House Oversight memo, via TRS:
House Oversight and Government Reform Committee leaders today sent a letter to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton asking why requests for more protection were denied to the U.S. mission in Libya by Washington officials prior to the September 11, 2012 terrorist attack that killed U.S. Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens. The denials came after repeated attacks and security threats to U.S. personnel.
“Based on information provided to the Committee by individuals with direct knowledge of events in Libya, the attack that claimed the ambassador’s life was the latest in a long line of attacks on Western diplomats and officials in Libya in the months leading up to September 11, 2012. It was clearly never, as Administration officials once insisted, the result of a popular protest,” the committee’s chairman, Rep. Darrell Issa, R-Calif., and subcommittee chairman, Rep. Jason Chaffetz, R-Utah, write. “In addition, multiple U.S. federal government officials have confirmed to the Committee that, prior to the September 11 attack, the U.S. mission in Libya made repeated requests for increased security in Benghazi. The mission in Libya, however, was denied these resources by officials in Washington.”
The letter outlines 13 security threats over the six months prior to the attack.
“Put together, these events indicated a clear pattern of security threats that could only be reasonably interpreted to justify increased security for U.S. personnel and facilities in Benghazi,” the chairmen write.
The Committee indicated it intends to convene a hearing in Washington on Wednesday October 10, 2012, on the security failures that preceded the attack.
Will we Americans even get a mention of this during tomorrow’s debate — either from the moderators or Romney himself, who seems increasingly to be borrowing from the sanctimonious John McCain defeat-with-showy-honor playbook of colossal fail.
I just hope that Romney’s internals look stellar to his campaign people, and he’s just playing four corners defense at this point as a result. Otherwise, I’m at a loss to explain how this country can continue to function in a fog of the daily surreal.
It’s like we’re living in the opening scenes of Joe vs. the Volcano. And we just can’t shake loose that oddly-off look the world has taken on.
For eight days we were told a YouTube video caused a spontaneous demonstration of savagery — in the name of peace and religious tolerance. We watched an American escorted from him home, his face and body covered, after our own press identified him as the maker of the video.
We watched the President, the DOJ, and the State Department try to scapegoat a citizen (who may have had ties to the FBI as an informant) when they knew full well that they needed time to get to work covering their own asses.
Which is something the murdered Libyan ambassador, I hate to say it, was not allowed to do — either figuratively or literally.
And yet campaigning by Obama continues apace, as Hollywood starlets and rapper moguls and phony New York bohemian art-scene pseudo-intellectuals (who made their bones on “Square Pegs” and “Sex in the City” and Ferris Beuhler’s Day Off, respectively) continue to lavish praise on a man who it is increasingly clear is intent on bringing down the free market capitalist system and rejiggering the balance of world power.
Such callousness on display. Such a presumptuousness that the press will cover for he and Hillary and Holder.
But is this a bridge too far, finally?
(thanks to Pablo)
Recall Samantha Power’s justification for Obama’s unilateral entry into the Libyan conflict — “from behind”, no less? The childish “R2P”? Responsibility to protect, they had it.
But there was no such responsibility toward American diplomats, apparently.
When there is only one customer for your product you tend to give them exactly what they expect and want to get.
They’re also throwing our intelligence agencies under the bus, still insisting that the initial intel gave them a protest story we all know to be bullshit. There was a significant CIA presence in Benghazi. So they’re either incompetent or they lied up the chain of command according to the top of that chain.
We’ve also watched as Pakistani Islamists capture, torture and imprison a Dr. who aided the US efforts to locate Bin Laden. And the US utterly fail to aid that man.
We’ve watched Pakistani officials offer cash bounties for the killing of Nakoula Bassely Nakoula. And the response of the US to this threat? Practical silence.
We’ve watched formerlycaptive Islamist murderers released from Guantanamo, only to see them return to the battlefield to kill again. and more planned to be released in the near future. We’ve watched our “allies” in Egypt release Islamist murderers from its prisons, only to see them participate in an assault on the US Embassy in Cairo.
We’ve watched in 2009 as Obama sided with the Islamist dictators in Iran when the people of Iran arose to demand their freedom, and were slaughtered, imprisoned and tortured by their theocratic tyrants for their troubles.
We’ve watched in 2011 as Obama stood aside when the Syrian people, likewise tired of seeing their children hauled off by Syrian government thugs for imprisonment, torture, rape and death, to have their bodies “returned” to their parents by being discarded on the streets with notes attached saying “this is what comes to those who resist”, those parents now murdered in their tens of thousands by that government, bombed in their cities, shelled in their villages, executed on their streets. From Obama? Hardly a peep. Wouldn’t want to upset the Mullahs.
[…] Rice — has unraveled.The first instinct of the Obama administration is always to lie.UPDATE II: Jeff Goldstein at Protein Wisdom provides excerpts of the letter from the House Oversight Committee …:“Based on information provided to the Committee by individuals with direct knowledge of events in […]
I think he’s handing the ME the keys because he knows he’s not going to win. This is WAY too blatant.
Doubtful…
I surely hope he doesn’t win another term.
Romney better show himself to be a Samurai warrior in the next four weeks.
Either way as we say around here: we’re fucked.
An example of Obama’s noise, fit only to be blocked out in order to hear his pure inner voice. But is it Ali Shirazi who makes the noise? Oh no, it’s not. It’s the Jerusalem Post here that’s the noise.
How about this story:
Obama waives sanctions on countries that use child soldiers
http://thecable.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2012/10/01/obama_waives_sanctions_on_countries_that_use_child_soldiers
LIHOP or MIHOP?
Yeah, that was what many leftists were shrieking after 9/11, claiming that Chimpy McHitlerburton either merely allowed the 9/11 attacks to occur (Let It Happen On Purpose) or actively took steps (Made It Happen On Purpose) to bring about the worst terrorist attack on American soil because OIL!
So, regarding the Benghazi attacks, I have to ask. LIHOP or MIHOP?
Oh, silly me, I forgot, its all because Mitt made some mildly scolding remarks towards the President. Yeah, that was the cause.
– Hair plugs helps his boss…… again.
Jesus.
Did the White House order a cover-up over the murder of Libya’s US Ambassador?
We should recall, I think, that on the night of the attack or in the early hours of the morning directly thereafter, some close to 35 Americans and Libyan employees were evacuated from the “safe house”. We have not heard from these people publicly to date, so far as I know. They have not been identified by name, perhaps because some of them are in the employ of the CIA, or perhaps because such identification and consequent interviews would not be “helpful” to the Obama administration. Which of these two possibilities, or what others may be the case, we cannot know.
Yet we can see how some of these anonymous revelations coming to light today may come from precisely these eyewitnesses to the attacks and to the goings on in Benghazi in the days just prior to the attacks.
And Obama and Hillary had the audacity to STAND IN FRONT OF THEIR CASKETS and blame this on a video when the not only knew it was terrorism at the time, but their reckless endangerment of the diplomats in Libya is what allowed them to be murdered.
Oh, and Obama thinks prepping for a debate at a Las Vegas resort is ‘a drag’. Responsibility is such a bummer, huh, dude? Sorry it’s cramping your golf plans.
I surely hope he doesn’t win another term.
– I don’t know Leigh. With Libya and F&F, plus yet more gun walking coming to light, I’m no longer sure it will matter, other than it will save the Congress a year of legal wrangling to remove him from office if he does win.
– An Obama win, followed by an expulsion might open up the field to some candidates we could actually support.
– No matter how you look at it things seem to be headed for some sort of train wreck.
I don’t think Obama would be removed from office under any circumstances. The GOP stalwarts wallow in their wussiness.
I keep finding myself saying “What in the hell is going on here and why isn’t someone doing something about it?!”
“It” could be any one of at least a dozen different scenarios, too BBH. Like you said, Libya, F&F, &c.
If he’s re-elected and subsequently removed, it wouldn’t be by means prescribed in the Constitution, but rather in the writings of Locke or Burke.
Quite, McGehee.
– Carney can’t keep hiding behind “the investigation”. For one thing, the State dept. and FBI have already been denied access by the Libyans, which I have not a single doubt was exactly what the WH wanted to stall and drag out til after the elections. But they’re being end runned by others going directly to Issa, so that’s not going to save their sick asses. (see followup post).
And Obama and Hillary had the audacity to STAND IN FRONT OF THEIR CASKETS and blame this on a video…
This. I’d love to see a few PACs run some adverts using the Obama/Clinton
campaign appearancephoto opapology toursolemn speech, playing Secretary Clinton’s words:…and close with a steely cold voiceover:
And then have your spokecritters prepped and ready to claw the eyes out of the sycophants when they try to criticize you for politicizing the dead. Perhaps by asking them why they weren’t asking that exact damn question when the event in question was going on.
Proportional response is for losers.
??? I saw that the Libyans cleared the FBI team two weeks ago.
Going back to my opinion on Romney six months ago, I wonder if we wouldn’t be better off if Obama won and the TEA party types sweep congress.
Obama would look like the problem when he refuses to sign anything from Congress, he would get the blame if government shut down, and there would be some real oversight in government.
I worry Romney will dither-dather around and end up being the scapegoat (along with “conservatism”) for the impeding collapse that will only be diverted by bold, principled action.
Not that advocating for Obama votes. I’m just saying if that’s what happens, it may not be the end game.
Of course, there is the whole foreign policy/SCJ appointments thing.
Na, never mind. We damn well better vote for Romney.
there is the whole foreign policy/SCJ appointments thing
That’s the prize to keep our eyes on right there. I can deal with a President Romney for four years or eight as long as we get our foreign policy in order and elect some non-communist Justices.
I really, really want Romney to go for the jugular in the debates. Fuck the press and all their pearl-clutching about him “attacking” the prezzident. No matter what he (Romney) says or does it will be wrong wrong wrong and disrespectful and raaaaaaaaacist. So, go for it Mitt. Call him a lying pussy who let our border patrol agents get killed and blew off the death of an Ambassador. What has he got to lose?
White House Has No Comment on House GOPers’ Assertions that Libyan Mission Requested Security Prior to 9/11/12 Attack
Bret Stephens’ column in the WSJ notes several moments as the Libya attack was unfolding where Obama and his team chose to sit tight and not intervene:
“The hour is 5 p.m., Sept. 11, Washington time….The U.S. diplomatic mission in Benghazi has been under assault for roughly 90 minutes. Some 30 U.S. citizens are at mortal risk. The whereabouts of Ambassador Stevens are unknown….
“There was no serious consideration at that hour of intervention with military force, officials said. Doing so without Libya’s permission could represent a violation of sovereignty and inflame the situation, they said. Instead, the State Department reached out to the Libyan government to get reinforcements to the scene….
Some officials said the U.S. could also have sent aircraft to the scene as a ‘show of force’ to scare off the attackers…State Department officials dismissed the suggestions as unrealistic. ‘They would not have gotten there in two hours, four hours or six hours.'”…The U.S. security detail only left Washington at 8 a.m. on Sept. 12, more than 10 hours after the attacks began. A commercial jet liner can fly from D.C. to Benghazi in about the same time. ”
Do we really want a president who tales 19 hrs to approve an attack on Bin Laden, and who waits 15 hours to take action when a US consulate is under attack?
http://tinyurl.com/9323ntx
– Don’t know about the start of things, but I could have sworn I saw an account on Drudge in the last couple of days where they had been denied access and the WH was pretending to be dismayed. I also saw a brief post on Drudge mentioning that Stevenson’s mother and family were pissed because they can’t get any answers out of the WH beyond we’re so sorry for your loss bs.
– We’ve still got 5 weeks til the elections and I’d bet you’re going to see some more chickens coming home to roost in several areas.
Yes!
-Ahmadinnerjacket
Yeth!1!!
-Occupy Wall Street
“you’re going to see some more chickens coming home to roost in several areas.”
“It’s a bombshell video that you will only see tonight on ‘Hannity,’ and it’s one that could dramatically impact the race for the White House”.
Yes!
-Democrat Senators For Not Taking Responsibility®
[…] UPDATE II: Jeff Goldstein at Protein Wisdom provides excerpts of the letter from the House Oversight Committee …: […]
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