All The Difference in the World
The New York Times quoted Algerian sources as saying that several of the Egyptian al-Qaeda captured in the hostage incident at a desert gas plant were also present in the attack on the US consulate at Benghazi. “The Egyptians involved in both attacks were killed by Algerian forces during the four-day ordeal that ended in the deaths of at least 38 hostages and 29 kidnappers, the official said. But three of the militants were captured alive, and one of them described the Egyptians’ role in both assaults under interrogation by the Algerian security services, the official said.”
This news broke as Hillary Clinton was testifying about Benghazi before legislators. She did not directly deny the possibility during her testimony . According to the Washington Post “asked about reports about a link between the Benghazi attacks and an assault last week on a natural gas complex in Algeria near the border with Libya, Clinton said, ‘We don’t have any way to confirm it as yet.’”
Pressed if she still believed the attack was the result of a video produced in LA she shouted “what difference does it make?” According to Washington Post the she then matter-of-factly unburdened herself:
the Arab Spring revolts that swept the Middle East and North Africa were not predicted. “This is a great opportunity, as well as a serious threat to our country,” she said of the upheaval that persists across the region. “I hope we seize the opportunity.” She said it would not be easy because the countries have no experience of democracy.
“We now face a spreading jihadist threat,” Clinton said. Many al-Qaeda operatives have been driven out of Afghanistan and Pakistan, she said. But she added: “We have to recognize this is a global movement.” U.S. forces can kill its leaders, but until democracy grows in the region, “we’re going to be faced with this level of instability,” she said.
It was quite a day. No, the administration didn’t anticipate the Arab Spring. Nor did they understand who was attacking the US consulate in Benghazi, though they understood it enough to send Susan Rice out to denounce a video made in California. They have no way to know if al-Qaeda Egyptians were present at both Benghazi and Algeria. And no, most emphatically no, it is not the case that al-Qaeda is dead, though General Motors might be alive.
This last despite the fact that the Obama administration is about to declare the war on al-Qaeda over. Con Coughlin of the Telegraph writes “Barack Obama has given up on the fight against al-Qaeda”.
Just before Christmas a senior Obama official claimed the America could wind up its campaign against al-Qaeda because it no longer posed a threat. That remarkable claim was made by US defence department general counsel, Jeh Johnson. At about the same time another Obama adviser told me that Washington didn’t really mind if the Taliban returned to power in Afghanistan once Nato troops had withdrawn in 2014, as the Taliban was no longer interested in working with al-Qaeda. Unbelievable!
Someone surrendered, but it doesn’t look as if it was al-Qaeda.
As for the FBI’s investigation into the Benghazi attack, aimed at bringing the perpetrators “to justice”, the FBI director has recently flown to Libya to arrange for cooperation which the agency has not in the past obtained. “FBI agents went to Benghazi in October to analyze the crime scene but have since remained in Tripoli because of security concerns. In an effort to generate leads, the FBI has put out a poster asking for information.”
A poster? And what does it say? Wanted: dead or alive. Momo le Nain, AKA Mohammed the Midget, AKA Shorty, height 3’6″ last seen wielding an axe and a knife?
Senator Rand Paul (R-KY) told Clinton that had he been the President, “I would have relieved you of your post.” He then asked her point-blank if the Benghazi consulate was moving weapons to armed groups in the region, a reference to the possibility that these may have wound up in enemy hands in a kind of international “operation fast and furious”. Clinton said to ask the CIA.
Later, Paul demanded Clinton respond to reports that, in the weeks before the attack in Benghazi, the U.S. was facilitating the movement of heavy weapons from Libya to Turkey for the purpose of arming the Syrian opposition. That story, first reported here by Business Insider, has become a key sticking point in conservative conspiracy theories about a Benghazi cover-up.
Clinton claimed that she had no idea what Paul was talking about, and suggested that he ask “the agency responsible for the annex” in Benghazi, a thinly-veiled allusion to the CIA.
Clinton’s testimony raised more questions than it answered, one of the most fundamental of which was the character of the Arab Spring. Who was driving the process of “bringing democracy” to Egypt, Libya and Syria? Was it Saudi Arabia? Was it Qatar? Both countries are financial and media powerhouses whose primary mode of national defense is bribery. If the Obama administration was leading the Arab Spring “from behind” who was leading from the front?
And was it “democracy” they were bringing to the region or an ideology so near and dear to the Saudi heart?
Some answers to those questions will soon be advanced, a few doubtless as disinformation. The Algerians, with their connections Russia and via Moscow possibly to Syria, are now in a position to create a counter-narrative of the Arab Spring, for it’s dollars to donuts they can make the Egyptian captive say anything at all. He may squawk a narrative to rival those put forward by the KSA and Qatar.
What is distinctly missing is the sense that Washington has an independent American view; or whether they are just a collection of shills for special interest groups. Almost reduced to insignificance with their “I don’t knows” are the seedy figures of Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton, the one proclaiming “I won” and the other yelling “what difference does it make?”
The real question to ask them is “who sent you?”
Rand Paul, by directly accusing Hillary of incompetence at the minimum, has raised an even higher level question: is there integrity at the highest levels of the administration? This is a political question whose most recent answer was provided by the 2012 elections. But the resignation of Richard Nixon in 1974, only two years after he won a landslide against George McGovern shows that political winds can change rapidly.
The press worked against Nixon in 1974. It cannot be expected to work against Obama in 2013. But the issues involved in the handling of the Arab Spring are several orders of magnitude more serious than those of Watergate. The charge against Nixon was covering up a low-rent act of political burglary. The potential accusation facing Obama will ultimately be one of endangering the national security of the United States. And unlike Watergate, which needed a Deep Throat to keep the suspense coming, the pot will keep boiling from a continuing torrent of bad news from abroad. Their foreign policy blunders have manifestly set in train catastrophes far too great for their tame journalists to contain. Events in Mali and Algeria have reminded us that Benghazi was simply the beginning; the lighting of the fuse; the sparking of the powder. The main charge has yet to detonate.
And when the magazine blows the issue will be whether the political system will have more or fewer “Rand Pauls” to ask the questions. To churn the machinery of the Constitution. For the largest scale risk raised by the Clinton testimony is whether the United States still possesses the requisite ability to politically resolve the crisis that she has let glimpse through the door.
The Three Conjectures at Amazon Kindle for $1.99
Storming the Castle at Amazon Kindle for $3.99
No Way In at Amazon Kindle $8.95, print $9.99
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Meanwhile, deep within his Fortress of Ineptitude, Uncle Joey remains “intoxicated”…..
http://www.politico.com/story/2013/01/no-joke-joe-biden-makes-2016-moves-86600.html
Given the nature of the interrogations will we use the information they provide?
wretchard, my initial response to the Hildabeast’s testimony is rather different, it seems to me she is being relatively honest and straightforward. Your complaint against her is that she doesn’t have a conceptual grasp and a plan of action and active US management of the Arab Spring.
Relatively. Her shouting about the film, or not, is a sign of her own and White House ineptitude of course, that is dishonest in the extreme. But about the larger picture, that it is basically chaos anyway, OK. Does the large picture of chaos excuse OUR chaos in re Benghazi? Of course not.
Really, who says anybody is leading the entirety (if any) of the Arab Spring from the front? Once there’s a party lots of people will show up and start their games, but is that leadership as such? I thought the original narrative was that twitter and facebook and the Internet’s free flow of information, was driving it all. Modernity. “Progress”. Secular forces. Which doesn’t mean it can’t be hijacked by Salafists, and that they wouldn’t try to bribe and suborn the whole thing contra US interests … whatever those might be, what you and I and Obambus and John Kerry might agree are our interests.
The deaths in Benghazi are another matter, and Rand Paul’s comments appropriate.
Most troubling to me is “I don’t know” and “What difference does it make” seem to be acceptable answers. I really do not recognize my country anymore but I see familiar faces in the crowd.
3. Josh “wretchard, my initial response to the Hildabeast’s testimony is rather different, it seems to me she is being relatively honest and straightforward.”
She is not being honest. Why wasn’t SHE making the rounds on the Sunday circuit? Why is she allowed to be incompetent given the high position she holds? I’m sure you buy the whole blood clot BS too. Sure they got caught off-guard and maybe they had no intel indicating what was to come, but isn’t that what she is responsible for preventing? She is a walking cluster-frack as a Sec State, a direct result of the inept White House and she should be thrown out on her extremely ample ass. Making excuses for that cow is exactly what they are hoping to get from the largely stupid masses. Drive a stake through her heart and let her never again be a serious consideration for high office.
Richard Nixon, despite his flaws, had the old-fashioned integrity to resign in the end. With Bill Clinton as his model, and the new “sensibilities” of so many current Americans, Obama will see no need to feel disgraced by any calamities, and will, therefore, not be removed from office even if things really blow up.
“…the Arab Spring revolts that swept the Middle East and North Africa were not predicted.”
Other than by the Bush Admin, who planned it that way. The Dems denounced this approach as a failure, and they still are.
When the IJN Musashi was sinking in the Sibuyan Sea after multiple attacks by USN aircraft, it received new orders from Adm Kurita to ground on the nearest island and carry on as a land battery. And that made just as much sense then as “lock up the guy who made that video” did in September 2012.
And I was so impressed by the SECSTATE’s impassioned pleas that the USA had to lead this morning. But did anyone ask her “And does that include this ‘from behind’ stuff?”
Has anyone else noticed that the Obama Admin’s answer to everything amounts to, “Well, sh*t happens”?
“under interrogation by the Algerian security services”
What, with no lawyers present?//sarc
That would make a training video.
“Who cares?”
A United States citizen sits in jail, and it sure as hell isn’t because of a parole violation.
Is General Motors really alive? There should be a story there.
“… the FBI has put out a poster asking for information.”
Almost beyond parody, except that the Marx Brothers did it. In “Duck Soup” Harpo hung out a sign, “Help Wanted” during the battle.
The Hard Men must be getting frustrated. Can you see them sitting around a table saying “We blow up their buildings and then rape their ambassador and they still send us money. What can get a rise out of these idiots?” Maybe the hope is that they may back off out of pity, like the guy who breaks into your rotten car and leaves a better radio.
I believe you may be right about Hillary being forthright in her clueless way. A day after Benghazi she blurted out “how could this happen in a city we helped liberate”. That spoke volumes. First, it implied she she was vaguely aware who had attacked. Not the video man either but precisely the people who she felt should show them gratitude but did not. She guessed then she had been double crossed.
Second, she was genuinely surprised at being double-crossed. It went on like a light in her head.
What’s the context. Let’s speculate. As they say in the old detective stories, “tell me a story that makes sense”. How about this?
The Obama administration was truly blindsided by the Arab Spring. They were in complete turmoil. Then some diplomat or contact from KSA and Qatar shows up and says, “we can turn this from the inside. We’ll buy into the revolution and run it from within.”
They glom onto this like a drowning man grabs at a life preserver. This sounded good to Obama and Hillary so they went along with Egypt. The press loved it. Then the Duck of Death started going wobbly and KSA and Qatar said, “we can work this Arab Spring magic there too. Matter of fact we know some guys who can bring him down. Let’s lead this — from behind!” And they went along.
They should have been a little wary by now, but hey, who looks a gift horse in the mouth. Then Syria was up next and the Obama administration was halfway into the third serial when Benghazi blew up. All of a sudden the penny dropped. Hillary finally realized she had been duped — as for the President, well that’s an open question — he’s never wrong. But he had to be protected from looking like a dupe.
That’s where Susan Rice came in. That’s where all the evasion came in. And they tied themselves in knots trying to get out from under. But in the meantime the administration began to have second thoughts about Syria and internally they rearranged the chairs in the cabinet room. Petraeus out. Panetta out. Hillary out.
Why is interesting.
One way to interpret this is that Obama didn’t know where the rot was coming from he just knew there was rising damp and mildew all over the structure. The only way to ditch the ringer was to ditch the lot. The other way to interpret it is that he himself was the termite in chief. This is an open question, but let’s leave that part until the end.
Meantime the administration started running from the stink. You will have noticed that they’ve throttled back on Syria, though it’s probably too late. The Russians are pulling out their citizens so Assad may be dog meat with or without further Western help. All emergency reverse but they still hit the iceberg.
And to prove it this this whole Mahgreb thing blows up. Mali, Algeria, probably the Niger and Sudan next, then Nigeria. Ka-boom. It’s horrible to contemplate. And that’s as far as makes sense so far.
There’s a lot of loose ends. If this were a Raymond Chandler novel it would be the time to light a cigarette or pour a whiskey and crack wise. But since we’re in real life we’ll just have to wait for the telephone to ring to bring in new information.
There’s a choice of two endings to the story. The first is where the characters are just incompetent. The second is one in which the characters are crooked. The only way to find out which is to play the scene out to the end. That requires the political machinery — the elected officials, the press, the interest groups on all sides — to turn the page. To answer the telephone.
The question is really whether the system can recover from a fault condition using the error handling mechanisms defined by the Constitution. That seems the best bet. Then we’ll know which way the story ends.
Secretary Clinton may or may not have been sincere, as I recall her holding court over the Rose Law firm billings in front of a gaggle of the Press and the Whitewater Real Estate corruption in the 1990′s, and other fables from her past.
She has lied serially and repeatedly in the past to cover her and Bill’s indiscretions. Sincerity? Once you can fake that, you’ve got it made.
Some people want to give her, sometimes called the smartest woman in America, the benefit of the doubt. She has a staff, she was not prepared for today’s testimony, she knew nothing, and was not prepared to tell anything.
She had a message to get out and she did, which is what will be repeated as the narrative for this day by the major news organs. Insufficient funding from the House! It’s the Republicans again! Why do you want to know who did this! People are dead! Let’s get all choked up again.
Incompetent or corrupt? How about BOTH!
Somewhere, in various computers, manilla folders, file cabinets, are the details and the raw information that would answer the questions as to “what happened”. Nobody in the Obama Regime wants to push those bits of information together to make a cohesive whole of a picture, because that would then summon reality.
Reality , not the make believe world of the halls of the West Wing or the State Dept., would have to be addressed.
What the Obama Regime has in abundance is the will to obfuscate reality and create an alternate myth to conform to the story they want to tell.
It’s Obama’s illusions I recall, as I really don’t know Obama, at all.
The Obama administration was truly blindsided by the Arab Spring.
They are blindsided by the sun rising in the east every morning, that’s the beauty of being a secular empiricist. When it comes to their attention they may issue new orders.
It’s true! It’s true! The crown has made it clear.
The climate must be perfect all the year.
A law was made a distant moon ago here:
July and August cannot be too hot.
And there’s a legal limit to the snow here
In Camelot.
The winter is forbidden till December
And exits March the second on the dot.
By order, summer lingers through September
In Camelot.
Camelot! Camelot!
I know it sounds a bit bizarre,
But in Camelot, Camelot
That’s how conditions are.
The rain may never fall till after sundown.
By eight, the morning fog must disappear.
In short, there’s simply not
A more congenial spot
For happily-ever-aftering than here
In Camelot.
Camelot! Camelot!
I know it gives a person pause,
But in Camelot, Camelot
Those are the legal laws.
The snow may never slush upon the hillside.
By nine p.m. the moonlight must appear.
In short, there’s simply not
A more congenial spot
For happily-ever-aftering than here
In Camelot.
Wretchard #9:
So you think that Hillary dislikes being cast as Wilmer in The Maltese Falcon?
I had assumed she was counting on taking one for the team and then getting a guaranteed 2016 slot as compensation for the heavy impression of the doorknob in her deirre.
9)’The question is really whether the system can recover from a fault condition using the error handling mechanisms defined by the Constitution.’
Do we have access to a kind of system log file where we can do an audit trail
W. would you please brief us on the error handling mechanisms provided by the Constitution ?
SF
“What difference does it make” is most honest comment I have heard from this administration in years. Right now Democrats are getting in position to be the next POTUS. Hillary wants it badly after have watch a lightweight like Obama steal it from her. Biden wants it also.
The good news for her is that Chicago Democrats have shown her how to seize and hold power. The bad news is that they want a piece of the action from here on out. These are the guys that can hold power. These are the guys that can get a district to vote 64% for a guy like Jesse Jackson Jr. while knowing that he will be indicted and resign his office only after he is re-elected. Oh and they get to choose his replacement. Sweet deal. But its not just big city districts across the country that are voting democrat. My younger friends and family are voting democrat. Helped by the constant drum beat from the national press they view republicans as the team they root against.
Chicago democrats, being helped by their cohort the national press, now see that they have the 50% needed to get any democrat elected. National debt out of control, 8% unemployment, 49% of Americans don’t even pay federal taxes, more Americans on the dole than ever before…the 50% don’t care as long as their “team”, the democrats win and they keep getting their government checks.
Arab spring – who cares what happens over there. Terrorists? Everyone knows, the press tells us, that the real issue is the gun owners in the US hiding behind the 2nd amendment supported by the NRA. National Debt? so what, keep printing money. Can’t afford your home, give it back.
The Chicago Democrats have shown the country how to do it by taking the national democratic party over from the Clintons. My guess is that they aren’t about to give it back to them. And what do the rest of us do while they control the votes in big city districts across the country. All we get to do is keep paying taxes to support their life style. All animals are create equal, but some are more equal than others….
The leftist elite in charge have gotten away with incompetence and ideological insanity for years in large part due to the fact that they own the “press”. There are signs that the “press” is losing influence according to polls. They still have enough penetration to swing elections due to the low information voters. My wonder though is how much longer can the “press” bubble last.
A foreign policy disaster can cause an economic disaster and the low information voters will suffer the most. If they figure out how much they have been lied to by the “press” their will be a good market hole digging equipment and lime.
There would need to be casualties on the scale of the first 9/11 and video aired nightly for the Senate Democrats to let any Impeachment Vote nonsense make it into their chambers! They (Demoncrats) have already proven that “The Party” comes first and there is no second! Even if the RINO’s get the Senate in 2014 there are to many can’s of worms to ever let day light in to the corruption we call America’s Government. I believe Jackie Chan was close, America isn’t the number one corrupt Government but it is squarely in the top 10. Like I said many moons ago, ain’t no one over 20 years old ever gonna hear the truth about Benghazi (or Egypt). We all know the ME is going to spiral further out of control the unknown is what’s gonna happen in the other hot spots over the next 3 yrs and 11 months.
#4. SpeakEasy–
Yeah -wasn’t it her job to know these things? How is it that she did not? But that is part of the current political rot. The ultimate credentials for “public service” consist of the depth and magnitude of your political connections, not competence or knowledge. Hell, if you started judging people in terms of competence that would knock most of the politically connected out of the running, and we can’t have that. Nor can you really afford to let a truly competent person attain any great position of power where they are the gate keepers for others to advance. Being competent, they might judge others on the same basis, and that would truly be a disaster for the political hacks.
Kakistocracies create their own accelerating decay. We are witnessing it now.
Hillary Clinton tells House Republicans what she thinks of them, and in a contemptuous, scornful tirade, tells them they’ll be sorry when she’s gone.
A brittle stare
An icy glare
It matters not, she screamed
It matters not
One little dot
What such as you have deemed
To be unwise
Declare as lies
I know what’s best for all
The Arab Spring
I know will bring
Al Qaeda’s sudden fall
I am in charge
My burden large
But I will carry on
Until the day
That you will say
We’re sorry that she’s gone
Before I go
Just so you know
I’ll say this to your face
For what I’m paid
My work has made
This world a better place
It matters a lot to the inhabitants of the Sahara what happens there. It really is not important to the rest of the world at all — and least of all to the residents of the New World.
America’s problem is not al Queda outside the gates, it is Subotai’s TWANLOC inside the gates. Not only inside the gates, but in charge. Islamists are not going to bring down the US, but all those self-satisfied Reds (Marxists) in government have already set the charges and lit the fuse. There is now no way of avoiding tears before bedtime.
But no matter how bad it gets, life will go on. And the sun will still rise tomorrow.
#12. She may finish up as Wilmer but she wants to be Brigid O’Shaughnessy right now. Here’s what she tearfully told the legislators.
Wow. Just wow. It was a perfect opportunity for someone to quote Sam Spade. Maybe Rand Paul could’ve done it if he had Bogie’s lisp.
If Hillary thinks she’ll get a big reward in 2016 for taking a bullet and find Barry waiting for her when she comes out in 2016 then she’s got another thing coming. The Chicago boys won’t be at the station.
15. toadold
“There are signs that the “press” is losing influence according to polls. They still have enough penetration to swing elections due to the low information voters. My wonder though is how much longer can the “press” bubble last.”
Yes, but this doesn’t necessarily mean that voters will suddenly jump onboard and vote Republican, nor that the MSM still wouldn’t have enough credibility to place doubt in voters minds with regards to voting Republican.
Republicans MUST expose the Dems’s lies every single second. If I were a leader in the Republican party and in front of a camera, I would state,
“Look, I get asked by my constituents everyday why the media isn’t asking why this president continues to mislead the American people. He tells them that taxes would only go up on the rich, but it has gone up on everyone. The guy still wants more. He tells them that Obamacare won’t raise medical costs or bankrupt medicaid, it will. The President also stated that Osama is dead, and GM is alive, but our Ambassador to Libya has been murdered and jihadists are spreading throughout North Africa. Under his watch, he has lost Syria, Libya, Egypt, and pretty soon, all of North Africa.”
“Now, I don’t want to be doing your job, but what can I tell them? Why aren’t you asking the President these questions? Hell, you got a guy at CNN sending daily love letters to Obama. I am sure there are many in the media who still value truth and are professional, but quite frankly, I don’t know what to tell them. So, until then, I am going to ask these question.”
Every single breath – hopefully some of it will get through. The Republicans need to position themselves, and they need to help burst that press ‘bubble’ fast.
19. Kinuachdrach
America’s problem is not al Queda outside the gates, it is Subotai’s TWANLOC inside the gates
An example, and I’m surprised it hasn’t gotten any play here, especially in LLIII’s post:
WEST POINT CADETS INDOCTRINATED AGAINST “RIGHT WING”
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2013/jan/17/west-point-center-cites-dangers-far-right-us/
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2013/jan/21/far-right-report-outrages-critics-of-federalism/
The second link is especially infuriating because the Washington Times, a supposedly conservative newspaper accepted the narrative that conservatives and limited government types are “Anti-Federalist,” when actual “Federalism” in its original sense is what most of us want, to one degree or another. Once again, those who supposedly “speak for us” fall on their rhetorical swords and allow the Left to redefine the language of political discourse.
#20 Wretchard:
Hillary is an old hand at this BS show. It is a variant of what she pulled in answering the Whitewater “scandal” issues when she showed up for a White House press conference dressed in pink and wearing demure bangs. Her subliminal “armor” was so blatantly obvious that I laughed out loud when I saw this.
“What difference does it make?”
I reckon these five little words will be engraved on Hillary’s political tombstone. She already knows she royally f***ed up when she lost her temper and blurted out this line. Indeed, I’ll wager the folks at the RNC are high-fiving each other even as I write this.
Pressed if she still believed the attack was the result of a video produced in LA she shouted “what difference does it make?”
None at all.
Except that the United States Government spent quite some time trying to tell us that was the cause, and that the guy who made the video is… still in jail, isn’t he?
23. MarkJ
I would hope the RNC would make use of this outburst but probably not.
The RNC had the chance to use dozens of Buraq’s stupid quotes but chose not to. Might be accused of being racist.
What a difference would it make?
Only four flag wrapped corpses.
Caused by warnings we missed,
From that question desist!
Since the Libyan coup, dear
I’m increasingly blue, dear
My appointment is through, dear
Now I’m good as resigned.
What a difference a day makes
There’s a panel before me
I can feed them baloney,
Since that moment remiss, lets reminisce
It’s not good when you find
you’ve been led like the blind
What a difference a day made
I just hope I pull through.
This is all too complex for me. I just want to know one thing: who dreamed up the idea to blame the video in the first place?
23. MarkJ: “I reckon these five little words will be engraved on Hillary’s political tombstone.”
God how I would like to believe that but the nation just re-elected a president presiding over record national debt, a refusal to even submit budgets for his entire first term, record food stamp enrollment, record disability enrollment (after the 99 weeks of unemployment extensions expired of course), etc, etc, etc.
The only explanation I can muster is, 1) the election was rigged or 2)a majority of Americans are too ignorant to care about anything anymore. Either one is discouraging. Watch for re-branding of Hillary over the next four years. Bill still has friends in high places and secrets to keep. Or not.
parenthesis:
“while Germany has made two Transall cargo planes available to assist France with the Mali mission, Berlin has ruled out transporting French troops or munitions.”
Then for what ?
http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/german-approach-to-crisis-regions-frustrates-allies-a-878717.html
Who dreamed up the idea to blame the video?
No one blamed the video, where did you get that idea? I mean really, we’re over the rainbow in Oz (not Australia) and that’s where we’ll be.
There was no video, and no one blamed it, and that’s the most recent version of reality from the West Wing.
The duplicity of the Media as a willing adjunct to the Obama Ministry of Truth is really about the funniest thing that could be said. The “low information voter” (LIV) will dutifully see the narrative about which Hillary spoke today and that is the “truth” that they will remember. Poor Hillary and those mean, nasty Rebublicans. It’s almost as if they killed the Ambassador. And we know that Sarah Palin virtually shot Gabby Giffords herself.
Ignorance is strength? I give you Joe Biden.
It’s “1984″, “Atlas Shrugged” and “Brave New World” all rolled into one.
Yes indeed, the sun will come up tomorrow morning, but then again Global Climate Change urges us to do SOMETHING ABOUT THAT, too.
This is an oversimplified take but it might be worth considering.
I’ll begin with a personal anecdote. I know that the company I currently work for is running a business model that has no chance of dealing with the present or surviving the future. But the powers that be are totally committed to it and utterly blind to everything else, so I voice no serious opposition to my higher-ups. Being a whistleblower in this scenario would not really get me anywhere, so I go with the flow, pretend not to notice things, and hope that an opportunity to jump ship will arise at some point in the future. I need my paycheck.
That is probabaly how a few mid-level analysts in the intelligence services are feeling right now about Africa. There is something big brewing in Africa and it probably scares the living snot out of them, but those to whom they can tell this to will not listen and everybody else they’re not allowed to tell at all.
Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton do not know how to process these things. The nuts and bolts of foreign policy is something completely outside their experience and they just accomodate themselves to the messes, believing that the other organs of governmnet will get around to fixing the problem eventually—especially if we give them more staff and more funding. When something nasty arises they do what they have always done: they ring the bell, they call the help. The whole focus and center of their being lies in the domestic policy arena and its infinitely nuanced terrain. Theirs is a world of upper floors, of prestigeous halls and elite social gatherings, and once that world gets a hold on the soul of a man it never lets go again.
The probelm is that the help is not allowed to do what it needs to do to actually solve the problem, so they just go with the flow, trying to hang on to their jobs if nothing else. They need their paycheck too.
It’s a tragic situation, I know. “But why won’t somebody just bring the truth to light, why won’t they be a whistleblower?” I’ll tell you why: because practically speaking, there is no point in doing so. They will not be believed, they will be relieved, and by the time history proves them right they will be forgotten old men—or dead. For most individuals in America today, be they public sector or private sector, white collar or blue collar, the only strategy that offers a prayer of success is to simply hold on to what they got.
But that is a slightly different subject. To return to the subject at hand, what we’re seeing in Africa is the beginning of a plunge into madness. Never forget that Africa is hell. Without Western food aid, monetary aid, developmental aid, Western medicine and peacekeeping, Western technology and capital to get the oil out of the ground and make the area profitable, Africa will simply blow up. It will be one billion starving, disease-ridden people, hacking each other up with machetes and rage-raping each other into bloody bits and pieces. And Africa is currently expelling a worn out West from her coasts.
There is no telling what sort of strange evils will breed in that swamp.
Gordon #27:
As I said a while back, in my dealings with the US intelligence community I have found that while an intelligence organization may or may not be terrific spies and may or may not be incredible analysts, but they always have to be friggin’ fantastic file clerks. “I don’t know.” or “We did not realize.” may or may not get you fired but “I knew but I lost it.” certainly will. So They Know.
And as Wretchard pointed out back then, the fact that the one who came up with the video excuse is otherwise known as “He Who Cannot Be Named” tells you right there who did it. Susan Rice was tossed under the bus, and we know for certain she did not come up with it; the official, accepted line from her is “I vas just following der orders.” Hillary was among the first to disavow the Video Outrage explanation, even as it was still the official Administration line. So who gave the orders? There is only One who could do that and not also end up kissing the bottom of a Greyhound Vistacruiser.
Thank you Wretchard, for finally having the courage to say what needed to be said here at PJM, even if some PJMers clearly have it in for the Pauls and the hated ‘Ronulans’ and don’t like the foreign policy implications of anyone in Washington asking whether the CIA was in fact running guns to Syria jihadis as it counteracts their ‘Syria rebels good, Russia = new Evil Empire” narrative. In truth there may be no good guys internationally as France seeks to revive its colonial empire in West Africa, and Africom is suddenly getting a red hot interest in Africa at the very moment the Chinese are inking deals left and right. If you recall Orwell had Africa as one of the major (MiniTrue reported) battlefields between Oceania and Eastasia/Eurasia in 1984. Seems like we’re headed for part of that vision. And shame on Terry Moran and every other ‘journalist’ (presstitute) who views covering Hillary’s backside and even distracting from her backhanded admission that the ‘annex’ was CIA-run and the ‘consulate’ was merely a front as his job.
While Ron Paul probably would’ve lost the 2012 election too, he would’ve done a hell of a lot better than Romney among young people and his son looks like an early front runner for the 2016 nomination with Ted Cruz — not those mainline RINOs like Christie or Jindal. So stick that in your pipe and smoke it all you Paul haters out there, paid and unpaid. Because Rand has finally had the guts to say what Boehner, McConnell and most of the other ‘GOP leaders’ have failed to do — say the emperor has no clothes, and ask what the hell was really happening in Benghazi, not snivel about minor details of what Obama said as Romney did in the debates — the moment I realized Savage was right and Romney was taking a dive rather than going for the jugular.
Re 22 Don Rodrigo:
FWIW here is an unsourced allegation:
“Dr. Jim Garrow, a renowned author and humanitarian, made the shocking claim on his Facebook page, yesterday.
I have just been informed by a former senior military leader that Obama is using a new “litmus test” in determining who will stay and who must go in his military leaders. Get ready to explode folks. “The new litmus test of leadership in the military is if they will fire on US citizens or not.” Those who will not are being removed.”
http://nicedeb.wordpress.com/2013/01/22/shock-claim-new-obama-litmus-test-for-military-leaders-is-they-must-be-willing-to-fire-on-us-citizens/
#33
I am not sure I am endorsing any particular point of view, nor promoting a particular narrative other than to say the checksum of the administration’s message is wrong. As to what the content of the message actually is, whether it says this about Russia or that about Iran, or whether it says anything at all is not for the moment determinate.
But whatever it is they’re messaging it ain’t it. We know the negative, as to the positive, we are no further ahead. About all we can reasonably conclude is that the video is probably not the cause of anything material. Who set Nakoula up, what happened in Benghazi, who attacked, how they knew about the CIA safehouse, what the consulate was doing, whether there were prisoners, what Hillary knew, these questions are still as unanswered as the day they were put.
This is a hell of a way to run a railroad. And when Hillary said, “what difference does it make”, I thought, “what difference did it make if Steiner existed or not?” So far we’ve got zip. This has been a total waste of time. Maybe what Hillary meant to say was: “what difference does this committee make? I’m not answering you anyhow.” Benghazi is like the Voynich Manuscript; we think it may mean something because they’re so evasive about it. Like they had something to hide. Maybe it’s just a reflection of their own gibberish policy. It occurred to me that they themselves may not know what it means.
There’s a foolschase to call a liar to the stand.
***3. Josh “wretchard, my initial response to the Hildabeast’s testimony is rather different, it seems to me she is being relatively honest and straightforward.”
She is not being honest. Why wasn’t SHE making the rounds on the Sunday circuit? Why is she allowed to be incompetent given the high position she holds? I’m sure you buy the whole blood clot BS too…***
In regards to the debate about Hillary’s sincerity, one could point to her now long history in the public eye for your answer.
Instead, watch the exchange when she makes the “What difference does it make comment.” Watch her closely…
See that clenched fist motion, ‘pounding’ on the table (but not really).
It’s a motion meant to show anger, and real indignation, but Hillary ain’t no actress, and she fails to pull it off. It is a rehearsed motion.
You know what it reminded me of?
Bill Clinton and his wagging finger, denying all allegations regarding Monica Lewinsky. Of course, Bill is a much better liar.
Here’s what I think went down. The Administration knew what a cock-up Benghazi was, and Hillary was NOT going to completely fall on her sword.
SO, they dissembled and delayed through the election, and while the squeaked by that, they knew as an issue it was still a festering sore. They kept Hillary out of the Congress’ grilling chair past November, but realized she could not stay out of it forever. BUT, they needed time to get their story straight, and to plan, and to rehearse.
So I think what was happening while Clinton was having her various medical issues was she was being prepped. I imagine a debate prep kind of intensity and format, going over lines in response to expected questions, even down to gestures.
I think they realized that the whole disinformation campaign thing they did looked really bad, so they chose a strategy of offense as defense.
“So, Hillary, when they harangue on this whole terrorist/not terrorist thing, get mad! Get angry! Get indignant! Pound the table to show how furious you are that they are playing politics while all you want to do is get to the bottom of things so you can stop it from ever happening again. But keep it short. We want it to fit into a soundbite!”
Watch that video again and tell me I am wrong…
I can’t understand why nothing has been mentioned of the alleged sodomizing and torture of The Ambassador. Surely there was a post mortem on him and the other victims? Whether it would be just to prove this did not happen, is surely relevant?
#3 Josh and #33 Not Uncle Joe:
While I agree with you about respecting Rand Paul for saying what he did, and find it refreshing, and wish more people had the cojones to do so, in that single statement he made it impossible to be elected in 2016 unless we have a fully recovered private sector economy (as if).
Think about it. He publicly stated that he believes that a condition for employment (and therefore an income stream) is a metric applied to the employee which, if unmet, will result in the loss of your job and your pay. As Mitt Romney, in a rare (for him) moment of brutal truth telling famously pointed out, 47% of the voters are now lost to Rand Paul. He essentially has to get every other person in the voting public to vote for him to win. That won’t happen.
Before any of you start complaining about this being a ridiculous assertion, I would point to who the real broken glass voters in 2012 were. What I’m saying isn’t crazy, folks.
These are the times in which we live, sadly.
Spend some time in a place like Massachusetts or Detroit and you’ll see an entire polity filled with people who are so immersed in the notion of income security uber alles that the idea of consequences for unmet metrics and bad behavior is actually treated as a form of oppression. (Our host lived in MA and he can attest to the machine and its workings.) If Jesus himself came back to earth and said what Rand Paul said I doubt he could get elected dogcatcher in MA. The rest of the country has been slouching that way for the past forty years.
Reagan’s great ability, and the reason he was elected in spite of his conservatism, was that he wasn’t perceived as a threat, that worshippers at the altar of the false god of perfect income stream security did not feel threatened by him. Once he got into office, he did clear dead wood (PATCO etc.), but the key is that he didn’t scare them off in the first place. That is what will get back the bully pulpit of the presidency for the center/right. Be strident about everything else but avoid that issue until in office, or you won’t get into office, ever.
Somewhere in Islamia there is a Saladin, an eastern Napolean. When he comes to the front all of this scattered, uncordinated jihad will find its focus.
“I wonder if the Emperor Honorius watching the Visigoths coming over the seventh hill truly realized that the Roman Empire was about to fall.” Star Trek
It took Lincoln three years to find the general who knew what it would take to beat ‘Bobby’ Lee, and was willing to pay the price.
How long will it take us?
Do we have that much time?
Are we willing to pay the price?
The Psalmist says that God tempers the wind to the shorn lamb.
I don’t know if that applies to the lamb who has shorn himself, out of season.
I expect not.
gordon
the whole scenario is an irrelevant snafu. TOTUS has long been jealous of Reagan’s PR at ending the Iranian hostage crisis and has publicly wished for the same opportunity. The writers for the teleprompter decided to give him a chance.
First they created false agitation over a video that no one ever saw in Algeria and Egypt.
Next they set up Stevens with no protection to be abducted by an Egyptian team. After the abduction, our hero was to ride in to the rescue, ala Reagan. Unfortunately the local Seals ignored their orders to stand down and tried to defend the Ambassador.
Quite naturally, the Egyptian team, which expected no resistance, felt they had been double-crossed and fell off the script.
The White House scenarists who had planned on a simple hostage scenario had no plan B, and panicked.
TOTUS who had expected a dramatic hostage rescue announcement in the debate instead was flummoxed.
Eventually, the WH, given the support of the media decided to stick with the story of plan A, and used distraction (cf Petraeus) and delay to let the incongruities disappear.
” until democracy grows in the region, ‘we’re going to be faced with this level of instability,” she said.’” Silly me I thought that was Bushs’ plan.
““We now face a spreading jihadist threat,” Clinton said”, but Obama said they were defeated.
Alot of contradicting going on between Hillary and Obama.
You’re right Wretchard about Hillary being a fool to take a bullet for Obama. When she does there will be no ambulance service from Chicago.
The Obama administration doesn’t want to know. They don’t care.
One of the criticisms of drone warfare is that you lose intelligence. I suspect that Obama considers that a feature. They don’t want to know. Warfare is a capitalist construct or something like that. The only reason he went hard in Afghanistan is to tick a box, put to rest the accusation that democrats are soft. I killed bin Laden, how dare you. But then promptly gave them north Africa.
Who was the governor in New Jersey before Christie? After nearly bankrupted the state one of the last things he did was authorize millions of dollars to his supporters. Reality means nothing to these folks, only power. It isn’t complicated, or even a good story. Just vile small people who are con artists.
#9 wretchard,
Hillary said a long time ago that she will resign from her position after Obama’s first term (if he’s reelected). I remember reading that on Barry Rubin’s blog a long long time before Benghazi, perhaps even before the eruption of the whole Arab Stink thing. Considering Bill Clinton said Obama was an amateur, my guess is that Hillary didn’t agree with all his policies, but didn’t have much of a say in spite of being the SecState, which would be a good reason to leave quietly rather than either continue and be held responsible for the consequences or make a noise and be blamed by the party for losing the election.
And I believe Lybia was a European initiative — am I wrong about that? At the beginning Obama was criticized for not intervening to stop the Duck of Death. Then the Euro countries depending on Lybian oil started getting really nervous with all the threats coming from both the Duck and the rebels. Then suddenly Obama decided to intervene.
Anyway, if it were Hillary or others in the admin responsible for the mess and Obama decided to get rid of them in order to correct the course, he sure has a funny way of showing it with the people he appointed to replace them. Kerry, Hagel, Brennan all support appeasing the radicals at best, and at worst even helping them take power believing that would make them America’s friends. Instead of correcting course it seems like Obama is so satisfied with the results that he intends to double down in this direction. So personally I have no doubt who is the termite in chief, though he might not be the only termite.
THIS is what Hillary Clinton is all about.
Disgusting.
Wretchard # 35 mentioned the word “gibberish”. I flashed on that because earlier, reading through the comments about Hillary’s performance, that was the word that occured to me. I even wished that Rand Paul or one of the other panelists had spoken the word to Ms. Clinton.
Between the puffing tears and the nonsensical outburst Hillary does not seems to be in control of herself. She often says she’s not doing the very thing she is doing. Back during Bill’s first run for president, in the middle of some bimbo eruption, on “60 Minutes” she cuddled next to Bill defending him against the world and said, ‘I’m not like Tammy Wynette singing about stand by your man.’ But that was exactly what she was doing.
She reminds me of the girls in high school who get involved in student government. They are smart, wear glasses, articulate, narrow and possessed of a high opinion about themselves; and completely oblivious to the fact that it is bizarre for 16-year-olds to be obsessed with government.
The question for me about Benghazi has always been: Why would the administration think it a great explanation to blame the riots and murders on some odd video in the first place? YouTube is filled with wild and crazy anti-Muslim videos; but it is filled with wild and crazy everything! It’s like taking your daughter to Las Vegas to find a husband and complaining that all the candidates are gambling, low-life rogues. And tell me, when did the federal government get in the movie reviewing business? It doesn’t matter what Hillary or Obama or Rice or anyone in the administration thinks of any movie or book. Their job was to proclaim to the world their powerlessness in the face of free citizen expression as guaranteed by the 1st amendment. It just didn’t make sense to me when Susan Rice was running around talking about some weird video that mocked Islam.
The Bush Admin wasn’t all that much better: during the Danish Cartoon crisis; they came out with some mealy mouthed statement scolding the cartoonists. Going back a bit further, when Khomeini put out a fatwa on Salman Rushdie wouldn’t it have been nice if the entire western leadership mounted some kind of unified defense of the writer? A lost opportunity that showed Jihad Islam that our spiritual blood pressure was extremely low.
I wonder if 500 years from now historians won’t look upon the century or so starting from WWI as one contiguous war; all the players from that war (and a few extras) have taken center stage and created world-wide bloodshed & mayhem. Now it is the turn of the crumbled bits of the Ottoman Empire (as represented by Jihad Islam given stage by petro dollars). I think —hope, pray —they are the last players in the drama.
@35 wretchard
As for who set up Nakoula, what’s the difference? When he gets murdered in prison, as he surely will be, it will be because Hillary Clinton went out of her way to broadcast his name all over the world. It hardly matters who set him up to begin with, she’s the one who used him for a scapegoat. She couldn’t shut up about the video when she was pandering to the jihadis, now it’s a taboo subject because she’s made a new political calculation and wants everyone to think she’s the Great White Hope. She’s a shell of a human being and a thoroughly appalling woman.
O/t yesterday I got a robocall on my voicemail informing me that President Obama is one of the greatest presidents of all time! but He needs my help to pass stricter gun control laws for the whole country because the deaths of 20 children in Connecticut was the last straw etc. so press 1 now to help with a donation to end gun violence and He will send me a FREE Sandy Hook commemorative bracelet to remind myself of how I made a difference.
I’m not kidding btw
http://www.france24.com/en/20130121-qatar-mali-france-ansar-dine-mnla-al-qaeda-sunni-islam-doha
Get a load of this…^^^^^
“It quoted an unnamed source in French military intelligence saying: “The MNLA [secular Tuareg separatists], al Qaeda-linked Ansar Dine and MUJAO [movement for unity and Jihad in West Africa] have all received cash from Doha.”
A month later Sadou Diallo, the mayor of the north Malian city of Gao [which had fallen to the Islamists] told RTL radio: “The French government knows perfectly well who is supporting these terrorists. Qatar, for example, continues to send so-called aid and food every day to the airports of Gao and Timbuktu.”
The presence of Qatari NGOs in north Mali is no secret.”
One would have to agree: Qatar is ‘punching above its weight.’
As a rival exporter of LNG, just how disinterested IS Qatar vis a vis Algeria?
========
And in other news:
Cairo has, effectively, run off its drilling talent. That’s why it has suffered an astounding collapse in natural gas supplies.
It has everything to do with islamist economic policy — and nothing to do with running out of target reservoirs.
Islamism = islam + communism –> It must really tug at the Wan’s heart-strings.
#7 RWE:
Now that I am retired I can give you a little inside baseball. I will use no names only positions. You can look them up if you care to. The warning advisor to the CJCS/J-2 (that’s the Chairman’s intelligence component for those who don’t know the codes) went to the DIA/DI (Director of Intelligence) in the spring of 2009 requesting information on the potential political and social instability in the Middle East. There were many indicators that something big and potentially bad was going to happen in the near future. The DI blew off the J-2. That summer the new DNI asked the DIA/DI to take a position called the Deputy Director of National Intelligence for Intelligence Integration (DDNI/II). Along comes the mislabeled Arab Spring and takes the powers that be by surprise, well not all of them, i.e., the J-2. The DNI then sets up a study group called I-21 to investigate the reasons for the intelligence failure. Guess who’s imprimatur goes on the study? None other than the DDNI/II, the very individual who blew off the J-2′s request for intelligence support in the first place. So as you can see the White House and State Department really did not have a clue about what was about to happen because the Intelligence community didn’t bother to answer someone’s question.
tdiinva #49:
That’s interesting!
But the question that comes to mind right off is that if the people at Bolling AFB were screwing off, what were all those people at Langley, VA doing?
How much does Bolling talk to Langley, anyway? I have always wondered about that.
48. blert
we know that, the Algerians know that too. Qatar is playing a double part, like Saudi Arabia, to a lesser point, they are “officially” our allies, and support any salafist movement.
Hollande travel lately to Abu Dahabi and to Saudi Arabia, but purposely avoided Qatar
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O8HspF7Ve4Y
It ‘s why for Syria, we don’t give the Rebels arms, but humanitarian helps to the populations
Qatar is also financing our suburbs micro enterprises. I suppose that our DGRS is surveying !
RWE:
The MENA division at CIA is the heart and soul of the Arabist clique in the government. That is where John Brennan cut his teeth. The Arabist position is that radical Islam is democratic force that we should support. That was their position in the Summer of 2001 and remains so today.