Benghazi Hearings Cancelled After Clinton Drops Out of Race

[JeffreyS]

[spuwho]

If you truly believe this graphic........

[avonjax]

Sorry but the graphic is accurate.

[avonjax]

Don't forget Kevin McCarthy admitted on the Sean Hannity show that the Benghazi Hearings are completely politically motivated to wreck Hillary's campaign. It is so refreshing to watch these idiots step in their own poop. I want my tax money back. Cash or credit. No Checks!

[SunKing]

Its inaccurate in that it fails to mention that a US Ambassador was killed during the current administration.  It is inaccurate in that there were 5 attacks on US embassies not 2 during the current administration.  Please tell us when 254 marines were killed during an Embassy attack.  That graphic is a joke.

Spin?

[finehoe]

Spin?

Not at all:

http://www.ibtimes.com/us-embassy-attacks-and-bombings-recent-history-782665

[fsquid]

The problem with this from the beginning has been that the administration's sole objective has been to circle the wagons and sell the idea that nobody screwed up, while the republicans' sole objective has been to prove that the person who screwed up was Hillary Clinton. I think both may be wrong.  Somebody, or a number of people, clearly screwed up and screwed up very badly. Things like this don't happen without major screw-ups.

There was, for example, the investigation that concluded that there had been "no intel failures." That's simply and clearly a lie. Things like this don't happen without intel failures. Furthermore, the whole video sidetrack was either an intel failure (intel got it wrong) or a deliberate and intentional lie (intel got it right, but politics dictated that a different spin be put on things, at least temporarily). I don't know which is the case. But I do know that one or the other is true. That's the only way you can get to that result.

I think republicans are so intent on pinning this on Hillary that they are ignoring what are surely obvious signs that should be followed up in order to determine who is really to blame. If it doesn't point to Hillary, republicans are not interested in checking it out. And democrats are perfectly willing to let them run down all those rabbit trails, because that lets them perpetuate the lie that nobody screwed the pooch on this one.

[finehoe]

Finehoe, you're fooling yourself if you think both parties aren't corrupt, bought and sold.

I've never said otherwise; clearly both parties are more interested in carrying water for their wealthy patrons than they are in the average citizen.  The problem is that the Republicans are several magnitudes more corrupt, bought and sold than the Democrats are.  It's intellectually lazy to mindless repeat "both parties are the same", "there's no difference in the parties", "they are equally to blame" when anyone who has paid the least bit of attention over the last twenty years knows that isn't the case.

[finehoe]

If this were one of Trey Gowdy's murder prosecutions, it would be declared a mistrial.

For 17 months, the former prosecutor who leads the House Benghazi committee has labored to give the appearance of diligence and impartiality. But, in an inexplicable and ruinous outbreak of honesty in recent weeks, the thing is unraveling just in time for Gowdy's moment in the spotlight: Hillary Clinton's testimony Thursday.
Dana Milbank writes about political theater in the nation's capital. He joined the Post as a political reporter in 2000.

First came House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy's admission that the committee was empaneled for the purpose of hurting Clinton's poll numbers.

This was followed by Rep. Richard Hanna, a New York Republican, voicing his view that "there was a big part of this investigation that was designed to go after people and an individual, Hillary Clinton."

Then there was Bradley Podliska, an Air Force Reserve intelligence officer and a self-described conservative, who was fired as a Republican staffer on the committee – in part, he said, because he resisted pressure to focus on Clinton. Podliska called it "a partisan investigation" with a "hyper-focus on Hillary Clinton." He said the "victims' families are not going to get the truth."

Prosecutor Gowdy is most displeased. "I have told my own Republican colleagues and friends: Shut up talking about things that you don't know anything about," he said on CBS's Face the Nation Sunday. "And unless you're on the committee, you have no idea what we've done."

But it appears some on the committee, more than $4.5 million into the investigation, have no idea what they're doing, either. Various Keystone-Cops moments performed by the committee have Gowdy looking less like Jack McCoy and more like Jacques Clouseau as he goes after the likely Democratic presidential nominee.

Gowdy this month made the sensational allegation that one of the emails on Clinton's private server contained the name of a CIA source, "some of the most protected information in our intelligence community." But the CIA said the name to which Gowdy referred was not classified. The State Department asked that the name be redacted – not for security reasons but for the individual's privacy. Gowdy, completing the comedy of errors, then released the email publicly on Sunday with the person's name – apparently unaware that the State Department had failed to redact it.

As that mess was being cleaned up, Gowdy was dealing with another, courtesy of my Washington Post colleague Mike DeBonis. Gowdy has spoken piously about keeping his investigation above politics and about refusing to raise money from it. But DeBonis reported that Gowdy's campaign had returned three donations after the Post inquired about the money's ties to a political action committee that ran an incendiary ad during last week's Democratic presidential debate. Three $2,000 contributions had been made to Gowdy by groups affiliated with the treasurer of Stop Hillary PAC. Stop Hillary PAC had spent $10,000 on robocalls last month to boost Gowdy in his district, and its treasurer had been involved with Gowdy's former leadership PAC.

Perhaps alcohol is to blame for the clumsy pursuit of Clinton. Podliska told the New York Times that committee members had started a "Wine Wednesdays" club and drank out of glasses imprinted with the words "Glacial Pace," a reference to complaints about the leisurely investigation from Rep. Elijah Cummings (Md.), the panel's top Democrat. GOP staffers also formed a gun-buying club. The slow pace leaves the strong impression that the panel is trying to extend its probe as far as possible into the 2016 election cycle.

The ham-handed targeting of Clinton predates the Gowdy panel. Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.), who led an earlier Benghazi investigation, suggested, falsely, that Clinton had issued a "stand-down" order to block a military response the night of the Benghazi attack. Issa also alleged, falsely, that Clinton personally authorized security reductions in Libya with her "signature" on a cable.

The contretemps have continued under Gowdy. The chairman claimed that he had "zero interest" in the Clinton Foundation and hadn't issued a subpoena related to it or interviewed a "single person" about it other than the staffer who set up Clinton's private email server. But Gowdy had armed marshals serve a subpoena at the home of Clinton adviser Sidney Blumenthal, and Gowdy and others asked Blumenthal numerous questions about the foundation.

Could such a skilled prosecutor and his experienced staff really be so hapless? Or are the mistakes more purposeful? Consider the damaging New York Times story this summer that initially reported, incorrectly, that federal inspectors general had requested a "criminal investigation" into whether Clinton "mishandled sensitive government information."

The "senior government officials" responsible for the two false allegations were anonymous. But there are some likely suspects.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/the-house-benghazi-committee-unravels/2015/10/20/ad6101c4-7763-11e5-a958-d889faf561dc_story.html

[Tacachale]

The problem with this from the beginning has been that the administration's sole objective has been to circle the wagons and sell the idea that nobody screwed up, while the republicans' sole objective has been to prove that the person who screwed up was Hillary Clinton. I think both may be wrong.  Somebody, or a number of people, clearly screwed up and screwed up very badly. Things like this don't happen without major screw-ups.

There was, for example, the investigation that concluded that there had been "no intel failures." That's simply and clearly a lie. Things like this don't happen without intel failures. Furthermore, the whole video sidetrack was either an intel failure (intel got it wrong) or a deliberate and intentional lie (intel got it right, but politics dictated that a different spin be put on things, at least temporarily). I don't know which is the case. But I do know that one or the other is true. That's the only way you can get to that result.

I think republicans are so intent on pinning this on Hillary that they are ignoring what are surely obvious signs that should be followed up in order to determine who is really to blame. If it doesn't point to Hillary, republicans are not interested in checking it out. And democrats are perfectly willing to let them run down all those rabbit trails, because that lets them perpetuate the lie that nobody screwed the pooch on this one.

Yeah, pretty much.

[coredumped]

Finehoe, you're fooling yourself if you think both parties aren't corrupt, bought and sold.

I've never said otherwise; clearly both parties are more interested in carrying water for their wealthy patrons than they are in the average citizen.  The problem is that the Republicans are several magnitudes more corrupt, bought and sold than the Democrats are.  It's intellectually lazy to mindless repeat "both parties are the same", "there's no difference in the parties", "they are equally to blame" when anyone who has paid the least bit of attention over the last twenty years knows that isn't the case.

I'll thank you for questioning my lazy intellect, but please tell me how the parties are different?
Obama, the nobel peace prize winning president, has more blood on his hands than Bush, after he said he would end the war, like all democrats.
Republicans tout how they'll cut spending, yet they keep expanding the government (Homeland security thanks to Bush).

So please, tell me the difference in corruption, and how the democrats are so much better? Better for whom? The poor? The minorities? Corrine has been in her district what seems like a lifetime, how has she really helped the poor there? Have their lives improved, or are they still on welfare?

You can wave your democrat flag all you want, but you've got blinders on to think they're any good, or have done any good.

[finehoe]

[You can wave your democrat flag all you want, but you've got blinders on to think they're any good, or have done any good.

Again, it's not how 'good' the Democrats are, but how bad the Republicans are.

How many wars did the D's start under false pretenses?
How many torture regimes have the D's instituted?
Which minority groups have the D's demonized like the R's have done with gays?
How many Terri Schiavo's have the D's exploited?
How many times have the D's threatened to default on the USA's obligations over faked videos?

That's just off the top of my head, the list goes on and on.

[Adam White]

Its inaccurate in that it fails to mention that a US Ambassador was killed during the current administration.  It is inaccurate in that there were 5 attacks on US embassies not 2 during the current administration.  Please tell us when 254 marines were killed during an Embassy attack.  That graphic is a joke.

Spin?

I don't think the graphic necessarily states 254 Marines were killed in an embassy attack. It states that 254 Marines were killed whilst Reagan was in power. But it can be confusing, given how the info is presented. Whether that is deliberate or just lazy is up for debate.

I think embassy or not, you'd be hard-pressed to say that 254 Marines killed at once was anything less than an intelligence failure by the US gov't. Certainly so if Benghazi was.

[finehoe]

I think republicans are so intent on pinning this on Hillary that they are ignoring what are surely obvious signs that should be followed up in order to determine who is really to blame. If it doesn't point to Hillary, republicans are not interested in checking it out.

No shit.  And it's ridiculous that Republicans' have the gall to hold Hillary Clinton personally responsible for the deaths of four Americans in in a remote building in war-torn North Africa, 400 miles from the capital of that country, while ignoring a concerted, highly coordinated attack using our commercial airliners and our training, in order to give George W. Bush a pass.

[coredumped]

and lets talk about the scale of lying about torture that went all the way up to the Vice President

Torture is wrong, no doubt. But we know republicans love war. The democrats run on "peace, love and ponies" yet Obama is droning the crap out of everyone, including doctors without borders...oh, and he also drones American citizens. So much for that pesky constitution and fair trial business.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/worldviews/wp/2015/04/23/the-u-s-keeps-killing-americans-in-drone-strikes-mostly-by-accident/

So yes, both parties suck, and are evil, and don't give a damn about you. But if placing a checkbox next to "D" regardless of who is running, by all means continue to do so...it's going so well now.