership’ who demanded edits of Benghazi talking points

May 10, 2013 | 3:41 pm
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Joel Gehrke

Commentary Writer

The Washington Examiner Email Author @Joelmentum Joel on FB

State Department spokesperson Patrick Ventrell refused to identify the member of State Department “leadership” who demanded that information about the role of terrorists in the Benghazi attack be edited from the official talking points.


“I can’t speak to every word that’s been cherry-picked from this email,” Ventrell said today.


“The email” in question was written by State Department spokesperson Victoria Nuland, as ABC reported, who feared that the CIA information about terrorists “could be abused by members [of Congress] to beat up the State Department for not paying attention to warnings, so why would we want to feed that either?”


When the FBI recommended only minor changes, Nuland replied that “These changes don’t resolve all of my issues or those of my buildings leadership.”

[American Patriot]

Facing questions on Benghazi, the White House stalls the press

May 10

Lesley Clark

McClatchy Washington Bureau

With an ABC News report raising new questions about whether the White House changed the controversial talking points delivered days after last September's Libya attack, the White House is pushing back its daily press briefing by the hour.

Read more National News

ABC News reported that it had obtained 12 different versions of the talking points "that show they were extensively edited as they evolved from the drafts first written entirely by the CIA to the final version distributed to Congress and to U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Susan Rice before she appeared on 5 talk shows the Sunday after that attack."


The White House has said it's editing was minimal, but the briefing was originally scheduled for 12:30 p.m. Then it was 1:45 p.m. -- and now, it's 3:15 p.m.That's for the general press: Politico reports that the White House pushed back the original briefing in order to hold an off-the-record session with invited reporters. The White House didn't confirm the off the record briefing.

Read more here: http://www.kansascity.com/2013/05/10...#storylink=cpy

[American Patriot]

Ummm yeah, you're hiding shit, liar

Friday, May 10, 2013 02:10 PM MDT White House: Republicans ignored Benghazi emails

Administration officials say top Republicans saw the emails two months ago and didn't express any issues

By Alex Seitz-Wald

• 24
• more

Topics: Benghazi, Benghazi attack, White House, John Boehner, Politics News
The inside of the U.S. Consulate after an attack that killed four Americans on the night of Sept. 11, 2012, in Benghazi, Libya. (Credit: AP Photo/Mohammad Hannon)



Republican members of Congress raised no objections when they first saw internal emails detailing the evolution of the administration’s talking points on Benghazi almost two months ago, senior administration officials said in response to a question from Salon today, and House Speaker John Boehner declined to attend or send a representative to that briefing.


Lawyers with the Office of the Director of National Intelligence briefed House and Senate Intelligence Committee members in March about the emails, which ABC News released today to much hullabaloo, after officials said they would make them available to members of Congress in February.


Yesterday, Boehner called for the release of the emails, but the administration officials, who agreed to speak on a conference call with reporters only on the condition of anonymity, said today that Boehner would have seen them had he attend the briefing, to which he and Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi were also invited.


On the Senate side, lawyers briefed Sen. Saxby Chambliss, the Vice Chairman of the Intelligence Committee and Sen. Richard Burr, who said the briefing satisfied many of his concerns. “It answers a lot, if not all, of the questions that the committee [had] from an oversight standpoint,” he told The Hill at the time. On the House side, those briefed included Intelligence Committee Chairman Michael McCaul. Republican members in neither chamber raised substantive concerns about the emails, the official said, and were free to discuss them publicly as they were not classified.


The emails about the September 2012 attack on the diplomatic post in Libya were shared with members of Congress during negotiations over the confirmation of CIA Director John Brennan. If Republicans had had major problems with what the emails revealed, they probably would have said something at the time and not confirmed Brennan 63-34, White House Spokesperson Jay Carney said during his daily press briefing this afternoon. “This is an effort to accuse the administration of hiding something that we did not hide,” Carney said.

[American Patriot]

White House dismisses Benghazi criticism

May 10, 2013 04:12 PM EST |

---

WASHINGTON — The White House says Friday's public disclosure of emails related to the attack on a U.S. compound in Libya is an attempt by Republicans to "politicize" the investigation.


Spokesman Jay Carney says lawmakers have known about the emails since earlier this year. And he disputed the notion that the emails suggest the White House was more involved in the crafting of talking points about the attacks than previously indicated.


The talking points suggested that the attacks on the Benghazi compound were spontaneous. It was later revealed that the attacks were planned.


The emails show White House officials were aware of the concerns from other agencies, including the State Department, about mentioning that specific groups might have been behind the attacks.

[vector7]

Sen. Graham challenges Joint Chiefs chairman on Benghazi testimony

By James Rosen
Published May 10, 2013
FoxNews.com



Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., issued a sharp and unusual challenge to the truthfulness of the nation’s top uniformed military commander on Thursday, demanding that U.S. Army Gen. Martin Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, return to Capitol Hill to provide fresh testimony on the Benghazi attacks.

The point of contention involved whether any military officers issued an order to U.S. armed forces personnel on the night of Sept. 11, when the U.S. consulate and a nearby annex came under terrorist attack, to “stand down” from providing assistance.

“I asked [Gen. Dempsey] directly,” Graham said in an exclusive interview with Fox News. “Were there any military assets in motion, to help folks in Benghazi, [that were] told to stand down? And what did [State Department whistleblower] Greg Hicks say? That Lt. Col. [Steve] Gibson -- a DOD employee, a member of the Army -- was in Tripoli, ready and willing to go to Benghazi, preparing to go to Benghazi, and was told to stand down.”


“Clearly,” Graham added, “our chairman of the Joint Chiefs' rendition that no one was told to stand down is now in question.”

What’s more, Graham lumped the chairman into a group of prominent Democrats whom the Senate Republican said he would like to see summoned, or recalled, to the witness chair to testify on Benghazi. These included former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Cheryl Mills, Clinton’s former chief of staff.

The roles of Clinton and Mills occasioned much dispute at Wednesday’s House Oversight Committee hearing where two career State Department employees who consider themselves whistleblowers -- Hicks and Mark Thompson, of the department’s counterterrorism bureau -- offered testimony that pointedly challenged the Obama administration account of the Benghazi attacks.

But the only mentions of Chairman Dempsey on Wednesday were admiring in tone, as Democrats repeatedly cited prior testimony by the general indicating that no military assets could be rallied in time to help the Americans killed in Benghazi.

Then-U.S. Ambassador to Libya Chris Stevens, information officer Sean Smith, and security agents Glen Doherty and Tyrone Woods were killed in two waves of attacks orchestrated, over eight hours’ time on the evening of Sept. 11, by terrorists with links to Al Qaeda. The hearing on Wednesday provided fresh evidence that Obama administration officials knew Benghazi was a terrorist attack “from the get-go,” as Hicks put it, but pressed a false narrative for weeks that depicted the deaths as the result of a spontaneous “protest” over an offensive YouTube video.

Asked to comment on Graham’s challenge to the chairman’s veracity, Pentagon spokesman Maj. Rob Firman told Fox News: “They weren’t told to stand down. They were simply told not to go to Benghazi. They were told to go to the airport in Tripoli to provide security there.”

Lt. Col. Patrick Seiber, a spokesman for the Joint Staff, said separately that Graham could call on Dempsey to testify again, but that the chairman’s remarks “will not change.”

In two exchanges during Dempsey’s appearance before the Senate Armed Services Committee on Feb. 7, Graham elicited testimony about allegations that some military personnel were told to “stand down” in their desire to launch operations to assist the beleaguered Americans in Benghazi.

“Did [then-AFRICOM Commander] General Ham on that night,” Graham asked, “did he order a military asset in motion and someone told him to stand down?” “No,” Dempsey testified.

In calling out Dempsey on Thursday, however, the senator at one point appeared to have recalled his prior interrogation of Dempsey inaccurately. He recalled having asked Dempsey “point blank,” in their exchange in February, where was the closest C-130 plane on the night of Sept. 11.

Graham further recalled that the chairman testified the nearest such plane was in Djibouti, Africa.

But the transcript of the Feb. 7 hearing shows Graham in fact asked the general on that occasion about AC-130 gunships, and that Dempsey never provided any information about the approximate distance between the nearest such planes and Benghazi.

[vector7]

Presidents of ABC and CBS News Have Siblings Working at White House With Ties to Benghazi

By Noel Sheppard | May 11, 2013 | 17:09



"CBS News President David Rhodes and ABC News President Ben Sherwood, both of them have siblings that not only work at the White House, that not only work for President Obama, but they work at the NSC on foreign policy issues directly related to Benghazi."

So stated political consultant and media commentator Richard Grenell on Saturday's Fox News Watch (video follows with transcript and commentary):

RICHARD GRENELL: I think the media's becoming the story, let's face it. CBS News President David Rhodes and ABC News President Ben Sherwood, both of them have siblings that not only work at the White House, that not only work for President Obama, but they work at the NSC on foreign policy issues directly related to Benghazi. Let's call a spade a spade.

Let's also show you why CNN did not go very far in covering these hearings because the CNN deputy bureau chief, Virginia Moseley, is married to Hillary Clinton’s deputy, Tom Nides. It is time for the media to start asking questions why are they not covering this. It's a family matter for some of them.

JON SCOTT, HOST: So they don't want to bring embarrassment upon folks who, who they're close to?

GRENELL: Who directly are related to this story. Absolutely. They're covering for them. There's no question about it.

For the record, Ben Sherwood's sister, Dr. Elizabeth Sherwood-Randall, is the Special Assistant to Barack Obama.

Virginia Moseley's husband, Tom Nides, is the Deputy Secretary of State for Management and Resources.

As for David Rhodes' brother Ben, he is Obama's Deputy National Security Advisor for Strategic Communication.

As ABCNews.com reported Friday, Rhodes was a key player in revising the White House's Benghazi talking points last September:




In an email dated 9/14/12 at 9:34 p.m. — three days after the attack and two days before Ambassador Rice appeared on the Sunday shows – Deputy National Security Advisor Ben Rhodes wrote an email saying the State Department’s concerns needed to be addressed.

“We must make sure that the talking points reflect all agency equities, including those of the State Department, and we don’t want to undermine the FBI investigation. We thus will work through the talking points tomorrow morning at the Deputies Committee meeting.”

After that meeting, which took place Saturday morning at the White House, the CIA drafted the final version of the talking points – deleting all references to al Qaeda and to the security warnings in Benghazi prior to the attack.

Consider, too, that CBS News executives possibly including Rhodes have allegedly come down on their own investigative reporter Sharyl Attkisson for "wading dangerously close to advocacy on" Benghazi.

If Attkisson gets the boot, it could very well be with a foot attached to the brother of an Obama administration official directly involved in the cover-up.

A family matter indeed.

The man behind the Benghazi cover-up?

May 5, 2013
Ed Lasky

Stephen Hayes of the Weekly Standard has a must read column regarding the Benghazi cover-up by White House officials.

CIA career officials clearly and repeatedly identified Al Qaeda and Al Qaeda-linked Islamic terrorists as the culprits behind the murder of four Americans.

Of course, this would cause embarrassment for the Obama team, especially in the few weeks before the election. They had been boasting for years that Al Qaeda had been decimated, the "tide of war" was receding; they had been on a mission to whitewash the prospect of Islamic terrorism as a threat to America (see Lauri Regan's superb column ("Can a President who has promised to stand with Muslims protect America? ). Obama's Cairo speech before an audience that included Muslim Brotherhood officials that he compelled Egypt to include, was a paean to Islam. It was also, to a great extent, a work of fiction that included grandiose and subsequently disproven claims about the positive contributions Islam has made to America and the world.

That speech was written by Obama's foreign policy speechwriter and now National Security Council team member, Ben Rhodes.



That is the man who Hayes "outs" as a key person behind the Benghazi cover-up.

He reportedly altered the CIA talking points to delete references to Islamic terrorists, "attacks" (they became "demonstrations") and other negative references to Islamism. Also, someone at the White House level apparently dreamt up the idea of blaming an inconsequential video for triggering a spontaneous protest, that in the frenzy of events, led to the murder of Americans. These CIA talking points were eviscerated to whitewash the role of Islamic terrorism.

There was a White House whitewash that should not be dismissed over events that occurred a 'long time ago;" contrary to Hillary Clinton saying that responsibility for the deaths of Americans serving their nation does "matter." And despite Secretary of State's John Kerry's dismissiveness towards the Benghazi murders - "we got a lot more important things to move on to" - justice for the America's dead demands we find who is responsible.

Ben Rhodes should be called to account for trying to divert blame away from Islamic terrorists and the Obama team members whose feckless negligence led to the Benghazi massacre.

I have previously written about Ben Rhodes and his role in the Obama White House. It is shameful that this "kid" (he is all of 35) has been given any responsibility at all in our government.

In "Does it bother anyone that this person is the Deputy National Security Adviser?" I noted his problematic background for someone given so much power by Obama. But then again he does specialize in fiction-writing.

He earned a master's degree in fiction-writing from New York University just a few years ago . He did not have a degree in government, diplomacy, national security; nor has he served in the CIA, or the military. He was toiling away not that long ago on a novel called 'The Oasis of Love" about a mega church in Houston, a dog track, and a failed romance.

Carol Lee of Politico wrote in May, 2009, that

Not long ago, Rhodes was one of the obscure guys who wrote Obama's campaign speeches in Starbucks and played video games into the early morning hours. Now he attends national security meetings and takes writer's refuge in a secret office on the third floor of the Eisenhower Executive Office Building.

Wow - what a meteoric rise! What qualifies him to have been given such power to lie to the American people? Why does he have so much influence with Barack Obama ?

Maybe it is just his avid willingness to do the bidding of his bosses, regardless of truth.

Why do I make this claim? Well, for one reason, Hayes notes he did it regarding Benghazi. But there is a pattern here that he puts his education as a fiction writer to work for political purposes.

Years ago, Democratic Senator and Obama-mentor Lee Hamilton plucked him from obscurity to write what became the Baker-Hamilton Iraq Study Group report. That report was rightly criticized for many reasons, among them was the stacking of its "expert list' with various pro-Arab apologist.

Incidentally, the commission ignored its mandate to focus on Iraq and instead devoted a lot of words to attack Israel. Some of the experts who were interviewed were appalled by the final written report because they felt it did not reflect facts, their testimony, or reality.

Who wrote this whitewash? Who was responsible for hitting the delete button of some of the expert testimony? Who tried to divert responsibility for terrorism away from where it belongs?

None other than Ben Rhodes - a man who has finally found a use for his fiction-writing education (since he failed as a novelist); to whitewash Islamists and the Obama administration.

One hopes the House calls Rhodes as a witness in this week's hearings regarding the Benghazi massacre and the miscarriage of justice in Washington. Will his fiction-writing on behalf of Obama come to light?

He bears responsibility for a great deal of what has gone wrong in American foreign and national security policy for the past few years.



Top Obama official’s brother is president of CBS News, may drop reporter over Benghazi coverage

5:15 AM 05/11/2013



The brother of a top Obama administration official is also the president of CBS News, and the network may be days away from dropping one of its top investigative reporters for covering the administration’s scandals too aggressively.

CBS News executives have reportedly expressed frustration with their own reporter, Sharyl Attkisson, who has steadily covered the Obama administration’s handling of the Benghazi terrorist attack in Libya since late last year.

“Network sources” told Politico Wednesday that CBS executives feel Attkisson’s Benghazi coverage is bordering on advocacy, and Attkisson “can’t get some of her stories on the air.”

Attkisson, who is in talks to leave the network before her contract expires, has been attempting to figure out who changed the Benghazi talking points for more than five months.

“We still don’t know who changed talking points but have had at least 4 diff explanations so far,” Attkisson tweeted on November 27, 2012.

But on Friday, ABC News reported that the Benghazi talking points went through 12 revisions before they were used on the public. The White House was intimately involved in that process, ABC reported, and the talking points were scrubbed free of their original references to a terror attack.

That reporting revealed that President Obama’s deputy national security advisor, Ben Rhodes — brother of CBS News president David Rhodes — was instrumental in changing the talking points in September 2012.

ABC’s reporting revealed that Ben Rhodes, who has a masters in fiction from NYU, called a meeting to discuss the talking points at the White House on September 15, 2012.

“We must make sure that the talking points reflect all agency equities, including those of the State Department, and we don’t want to undermine the FBI investigation,” Rhodes wrote to his colleagues in the Obama administration. “We thus will work through the talking points tomorrow morning at the Deputies Committee meeting.”

Ben Rhodes, a 35-year old New York City native and former Giuliani staffer who has worked for Obama since the president’s tenure in the U.S. Senate, has established himself as a hawkish force on the Obama foreign policy team, advocating for military intervention in Libya during the president’s first term and reportedly advocating for intervention in Syria, as well.

But despite his hawkish views, Rhodes identifies himself first and foremost as a strategist and mouthpiece for the president’s agenda.

“My main job, which has always been my job, is to be the person who represents the president’s view on these issues,” Rhodes said in March.
David Rhodes has been the president of CBS News since February 2011.

Neither the White House nor CBS News responded to requests for comment for this report.


Relatives of top CBS, ABC and CNN executives helping Obama on Benghazi!

• May 11, 2013
• By: James Simpson

You knew the mainstream media was biased, but this is incredible. It was revealed today that CBS News President David Rhodes' brother is Obama Deputy National Security Advisor Ben Rhodes, who was instrumental in rewriting the Benghazi talking points. But it gets worse.

It is now learned that ABC President Ben Sherwood's sister, Dr. Elizabeth Sherwood-Randall, is a Special Assistant to Barack Obama on national security affairs. But even this isn't it! CNN's deputy bureau chief, Virginia Moseley, is the wife of Tom Nides, who until February was Hillary Clinton's deputy.

Ben Rhodes is a top NSC advisor with absolutely no foreign policy or military experience. None! This idiot has advocated intervention both in Libya and now Syria. How has that worked out for us? He is responsible for helping to massage the Benghazi talking points to watered down drivel. His greatest accomplishment appears to be a Master's Degree in fiction writing received from New York University.

So perhaps we should call him Obama's fiction writer!

In what may be a belated effort to salvage its reputation, or perhaps an effort to get the best scoop now that keeping quiet is out of the question, ABC published a story revealing that there were twelve revisions of the Benghazi memo. The final version eradicated all references to terrorists and al Qaeda.

Nice work, Mr. Fiction Writer!

Is there any doubt that CBS, ABC and CNN lose all credibility as objective news sources when their top leadership have siblings in top positions in the Obama administration, and do everything they can to suppress absolutely critical national security news for months?

Conservative comedic writer IowaHawk tweeted:

• 1973: reporters investigate All the President's Men.
  
• 2013: reporters are All the President's Men.

Indeed.

The only mainstream media reporter really doing her job is CBS's Sharyl Attkison. Attkison has also done a heroic job on the Fast N' Furious Eric Holder gun running scandal. Now it appears CBS is pressuring her to leave.

Gee, wonder why?

Whatever shred of credibility existed among the network news organizations has now been utterly obliterated. We can only hope that the American people get the message. I think it is too late for the networks. And for those who think this is just "old news," not worth worrying about, I will quote the mother of the murdered Sean Smith:

"I want to wish Hillary a happy Mother's Day. She's got her child. I don't have mine - because of her."

[American Patriot]

[American Patriot]

Obama may be asked about Benghazi, IRS

David Jackson8:04 a.m. EDT May 13, 2013

(Photo: Carolyn Kaster, AP)

President Obama holds a brief news conference Monday morning with British Prime Minister David Cameron, but he is likely to be asked about pressing domestic issues: Benghazi and the IRS.


As Republicans call for a select committee to investigate the administration over the Sept. 11 attack on a diplomatic post in Benghazi, Libya, Obama and his aides must also deal with reports that the Internal Revenue Service targeted conservative groups.


Obama and Cameron are scheduled to face the press at 11:15 a.m. in the White House Rose Garden.



Obama has not commented publicly on the IRS admission that it gave extra scrutiny to the tax-exempt status of groups with "Tea Party" and "Patriot" in their names, though White House aides have criticized the practice.



White House spokesman Jay Carney said the IRS, which is conducting its own investigation, is a non-partisan entity and has only two political appointees.
"We certainly find the actions taken, as reported, to be inappropriate," Carney said.


Rep. Susan Collins, R-Maine, told CNN's State of the Union that it is "almost as disturbing that President Obama and treasury secretary Jack Lew have not personally apologized to the American people and promised a full investigation."


Some congressional Republicans are also calling for a select committee to investigate administration actions surrounding the Sept. 11 attacks

Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., and other Republicans say Obama aides tried to cover up the fact that the attack was carried out by a terrorist group. The aides, who initially attributed the attack to protests over an anti-Islam film, said the story changed because the evidence did.


Carney has accused the Republicans of trying to "politicize" an attack that killed four Americans, including ambassador Christopher Stevens.

[American Patriot]

Republicans call for depositions in Benghazi probe, amid revelation Clinton barely interviewed

Published May 12, 2013

FoxNews.com

Congressional Republicans on Sunday pressed their investigation into the Benghazi attacks, suggesting depositions for high-ranking officials and more whistle-blowers testifying amid further questions about why then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was not thoroughly interviewed about the issue.

Rep. Mike Rogers, chairman of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, told “Fox News Sunday” that more potential and self-proclaimed “whistle-blowers” might come forward after three of them – career State Department foreign service employees – testified last week before the House Oversight and Government Affairs Committee.

“We have had people come forward because of the (hearing) and say we would also like to talk," the Michigan Republican told “Fox News Sunday.” "I do think we're going to see more whistle-blowers. Certainly my committee has been contacted; I think other committees as well."

Rogers’ remarks came as Thomas Pickering, the former U.S. ambassador who helped write a report on security at a U.S. outpost in Benghazi, Libya, defended his assessment but absolved Clinton.

"We knew where the responsibility rested," Pickering told CBS’ “Face the Nation.” “They've tried to point a finger at people more senior than where we found the decisions were made.”

Pickering said he and retired Adm. Mike Mullen had to work within the legal scope of the investigation and that they “knew and understood” Clinton’s role based upon “talking to other people at meetings.”

Four Americans, including Ambassador Chris Stevens, were killed in the Sept. 11, 2012, attacks on the U.S. outpost.

Congressional Republicans have since led efforts to learn whether the Obama administration provided adequate security and if the explanation of events was altered as part of a possible political cover-up.

Among the lingering questions are whether Clinton was involved in changing a CIA memo about how the attacks started and was she at least partially responsible for the apparent lack of adequate security.

The Accountability and Review Board, led by Pickering and Mullen, did not question Clinton at length about the attacks but concluded the decisions about the consulate were made well below the secretary's level.

However, Pickering's defense Sunday of the panel's conclusions appeared to do little to quiet Republicans' calls for more accountability for the attacks, which killed Stevens, Information Officer Sean Smith, and two embassy security personnel, Glen Doherty and Tyrone Woods, both former Navy SEALs.

Rep. Darrell Issa, chairman of the House oversight committee, told NBC’s “Meet the Press” he would like to interview under oath Pickering and Mullen, the former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

California Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein told NBC that Congress' review seems aimed at discrediting Clinton and her potential 2016 presidential bid.

Pickering and Mullen's report, released in December, found that "systematic failures and leadership and management deficiencies at senior levels" of the State Department meant that security was "inadequate for Benghazi and grossly inadequate to deal with the attack that took place."

The House oversight committee hearing last week included testimony from Gregory Hicks, a former deputy chief of mission to Libya.

Hicks, a self-proclaimed whistle-blower, detailed his phone conversations from Tripoli with Stevens, who died during the two nighttime attacks.

Hicks and two other State Department witnesses criticized the Pickering and Mullen review. Their complaints centered on a report they consider incomplete, with individuals who weren't interviewed and a focus on the assistant secretary level and lower.

The hours-long hearing produced no major revelation but renewed interest in the attacks that happened during the lead-up to the November 2012 presidential election.

Five days after the attacks, in the final weeks of President Obama’s re-election bid, U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Susan Rice went on Sunday talk shows and said the attacks were “spontaneous” and sparked by protests elsewhere in the Middle East over an anti-Islamic video.

However, new reports show the original CIA memo on the incident was scrubbed of the mention of “Islamic militants” and early intelligence about Al Qaeda in the region.

The series of emails that circulated between the State Department and the CIA led to weakened -- and, in some cases, wrong -- language that Rice used to describe the assault.

Issa also said he will on Monday request private testimonies from Pickering and Mullen and that his oversight panel has not been provided sufficient details on the State Department review.

Pickering, who was sitting next to Issa during “Meet the Press,” said he wanted to appear at the Republican-led hearing Wednesday but was blocked.

Issa said Democrats could have invited their own witnesses, such as Pickering, but did not.

Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., on Sunday renewed congressional Republicans’ call for a House select committee on Benghazi -- like the one used to investigate Watergate -- and called the Obama administration’s handling of the terror attacks “a cover-up.”

"I would call it a cover-up in the extent that there was willful removal of information, which was obvious,” McCain said on ABC’s “This Week."

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2013...#ixzz2TB6MsyC1