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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsDear Useless Republicans, please STFU on Benghazi
The current craziness:
Cheney slams Obama over Benghazi: We were always ready on 9/11?
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10022815670
Grampy McCain says Benghazi just like Iran-Contra.
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10022805271
Fox News Invites Convicted Cover-Up Expert Oliver North To Comment On Alleged Benghazi Cover-Up
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10022815907
...calls for a repost.
by Richard Riis
Senator John McCain got himself worked up into a righteous lather on Sundays "Meet the Press" over what he continues to insist was a massive cover-up on the part of the White House about the Sept. 11, 2012 attack on the United States consulate in Benghazi .
"There are so many answers we don't know," McCain told host David Gregory. "We've had two movies about getting bin Laden and we don't even know who the people were who were evacuated from the consulate the day after the [Benghazi] attack. So there are many, many questions. So we've had a massive cover-up on the part of the administration."
Pressed by Gregory on what he meant by a massive cover-up, McCain could only sputter, I'm asking you, do you care whether four Americans died? And shouldn't people be held accountable for the fact that four Americans died?"
"Well, what you said was the cover-up -- a cover-up of what?" Gregory pressed on.
"Of the information concerning the deaths of four brave Americans," McCain replied. "The information has not been forthcoming. You obviously believe that it has. I know that it hasn't. And I'll be glad to send you a list of the questions that have not been answered, including 'What did the president do and who did he talk to the night of the attack on Benghazi?'"
McCains phony and self-perpetuated outrage over the attack in Benghazi is not only disingenuous but monumentally hypocritical. Its nothing more than a disgraceful attempt to squeeze political capital out of tragedy.
Contrary to what the McCain and his fellow Republicans in Congress would have you believe, American embassies and consulates are attacked quite frequently, or at least they have been over the last few decades. During the Bush administration, for instance, American diplomatic missions were attacked, by my count, 14 times. Scores of people, including Americans, were killed and wounded in those attacks. Did any of the people who continue to clamor for a formal investigation into what happened in Benghazi raise any questions about President George W. Bushs role or whereabouts in the wake of any of these attacks? Is the papacy a lifetime job?
Were the Republicans this aggressive in response to the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks in which 2,996 people were murdered right here on American soil? In that case we actually have solid evidence demonstrating that President Bush disregarded warnings of an imminent attack on American soil. What else would you call a CIA national security brief dated August 6, 2001 entitled Bin Ladin Determined to Strike in US? But its the Benghazi attack that has Republican knickers in a twist. Surely Im not the only one that finds that not only odd but infuriating.
Where was all that concern for our men and women serving in embassies and consulates across the globe when these other attacks and killings occurred?
June 14, 2002, Karachi, Pakistan - A truck with a fertilizer bomb driven by a suicide bomber was detonated outside the United States consulate. Twelve people were killed and 51 injured, all Pakistanis.
Calls for congressional investigation: none.
February 20, 2003, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia A truck bomb detonated in front of an international diplomatic compound kills 20, seven of them Americans.
Calls for congressional investigation: none.
February 28, 2003, Karachi, Pakistan Motorcycle-riding gunmen killed two police officers and wounded five other officers and a civilian in front of the U.S. consulate.
Calls for congressional investigation: none.
March 15, 2004, Karachi, Pakistan Pakistani police discovered and disarmed a van filled with nearly 200 gallons of liquid explosives hooked up to a timer and two detonators parked in front of the U.S. consulate.
Calls for congressional investigation: none.
July 30, 2004, Tashkent, Uzbekistan - Suicide bombers struck at the entrances of the U.S. and Israeli embassies. Two Uzbek security guards were killed in each bombing.
Calls for congressional investigation: none.
December 6, 2004, Jeddah, Saudi Arabia Armed militants stormed the American Consulate, breaching the compound's outer wall. A Yemeni, a Sudanese, a Filipino, a Pakistani and a Sri Lankanall employees of the consulatewere killed by gunfire, and about ten others were wounded.
Calls for congressional investigation: none.
March 2, 2006, Karachi, Pakistan - A suicide car bomb killed four people and injured thirty outside the Marriott Hotel, 20 yards from the U.S. Consulate. Among the dead was David Foy, an American diplomat and three Pakistanis. It appears that Foy was the direct target of the bomber, who detonated his vehicle in the car park behind the consulate as Foy arrived.
Calls for congressional investigation: none.
September 12, 2006, Damascus, Syria - Gunmen tossed grenades over the perimeter walls of the U.S. Embassy before opening fire with automatic weapons. A car bomb was detonated outside the embassy, although a truck bomb filled with pipe bombs and gas cylinders failed to explode. A Syrian security guard was killed, and thirteen people were wounded, including two security guards and a Chinese diplomat.
Calls for congressional investigation: none.
January 12, 2007, Athens, Greece - A rocket-propelled grenade was fired into the U.S. Embassy. There were no injuries.
Calls for congressional investigation: none.
October 1, 2007, Vienna, Austria A man was prevented from entering the U.S. Embassy with a backpack full of explosives.
Calls for congressional investigation: none.
February 17, 2008, Belgrade, Serbia - A mob of 2,000 protesters vandalized the Slovenian Embassy and burned portions of the United States and Croatian Embassies.
Calls for congressional investigation: none.
March 18, 2008, Sanaa, Yemen Three mortar rounds were fired at the U.S. embassy but missed, landing outside a nearby girls school. Three policemen and 13 students were wounded.
Calls for congressional investigation: none.
July 9, 2008, Istanbul, Turkey Gunmen attacked the United States consulate killing three Turkish police officers.
Calls for congressional investigation: none.
September 17, 2008, Sana'a, Yemen The American Embassy is attacked by assailants armed with rocket-propelled grenades, automatic rifles, grenades and car bombs. A 20-minute battle results in 13 deaths and 16 injuries. Six members of the Yemeni security forces and seven civilians, including one American, were killed in the attack, and sixteen people were wounded.
Calls for congressional investigation: none.
Quotes I could readily find from John McCain pertaining to any of these 15 incidents: zero. And I spent the better part of a day combing through the newspaper archives.
Frankly, I would not have called for a congressional investigation of any of these attacks either. The United States has 275 embassies and consulates around the world, and its patently absurd to expect the president - any president - to be personally involved in the security arrangements for each one of them, even those that might be perceived as being at greater risk than others. The United States it at war. We have enemies everywhere. The world is too full of terrorists, militants and just plain fanatics to even pretend we can guarantee the complete safety of any American mission or diplomatic employee. We do the best we can with what we have, and, all things considered, we're doing pretty well.
Of course, it would easier if some of the most willful enemies of national security were not right here at home. House Republicans, out of purely partisan spite, cut the Obama administrations request for embassy security funding by $128 million in 2011, and $331 million in 2012. It takes some mighty big cojones to cut funding for diplomatic security and then try to exploit a tragedy resulting from weakened security at a diplomatic post.
So, let it go, Senator McCain. Perpetuating this hypocritical and baseless witch hunt is not only disrespectful to all those who lost their lives defending our diplomatic missions abroad, but an embarrassment to yourself, your party and your country.
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2013/02/18/1187897/-Dear-Senator-McCain-STFU
Perfect smack down.
Note:
chelsea0011
(10,115 posts)any investigation of the Bush presidency over Iraq.
Mr. David
(535 posts)And he deserved the impeachment. The day after he was nominated, should have begun impeachment proceedings.
9/11 could have been prevented. Darth could have easily died from too much stress as a president before 9/11 occurred.
Jeffords would have still crossed to give Senate the majority and he didn't even like *.
RevStPatrick
(2,208 posts)They're going to keep yammering and hammering and yammering and stammering, blathering and babbling and cackling and chattering. They're going to prattle and twaddle and blather and waddle, their jibber-jabber-gibberish never to make sense.
This is what they do.
They are obfuscators.
This is their purpose.
To get us to say nasty things about them, so that their nasty little followers can then say nasty things about us. They yammer on, knowing full well that it's all bullshit, but also knowing that the 23% "backwash" will believe the blather.
And then nothing productive actually gets done.
On purpose...
ProSense
(116,464 posts)This is what they do.
They are obfuscators.
This is their purpose.
To get us to say nasty things about them, so that their nasty little followers can then say nasty things about us. They yammer on, knowing full well that it's all bullshit, but also knowing that the 23% "backwash" will believe the blather.
...when called on their BS (http://www.democraticunderground.com/10022814420), they feign ignorance (http://www.democraticunderground.com/10022816109).
zerosumgame0005
(207 posts)and when it comes undone they will still scream it's Obama's fault...
Skidmore
(37,364 posts)they are trying to get in pre-emptive strikes against Hillary Clinton to weaken her position before she even announces interest in candidacy.
Laura PourMeADrink
(42,770 posts)FSogol
(45,488 posts)jambo101
(797 posts)They lie and cheat,most of what they say is pure bs and hypocrisy, their rightwing media is nuts and fomenting some very negative traits in the way many Americans think., why do people support these rightwing nut jobs? has a large % of Americans come down with some form of collective dementia?
Why havent many of these rightwing talking heads been taken to court and charged with sedition.?
lpbk2713
(42,757 posts)Isn't that pathetic?
Patiod
(11,816 posts)Presiding While Black
dmr
(28,347 posts)I can't remember which Repub was yammering on this morning, but he reminded me of Nancy Grace barking over on HLN - sneers and all!
I turned him off just like I do her.
Laura PourMeADrink
(42,770 posts)future under a Republican administration?? and they wonder why they lost.
Skittles
(153,164 posts)their pointy little heads are able to comprehend they will never have a stained dress scandal with President Obama so they have to latch on to SOMETHING, ya know???
99Forever
(14,524 posts)JDPriestly
(57,936 posts)After all, it is odd to me that the American and Turkish ambassadors were meeting in Benghazi so far from their embassies in Tripoli. The reason may be very commonplace and trivial, such as that the Turkish ambassador was on a vacation or holiday and the American ambassador flew in for a meeting.
But then, does this have something to do with Syria, with Egypt? Was there something that the Turkish and American ambassadors wanted to discuss away from their staffs?
I do have some curiosity about this.
It seems a little odd to me that they would be meeting in Benghazi.
And a report I read in the Dayton newspaper was that the American ambassador had checked with the security detail at the door of the consulate to make sure that security arrangements were adequate for the meeting.
So, most likely everyone here is right, and this Benghazi thing is just something Republicans are blowing way out of proportion just so that they have some manufactured scandal to talk about. But I don't know enough facts about the situation to come to that conclusion.
Sorry, but I've been around the block and been disillusioned too many times. We may not have been told the background story about what was transpiring in Benghazi before the attacks and what was expected that night.
davidthegnome
(2,983 posts)It plays Rush from 12 to 3 every day. Yesterday, as I was waiting for some logs to print, twiddling my thumbs, I turned up the volume out of sheer, morbid curiosity. Rush was ranting about Benghazi, pointing fingers at liberals, at the media, at the Obama administration... a whole lot of blather with very little substance. I still do not understand where they are going with this, or what exactly they're hoping to accomplish, all I know is that, when you turn on the idiots these days, "Benghazi... evil democrats... fucking black guy in the white house..." is, in a nutshell, what you will likely hear first.
They seem to be lacking a point....
Xyzse
(8,217 posts)Thanks!