I take responsibility. I’m in charge of the State Department’s 60,000-plus people all over the world, 275 posts. … I take this very personally. So we’re going to get to the bottom of it, and then we’re going to do everything we can to work to prevent it from happening again. – Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, 2012 Benghazi attacks Statement, Wikipedia, “2012 Benghazi attack”
WASHINGTON, D.C. – The pro and con of Hillary Rodham Clinton’s public testimony before the U.S. House of Representatives Select Committee on Benghazi runs the gambit.
For every, lets say, one article that’s con there’s five that’s pro. So then there’s that.
Here’s the thing: Mrs. Clinton’s PUBLIC testimony yesterday was helpful, with emphasis on the word PUBLIC and helpful.
And it was helpful because we learned about a man named Sidney Stone Blumenthal.
Mr. Blumenthal, apparently, is a long-time friend and confidant of Bill and Hillary Clinton, working for both of them for many years. Apparently in the run-up to, during, and after the Benghazi attack in September of 2012 Mr. Blumenthal had regular contact with the former Secretary, even after then White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emmanuel and President Obama himself told her not to, in fact, and when she was tapped to be Secretary of State for Mr. Obama Mr. Blumenthal was effectively barred from being hired to work for the Obama Administration during the president’s first term in office.
And we also learned that Mr. Blumenthal had significant ‘business interests in the North African region, and stand to gain a great deal financially had the country gotten thrown off into civil war through various defense contracts’ According to a report from the International Business Times.
Rep. Trey Gowdy of South Carolina claims there was a financial stake for Blumenthal in Libya as he pressed for Clinton to intervene.
“Blumenthal was not merely acting as a steward of information to Secretary Clinton but was acting as her de facto political adviser,” Gowdy said in a blistering letter to Rep. Elijah Cummings of Maryland, the Benghazi panel’s top Democrat. “While Blumenthal, an old friend of Clinton’s, admittedly knew little about Libya and had not ever been to Libya, Clinton seemingly read every one of his emails on the topic that began appearing out of nowhere in February 2011.”
Gowdy writes that Blumenthal maintained a frequent dialogue with Clinton about U.S. policy in the country — nearly half of the emails Clinton received regarding Benghazi and Libya prior to the attacks involved him. Blumenthal, who served as a former White House aide to her husband, was not employed in any official capacity at the time of their correspondence.
Even though Blumenthal tried to tip Clinton’s hand on the matter, he admittedly was not an expert in Libyan affairs and never traveled to the country. Gowdy also claims Blumenthal knew that a Libyan intervention “does not contain much political benefit, and offers alternative ways to sell the American public on why the country is involved.”
In the section of the memo titled “Blumenthal’s motivation revealed — money,” Gowdy delves deeper into their relationship.
“Beyond the pure politics that were occurring at this time, perhaps more disturbing is that at the same time Blumenthal was pushing Secretary Clinton to war in Libya, he was privately pushing a business interest of his own in Libya that stood to profit from contracts with the new Libyan government — a government that would exist only after a successful U.S. intervention in Libya that deposed Gaddafi,” Gowdy wrote, referring to former Libyan leader Moammar Gaddafi. – Taken from [The] International Business Times, “Hillary Clinton adviser Sidney Blumenthal had Financial Stake in Libya” By Jackie Salo 10/08/2015
We also learned, by mention, a little more about the C.I.A.’s “annex,” in Benghazi, Libya where two of the four Americans, Glen Doherty and Tyrone Woods, lost their lives on the day of the attacks.
Although Republicans and Democrats on the Committee fell woefully short to discuss more broadly and openly about the annex with Mrs. Clinton and the C.I.A.’s role and reasoning for being there in the first place – something the ‘hero’ David Petraeus the former Director of the C.I.A. needs to openly discuss – Mr. Clinton offered only that, “the State Department made use of the C.I.A.’s security [services] in order to help protect our diplomats in Benghazi…”
The Wall Street Journal said the consulate was being used as a CIA operation, adding that of the 30 American officials evacuated from Benghazi following the assault, just seven worked for the State Department. … In a break from tradition, it said CIA Director David Petraeus did not attend the ceremony when the coffins arrived back on American soil in order to conceal the CIA operation in eastern Libya.
It said the nearly two dozen CIA operatives secretly worked out of a separate building known as the “annex,” where officials at the consulate had retreated following the initial attack before coming under fire again. … The operation, which hit the ground shortly after the start of the February 2011 revolt that overthrew Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi, was aimed at counter-terrorism and securing heavy weapons held by the embattled regime.
The Journal suggested that the security lapse may have been due to miscommunication between the CIA and the State Department, with the latter assuming the annex security team was a sufficient backup for its own guards. ..The day after the attack, the CIA sent Libyan security officials to the annex to destroy classified documents and sensitive equipment while leaving the charred and ransacked consulate – which by design had contained no classified materials – unattended, The Journal said. – Taken from The U.K. Telegraph, “[The] CIA confirms a role in US consulate attack in Benghazi, [Libya]…” Author Unknown, 11/02/12
In what can only be described as an almost put it out there moment, the select committee did discuss the C.I.A Annex and the albeit reasoning for the U.S. having a presence there in the first place. [With Mrs. Clinton limiting her answers, and merely listening when the Republican controlled committee members weighed in.] But what is coming clear is that the reason the C.I.A was, is, and always will be in Libya is to cause a civil war, through long-time friend and Clinton aide Huma Abedin Weiner’s connections to the Muslim Brotherhood and the Council on American Islamic Relations (C.A.I.R.) – Abedin Weiner having close family connections to both organizations.
Clearly there is a problem here. And even though the more progressive wing of our American Democracy would love for this to all be swept under the rug. This issue, this scandal is far from over.
In Response: So what then should be done, you may be asking?
Well. In my humble opinion several things need to happen. Mrs. Clinton needs to be told in no uncertain terms by this Select Committee that more testimony from her is needed, and not to wonder to far from American soil.
The ‘hero’ and the TRAITOR Gen. David H. Petraeus, U.S. Army – Retd. and former Director of the Central Intelligence Agency during the first term of the Obama Administration ,when this attack occurred, from the Spring of 2011 until the Fall of 2012 should be compelled to testify before this committee, OPENLY.
And he needs to tell-all without fail or reservation of the C.I.A’s role, place and purpose – still to this day – in Benghazi, Libya starting with the attack in September of 2012, the writing of Susan Rice’s “talking points,” for all the Sunday shows she went on, and why, “Libyan forces” were sent to the C.I.A “Annex” the very next day to destroy classified documents, materials and equipment that had not been destroyed, initially, in the attack(s) that day?
THEN he needs to reveal what, if any, classified information in relation to the attacks he revealed to his then-lover Paula Broadwell. And I really think that Ms. Broadwell herself should be subpoenaed to testify before the U.S. Senate’s Select Committee on Intelligence and the Judiciary Committee as well to tell her role in all this. What she knew and when she knew it.
Clearly both Petraeus and Broadwell broke the law. His deal with the U.S. Justice Department be damned. You cannot knowingly or even unknowingly reveal secrets or betray U.S. Interests, Sovereignty or Purpose for the sake of doing so. IF you do you are guilty of crimes in relation to something called The Espionage Act of 1917 or Title 18, Sub-Section 792 of the United States Code and Statute Book.
An Act to punish acts of interference with the foreign relations, and the foreign commerce of the United States, to punish espionage, and better to enforce the criminal laws of the United States, and for other purposes. – Taken from the Wikipedia Paged titled, “[The] Espionage Act of 1917”
This is the same act, by the way, that folks like Mr. Eugene V. Debs, Julius and Ethel Rosenberg, and famed “Pentagon papers,” whistle-blower Mr. Daniel Ellsberg – who, incidentally, was the only American ever to be tried, but never convicted under the Act because of a technicalities in relation to the prosecution’s case against him in the Spring of 1973 by Judge William M. Bryne, Jr.
So that’s 1A and 1B of this Benghazi story. 2A and 2B of this story needs to be the FACT that both Sidney Blumenthal and Huma Abedin Weiner need to be compelled to come back and testify OPENLY before this committee as well.
They need to be asked WHY they involved [The Society of the] Muslim Brotherhood and the [The] Council on American-Islamic Relation or C.A.I.R in International U.S. Affairs (centering around our whole involvement in the Northern most portion of Africa) as it relates to and is defined by the Espionage Act of 1917.
And Mrs. Clinton should testify right along with them in addition to her own return(s) to the Committee as well. After all, it’s only fair because she is associated with these two people. And they both have working and real-time knowledge of the situation in Libya.
IF Julius and Ethel Rosenberg can be convicted on even the appearance of impropriety and summarily electrocuted thereafter so to can Mrs. Clinton, Huma Abedin Weiner, Sidney Blumenthal, and David Petraeus [with a side note to Paula Broadwell being done the same].
“This death sentence is not surprising. It had to be. There had to be a Rosenberg case, because there had to be an intensification of the hysteria in America to make the Korean War acceptable to the American people. There had to be hysteria and a fear sent through America in order to get increased war budgets. And there had to be a dagger thrust in the heart of the left to tell them that you are no longer gonna get five years for a Smith Act prosecution or one year for contempt of court, but we’re gonna kill ya!” – Julius Rosenberg commenting on he and his wife’s trial and subsequent conviction in March of 1951, Wikipedia, “Julius and Ethel Rosenberg, Trial and conviction section”
That’s 2A and 2B of this story. NOW for 3A and 3B of this story.
I think that the former Secretary of Defense for the Obama Administration during the Benghazi attacks, Leon Panetta, needs to be compelled to testify, PUBLICLY, before this select committee as well. Asked to dispel the subsequent “rumors and conspiracy theories,” surrounding the U.S. Military’s role, under his command and control on behalf of the President, in the Benghazi attacks. As well as the attacks on the U.S. Embassy in Tripoli in those fateful days in September of 2012.
The who knew what, when needs to be asked and answered thoroughly. If there is no there, there then Mr. Panetta should good and well be able to make short shrift of the conspiracy theories, rumors, and innuendo surrounding the U.S. Military and the Benghazi attacks.
Finally. Our outgoing Commander and Chief need to come before the committee; willingly, voluntarily and without cause or reservation to give an accounting of his role and deliberations in the Benghazi attacks.
What was he doing? Where was he on the night he learned of the attacks? And what did he do or not do to try to stop or prevent the attacks (Benghazi and Tripoli), altogether, in the run-up to that day in September of 2012.
I mean we know he was weeks out to his last term in office – having been more concerned with winning reelection rather than governance in concern of this incident – BUT we don’t know whether it is true or untrue that he went to bed at 3 a.m. est that night instead of going to the Situation Room in the basement of the White House for a classified briefing??? We do not know.
“I take responsibility. I’m in charge of the State Department’s 60,000-plus people all over the world, 275 posts. … I take this very personally. So we’re going to get to the bottom of it, and then we’re going to do everything we can to work to prevent it from happening again. … In the wake of an attack like this, in the fog of war, there’s always going to be confusion. And I think it is absolutely fair to say that everyone had the same intelligence. Everyone who spoke tried to give the information that they had. As time has gone on, that information has changed. We’ve gotten more detail, but that’s not surprising. That always happens.” – former Secretary of State Clinton’s statement(s) in the wake of the Benghazi attacks in 2011 and 2012, Wikipedia page titled, “Hillary Rodham Clinton’s Tenure as Secretary of State; Regional issues and travels: 2012”
Subsequently…
On January 23, 2013, during testimony at a Senate hearing on Benghazi, Clinton engaged in a heated exchange with Senator Ron Johnson. When Johnson pressed her to explain why, in the immediate aftermath, no one from the State Department had asked American evacuees if there had been a protest before the attack, Clinton replied:
With all due respect, the fact is, we had four dead Americans! Was it because of a protest or was it because of guys out for a walk one night and decided they’d go kill some Americans?! What difference, at this point, does it make?! It is our job to figure out what happened and do everything we can to prevent it from ever happening again, Senator. Now, honestly, I will do my best to answer your questions about this, but the fact is that people were trying in real-time to get to the best information. The [Intelligence Community] has a process, I understand, going with the other committees to explain how these talking points came out. But you know, to be clear, it is, from my perspective, less important today looking backwards as to why these militants decided they did it than to find them and bring them to justice, and then maybe we’ll figure out what was going on in the meantime.[207]
In March 2013, Representative Duncan D. Hunter introduced legislation into the 113th Congress to authorize awarding of Congressional Gold Medals to Doherty and Woods for their actions which led to their deaths.[208]
In April 2013, the Pentagon announced the activation of a USMC quick response force for North Africa which would use the range and speed of the Bell Boeing V-22 Osprey to be able to respond to similar events in the future.[209] Spain authorized the basing of the quick response force at Morón Air Base near Seville, for a temporary one-year term.[210]
On May 13, 2013, President Obama stated during a news conference, “The day after it happened, I acknowledged that this was an act of terrorism.” This claim was disputed by Glenn Kessler of the Washington Post in a “Fact Checker” article, which explored at length the difference in meaning between the phrases “act of terror” and “act of terrorism.”[211] In the article, Kessler accused Obama of “revisionist history” for stating he had called the attack an “act of terrorism” when it fact he had used the term “act of terror.”[211][212] – Taken from Wikipedia paged titled, “2012 Benghazi Attack; Aftermath…”
And while Mrs. Clinton’s testimony yesterday was long, and often, it seemed, unending it was helpful, shedding that much more light on this issue.
Now. There are those who will say well Republicans have done little in the way of defense of our embassy’s, consulates and outposts around the world in the wake of the attacks in Benghazi making political hay “out of an otherwise tragic event”. True to a fault.
When Democrats ran the show up on Capitol Hill Ronald Reagan got away with Iran-Contra, and the U.S. Embassy and Marine Barracks bombings in Beirut, Lebanon in 1983 before that.
You can even make the argument that Bill Clinton got away with no accounting for the Oklahoma City bombing in 1995, and before that the first World Trade Center bombing in 1993.
Absolutely no accountability or firm review has ever been conducted or concluded by the Congress of the United States of America, since the Watergate hearings in the 1970’s and the Church Committee (Hearings) in 1975!
You say well Rhett, what about the Accountability Review Board or A.R.B Report and all the subsequent investigations and hearings before the Select Committee on Benghazi was ever formed? True to a fault again. Because politicians, pollsters, pundits and the like have decried, “accountability, no accountability, monumental waste of time, not a monumental waste of time” since. And little else has been done, as you well know, until now, maybe?
Because The Select Committee on Benghazi has a real chance, a real opportunity to go down in the annuals of history as either a success or a failure when it comes to getting to “the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth,” as the Committee’s Ranking Member Elijah Cummings, D-MD said in his opening statement yesterday.
On a Personal Note: I don’t buy nor do I trust the words, deeds, and actions of Hillary Clinton and her nefarious crew. Further I think that they all should hang for their high crimes and misdemeanors against the People of the United States of America. Period. Full stop.
But it’s not up to me to decide their fate, their fate rest in the hands of this Select Committee – for good or for ill – as it should. Determining, rightly or wrongly, whether or not Mrs. Clinton and those with whom she is associated with are culpable in this fiasco?
A fiasco that cost the lives of four brave American patriots who gave their last full measure of devotion.
In my estimation such should haunt Mrs. Rodham Clinton until her last breath on this earth, and it should unsettle the nerve of President Obama until he himself “slips the surly bonds of earth to see and touch the face of God”.
No American man, woman or child of age and stripe should die, needlessly, for the sake of business deals or our way of life – rightly or wrongly. Not now, not ever.
Now go and do your worst or your best Benghazi Select Committee, the names and fates of four Americans rest in your hands.
#LetUsPray
–Rhett E. Column
#SayWhatNews Approved!
Say What News?! 