…lied. People died.
Ham testified in the classified session that there was some peripheral chat about a demonstration, but that he and other commanders were always clear, from the beginning, that Benghazi was a terrorist attack. That’s the word they delivered to President Obama and his top advisers including then Defense Secretary Leon Panetta. Ham has been consistent both in sworn testimony and in his public comments.
So that was always the military’s take. It was as we all know not President Obama’s take. He was selling the attack as a demonstration in response to a movie for weeks after the fact. Then Secretary of State Hillary Clinton sold the same line, and then hand-picked the Accountability Review Board to conduct a phony investigation into the attack.
Sort of like the IRS “investigation.”
[Update]
Even Dianne Feinstein is disputing the latest attempt to misshape the narrative.
Obama And Clinton And Rice …lied. People died.
Um, isn’t the point of the “X lied. People died.” formulation that the lies caused the deaths?
Um, yes.
Four people died in Benghazi. Unless you believe it was a video that caused it.
Yes, people died. But how did Obama’s statements after their deaths cause those deaths? Is this a time travel thing?
How about turning down requests for security before hand in a country where Obama helped Islamist militants overthrow the government? Oh wait, the Obama administration only lied about that after the fact.
Maybe Obama’s lies didn’t lead to what happened in Benghazi but his policies certainly did.
Obama, Clinton, and Rice’s lies after the fact probably had a whole lot to do with a staggering amount of deaths still occurring in Syria, Iraq, and a few other places, including continuing deaths in Libya.
“Um, isn’t the point of the “X lied. People died.” formulation that the lies caused the deaths?”
Umm isn’t that the sort of trivial sort of counter argument that you get in your typical second grade social studies class – meant to distract from the horrible deaths Obama knew were happening; knew were being caused by a terrorist attack, knew he could help, but did nothing to prevent?
You sure have come a long way in your debate points on this topic…from weak recitations of weak and clearly false administration talking points to sentence structure.
meant to distract from the horrible deaths Obama knew were happening
Once he knew they were happening there wasn’t anything he could do to stop them.
knew were being caused by a terrorist attack
He described the attack as an act of terror the next day.
knew he could help
How?
but did nothing to prevent
Are we back to time travel?
From the beginning the Benghazi story has been a desperate attempt to link a supposedly bad act — exaggerating the role of the video, and downplaying the role of Al Qaeda — to an truly bad event — the death of four Americans. As if what Obama/Clinton/Rice said after the fact somehow caused the deaths. Rand’s phrasing is just another attempt.
You saw the same sort of threadbare logic with Fast and Furious. ATF hadn’t kept track of their guns, a border patrol agent was killed by people who had those guns, therefore Obama has blood on his hands. Never mind that the bad act — selling guns with inadequate followup — did not directly cause the bad event, you just link the two together. But at least the act preceded the event, and the logic doesn’t require time travel.
As if what Obama/Clinton/Rice said after the fact somehow caused the deaths. Rand’s phrasing is just another attempt.
No, it’s not.
So it’s OK to lie to the American people about deaths to win a reelection as long as the lies don’t actually cause those particular deaths?
No, and I don’t see any proof that they lied. It’s a year later, and we’re still arguing about exactly who did what and why. The notion that Obama et al had definitive answers to those questions within hours, and then deliberately went out to sell a different story (including getting the CIA to endorse said story), has always been ludicrous. Which, I suspect, is why you get things like your out-of-order headline. The “lie” charge is paper-thin, so you need to beef it up with the “died” part.
It’s a year later, and we’re still arguing about exactly who did what and why.
And there’s a simple reason why, because that information has been suppressed.
The notion that Obama et al had definitive answers to those questions within hours, and then deliberately went out to sell a different story (including getting the CIA to endorse said story), has always been ludicrous.
And yet, that’s what happened.
And yet, that’s what happened.
Clearly this is a matter of faith with you. I’ll wait for actual evidence.
“Once he knew they were happening there wasn’t anything he could do to stop them.”
Wrong.
“He described the attack as an act of terror the next day.”
Wrong. There was several paragraphs of separation.
“but did nothing to prevent
Are we back to time travel?”
Ya, why would Obama grant the extra security requested? It makes no sense that people want to hold Obama accountable for his actions. People should not even be allowed to comment on his missteps unless they have a time machine.
” As if what Obama/Clinton/Rice said after the fact somehow caused the deaths.”
Umm no. The lies were a cover up for the policy decisions that led to those deaths.
“You saw the same sort of threadbare logic with Fast and Furious. ATF hadn’t kept track of their guns, a border patrol agent was killed by people who had those guns, therefore Obama has blood on his hands. ”
Emails show the F&F operation was being used for political purposes to push gun control North of the border and there are speeches by Clinton, Obama, and other top tier Democrats that back this up.
Emails show the F&F operation was being used for political purposes to push gun control North of the border and there are speeches by Clinton, Obama, and other top tier Democrats that back this up.
Point me to one email by Obama or Holder indicating that Fast & Furious was meant to push gun control.
Wrong. There was several paragraphs of separation.
Why would you write that, when it’s so easily refuted? Here’s the paragraph in question:
Where’s your “several paragraphs of separation”?
“Where’s your “several paragraphs of separation”?”
He was talking about other events in the paragraph before the one you linked and Benghazi several paragraphs before. We already did this whole argument a number of times. He never referred to Benghazi specifically as an act of terror.
But even if he did, he had his administration out there for weeks blaming a video. Did you watch all those Carney press conferences? Did you see Obama’s appearance on The View? Why was Obama pushing the video as the cause weeks after the event if he claimed it was a terror attack the next day?
“Point me to one email by Obama or Holder indicating that Fast & Furious was meant to push gun control.”
Why does it have to be Obama or Holder? They have underlings for these things. Or do you think Obama writes all of his own speeches?
Also, I said there were emails asking for information about F&F that could be used for pushing gun control not that the email said the purpose of F&F was for gun control.
What we know is that Obama, Hillary, and other top Democrats were pushing for new gun control measures based on violence in Mexico while the ATF was running guns to cartels. We also know it wasn’t just some local rogue agents and that higher ups at the ATF were seeking information about the violence caused by F&F guns to use for political reasons.
What is the burden of proof we are working with here? Are we using the standards Democrats hold other people to or are we using the standards Democrats have for themselves?
Global warming! Corporate America!
That’s all I got, Comrade Jim…
“Once he knew they were happening there wasn’t anything he could do to stop them. ”
So TOTALLY wrong; so proven wrong; so demonstrably wrong, that I find it ghastly that even *you* continue to spout this nonsense.
If you actually believe that, you are sitting next to pajama boy in your own plaid onsie sipping hot cocoa.
If you don’t believe that, then there isn’t much to be said for your character.
When did Obama know that people were dying, and what exactly could he have done at that point to make a difference? If this has all been proven, it shouldn’t be hard for you to come up with the evidence.
What our Beloved Jim is trying to argue is that because Obama’s, Clinton’s, Rice’s lies came after the the people in Benghazi were left unprotected by them; abandoned by them while under attack (when they could have been helped); allowed, by them, to be slaughtered, that the usual chant of “X lied; people died” is somewhat out of temporal order.
Like anyone who has zero basis for rational debate on the subject; who has no factual or logical basis for their robot-like defense of their beloved Dear Leader, ……
like someone who is flat out wrong about what was done and could have been done before, during and after the event……
Beloved Baghdad Jim looks to attacks on sentence structure or grammar.
To quiet Jim’s delusional mind let me alter the formula for him:
Obama and Clinton failed; their people died; they lied.
Not as handy as Obama lied; people died, but then, not everything Obama fails at can be handily reduced to a bumper sticker.
Just for the English major Jim.
Obama lied people died is not the same as Obama lied then people died or Obama lied leading to people dying.