They keep finding these deleted emails that are anything but wedding plans or yoga routines, in spite of Hillary testifying under oath that she turned over all work-related emails in 2014. As I read somewhere, they find damning emails, but they never find that any laws have been broken. This is what it means to be Clinton:
The State Department says about 30 emails involving the 2012 attack on U.S. compounds in Benghazi, Libya, are among the thousands of Hillary Clinton emails recovered during the FBI’s recently closed investigation into her use of a private server.
Government lawyers told U.S. District Court Judge Amit P. Mehta Tuesday that an undetermined number of the emails among the 30 were not included in the 55,000 pages previously provided by Clinton to the State Department. The agency said it would need until the end of September to review the emails and redact potentially classified information before they are released.
The hearing was held in one of several lawsuits filed by the conservative legal group Judicial Watch, which has sued over access to government records involving the Democratic presidential nominee.
U/I MAN: …I did eight years of active duty service, two tours in Iraq. From a platoon of thirty-one, I had seven that were killed, six wounded beyond return, we got hit hard. And I know there’s a lot of military… probably people in crowd with military service members… I’m anxious to get to the VA, I’m not sure so I wanted to…
CLINTON: I am.
U/I MAN: Hopefully, you can get to it, but I know that we’ve had…
CLINTON: I’m not talking about the VA…
U/I MAN: But we have loved ones that we want to hear about and we care about, and I’ve met with many of these Gold Stars parents and families so I’ve…
CLINTON: Are you done with your speech?
U/I MAN: I’ve seen them mourn, and the thing is we had four lives in Benghazi that were killed and your wife tried to cover it up. Going over those lives, those four lives, those four American lives, if someone lost their son, their grandchild, their brother…
CLINTON: Are you a Marine?
U/I MAN: Let me talk. Yes, I was a Marine. I was in an infantry unit out in California, I was a Marine drill instructor out here at Parris Island…
CLINTON: Are you finished, sarge…
U/I MAN: I think that every recruit, regardless of race, religion, color, okay…
CLINTON: Okay, now can I answer?
DEMOCRAT MOB NOISES
CLINTON: Okay, now can I answer?
DEMOCRAT MOB NOISES
CLINTON: I heard your speech. I heard your speech. Now listen to me.
DEMOCRAT MOB NOISES
CLINTON: I’m not your commander-in-chief anymore but if I were I’d tell you to be more polite and sit down.
DEMOCRAT MOB NOISES
U/I MAN: I won’t take it. I will just raise my voice.
DEMOCRAT MOB NOISES. SECURITY TAKES U/I MAN BY ARM.
U/I MAN: I’m a citizen. But the bottom line is that (unintelligble).
CLINTON: Don’t throw him out. I you shut up and listen to my answer I’ll answer you.
U/I MAN IS EJECTED
CLINTON: Can I tell you something. That is what is wrong. His mind has been poisoned by lies and he won’t listen.
According to Clinton, the problem isn’t that Hillary Clinton lied to the surviving families of 4 Americans killed in Benghazi when she blamed their deaths on an internet video. No, that’s not what’s wrong. What’s really wrong is that only a poisoned mind would disbelieve and challenge the narrative that the White House and Hillary Clinton’s State Dept. have pushed since Day One. But sadly, that “poisoned mind” is unable to get the help needed to be free from such contamination because the VA under the Obama administration is in such disarray that the afflicted might actually die waiting to get the help he so desperately needs!
Red State also provides the transcript of the female protester who continued the confrontation after the former Marine was ejected. She too was thrown out of the assembly:
U/I WOMAN: Hillary lied over four coffins. Four coffins. So all the families are liars? Are they liars? I want to know, I want to know.
CLINTON: Give me a chance, lady.
U/I WOMAN: Well answer. Did she lie? Did she lie?
CLINTON: No.
U/I WOMAN: She didn’t lie? The families are lying?
CLINTON: Will you listen to me?
DEMOCRAT MOB NOISES
CLINTON: Are you going to listen to my answer?
U/I WOMAN: I am.
CLINTON: Are you afraid?
U/I WOMAN: No, I’m not afraid because I know you’re going to lie.
DEMOCRAT MOB NOISES
SECURITY TAKES U/I WOMAN BY ARM.
U/I WOMAN: She lied over four coffins. Over our military men.
DEMOCRAT MOB NOISES. U/I WOMAN EJECTED.
Just like his wife, Clinton accuses the surviving family members of of lying.
And then, oddly, the former president wants to know if the challenger is afraid. What, does he believe she can’t handle the truth? The Clinton truth??
On a side note, I read where Bill Clinton appeared surprised at being confronted about Benghazi. Surely the campaign realizes that this issue is one of Hillary’s biggest vulnerabilities given that this particular scandal, more than the others, pulls at the emotional heartstrings of an America sympathetic to four families having been shamefully lied to over the caskets holding their loved ones. If this is how the campaign handles a Benghazi confrontation at a rally, how on earth will the presumptive nominee handle a direct confrontation and challenge about it during a debate with the GOP nominee? Assuming, of course, that the GOP nominee will go at her full-throttle about Benghazi.
While Bill and Hill may believe that 11 hours of testimony equals a case closed, a lot of Americans strenuously disagree.
Evidence suggests that the security failures at Benghazi likely went straight to the top — meaning, very possibly, Hillary Clinton herself:
The decision to keep U.S. personnel in Benghazi with substandard security was made at the highest levels of the State Department by officials who have so far escaped blame over the Sept. 11 attack, according to a review of recent congressional testimony and internal State Department memos by Fox News.
Nine months before the assault that killed Ambassador Chris Stevens and three others, State Department Under Secretary Patrick Kennedy signed off on an internal memo that green-lighted the Benghazi operation.
The December 2011 memo from Jeffrey Feltman — then-Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs (NEA) — pledged “to rapidly implement a series of corrective security measures.” However, no substantial improvements were made, according to congressional testimony to the House oversight committee from Regional Security Officer Eric Nordstrom.
The essence of the story is that Hillary had a goal of establishing a permanent presence in Benghazi — something completely unknown to Thomas Pickering of the inappropriately named “Accountability Review Board,” which held nobody accountable, conducted an insufficient review (not even interviewing Clinton), and which I suspect may not have even been a “board.” (What with the dishonesty of the first two words of this thing’s title, why would we believe the third is truthful?!)
You see, a permanent consulate is required by law to have certain security standards. Posterior-covering talking points in panicked emails after the slaughter warned not to refer to Benghazi as a “consultate,” presumably so that nobody would point out the inconvenient discrepancy between legal security requirements for consulates and the lack of security for this, er, “mission” or “diplomatic post.”
But the lack of security deeply troubled one State Department official:
Nordstrom repeatedly expressed his deep security concerns and noted Benghazi was still “undefined” in emails with his superiors seven months before the attacks.
In February 2012, he wrote that “while the status of Benghazi remains undefined, DS (Diplomatic Security) is hesitant to dev[ote] resources and as I indicated previously, this has severely hampered operations in Benghazi.”
He said that he “only had two DS agents on the ground. … and been advised that DS isn’t going to provide more than 3 DS agents over the long term.”
The connection to Hillary lies not merely in her ambitions to make Benghazi a Consulate that Shall Not Be Called a Consulate, but also in the level of approval that would have been needed to maintain the consulate without sufficient security. The Mustache himself says Hillary’s involvement was likely:
While other media reports have made passing references to the action memo signed by Kennedy and Feltman in the context of ongoing security issues, former State Department officials tell Fox News that the document is significant because Kennedy would not set policy on his own. Kennedy was ultimately responsible for overseas building operations deals with building leases and security, which should have followed strict OSPB standards.
“I find it very hard to believe that he (Kennedy) would sign this memo without having talked to Secretary Clinton or at least Deputy Secretary (William) Burns,” former ambassador to the U.N. John Bolton told Fox News after examining the December 2011 memo.
“Keeping this position open in Benghazi is a policy decision. It’s a policy decision that overrides normal security considerations. And I think that’s significant enough that a careerist like Undersecretary Kennedy would not do it on his own.”
Cue the Outrage Trump Card.
WHAT DIFFERENCE, AT THIS POINT, DOES IT MAKE?!?!?!
Remember when Hillary Clinton breezily told us this:
From one of the thousand of emails recovered by the FBI, we learn today that on at least one occasion, not only did Hillary Clinton send classified information to her daughter, Chelsea Clinton, but she also deleted the email in an effort to cover her tracks. One might reasonably assume that as a private citizen and non-government employee, Chelsea Clinton has never had a security clearance that would allow her to be privy to governmental classified emails:
The Dec. 20, 2009 email chain, entitled “Update,” started with a message from Michael Froman, who served as a deputy assistant to President Obama and deputy national security adviser for international economic affairs.
The email, which is redacted because it contains information classified as “Confidential,” was sent to Jake Sullivan, Clinton’s foreign policy adivser at the State Department, and several Obama aides. Sullivan sent it to Hillary Clinton who then forwarded it to Chelsea, who emailed under the pseudonym “Diane Reynolds.
All of the text in the body portion of the classified emails is redacted because it contains foreign government information.
The State Department labeled the email a “near dupilcate,” indicating that it was mostly similar to other emails that the agency has released from the trove of emails that Clinton turned over in Dec. 2014.
Clinton did not delete other responses she made to others on the email thread.
There is absolutely no reason to believe that if Hillary Clinton is elected president, Chelsea Clinton, along with Bill Clinton, would not be privy to issues of national security. Three for the price of one!
What do you call it when a fundamentally dishonest individual tenaciously repeats a well known lie because she understands that sooner or later, Americans will become so exhausted from their efforts to refute it, they will just eventually give up, and perhaps even give in? Cynically determined to wear down Americans, or understanding that her loyalists, like Trump’s, believe truth is superfluous, malleable, and/or doesn’t really matter, Hillary Clinton is still peddling her particular brand of the “truth”. And now that she makes an appearance on the Washington Post’s Recidivism Watch – a unique place that “tracks politicians who repeat claims that we have previously found to be incorrect or false,” Americans are once again reminded that Hillary Clinton’s version of the truth is rarely ever that.
“As the FBI said, everything that I’ve said publicly has been consistent and truthful with what I’ve told them.”
As a reminder, this is what Comey said to Congress:
We have no basis to conclude she lied to the FBI.
From the Fact Checker:
Clinton continues to twist this statement by Comey into a line that suggests the FBI declared that her public remarks on the email issues were truthful. But Comey repeatedly refused to confirm that when pressed by lawmakers: “That’s a question I’m not qualified to answer. I can speak about what she said to the FBI.”
When asked specific questions about certain public statements made by Clinton, Comey did not endorse Clinton’s claims. Here’s an exchange between Comey and Rep. Trey Gowdy (R-S.C.), chair of the House Select Committee on Benghazi:
GOWDY: Secretary Clinton said there was nothing marked classified on her emails either sent or received. Was that true?
COMEY: That’s not true.
GOWDY: Secretary Clinton said, “I did not email any classified material to anyone on my email. There is no classified material.” Was that true?
The Benghazi Select Committee released its report this morning. While the New York Times is in full Hillary-defense mode on the front page: “2-Year Panel On Benghazi Ends, Finding No New Fault By Clinton,” Chairman Trey Gowdy gives Americans far more credit for their intelligence:
Now, I simply ask the American people to read this report for themselves, look at the evidence we have collected, and reach their own conclusions. You can read this report in less time than our fellow citizens were taking fire and fighting for their lives on the rooftops and in the streets of Benghazi.
The Weekly Standard provides a look at the supplemental “additional views” report, which lays out the devastating timeline confirming that the “Obama administration knowingly provided the American people a false story about the Benghazi attack, its causes and its consequences”. Who’s surprised? Lies, lies, and more lies:
9/11—Public Statements
Secretary Clinton’s 10:08 p.m. Statement on the Attack in Benghazi:
“I condemn in the strongest terms the attack on our mission in Benghazi today. * * * Some have sought to justify this vicious behavior as a response to inflammatory material posted on the Internet.”
Secretary Clinton’s E-mail to daughter at 11:23 p.m.:
“Two of our officers were killed in Benghazi by an Al Quedalike [sic] group[.]”
9/12—Public Statements
Secretary Clinton’s Remarks on the Deaths of American Personnel in Benghazi, Libya morning of September 12, 2012:
“We are working to determine the precise motivations and methods of those who carried out this assault. Some have sought to justify this vicious behavior, along with the protest that took place at our Embassy in Cairo yesterday, as a response to inflammatory material posted on the internet.”
9/12—Private Statements
Summary of Discussion between Acting Assistant Secretary Beth Jones and Libyan Ambassador Aujali at 9:45 a.m.:
“I told him that the group that conducted the attacks—Ansar Al Sharia—is affiliated with Islamic extremists.”
Jacob Sullivan in e-mail to embassy in Kabul, Afghanistan:
“There was not really violence in Egypt [and] “we are not saying that the violence in Libya erupted ‘over inflammatory videos.'”
Secretary Clinton’s Statements to Egyptian Prime Minister Kandil at 3:04 p.m.:
“We know that the attack in Libya had nothing to do with the film. It was a planned attack – not a protest. . . . Based on the information we saw today we believe the group that claimed responsibility for this was affiliated with al Qaeda.”
Under Secretary Patrick Kennedy to congressional staff briefing:
When asked whether “this [was] an attack under the cover of a protest” Kennedy said, “No the attack was a direct breaching attack.” More to the point, he was then asked whether “we believe [this was] coordinated with [the] Cairo [protests] to which Kennedy responded, “Attack in Cairo was a demonstration. There were no weapons shown or used. A few cans of spray paint.”
9/13—Public Statements
Secretary Clinton’s Morocco Remarks:
“I also want to take a moment to address the video circulating on the Internet that has led to these protests in a number of countries. * * *
To us, to me personally, this video is disgusting and reprehensible. It appears to have a deeply cynical purpose: to denigrate a great religion and to provoke rage. But as I said yesterday, there is no justification, none at all, for responding to this video with violence. * * *
Violence, we believe, has no place in religion and is no way to honor religion. Islam, like other religions, respects the fundamental dignity of human beings, and it is a violation of that fundamental dignity to wage attacks on innocents. As long as there are those who are willing to shed blood and take innocent life in the name of God, the world will never know a true and lasting peace. It is especially wrong for violence to be directed against diplomatic missions. . . .
Stephen Hayes makes two solid points in light of the report:
What makes #Benghazi report so damaging to WH/Clinton, it’s not Gowdy/GOP opinions, it’s WH/State/CIA own documents/emails/testimony.
and,
Key unanswered question in #Benghazi report: Why were assets not deployed even after Obama/Panetta gave orders to send them?
Could it have been the result of yet another moment of fretful indecision?
The report also found that a State official brought up a question about whether Marines should wear civilian clothing instead of their uniforms. Under secretary of State for management Patrick Kennedy told investigators he wanted to ensure that security was enhanced, not hurt by flags on the uniforms of any U.S. military presence.
But, one commander told the committee that as they were readying themselves to deploy they kept having to change in and out of their uniforms four times.
Perhaps her landslide loss this week speaks to voters being weary of her never-ending presence on the national stage and being tired of her yelling at them. Certainly their increasing distrust of her greatly factored into the outcome. Considering everything from Benghazi, to her email scandal, to an FBI investigation, well, any of these would cause a rational person to harbor grave doubts and misgivings about her judgement and trustworthiness.
And then there is her hypocrisy. Consider her close ties to Wall Street. She earned big Wall Street money giving big speeches. Speeches, by the way, whose content she would rather you didn’t know. And no wonder. Pandering is always fraught with danger. You pander to a special interest group one day, the next day you are excoriating them before voters for their mere existence. It’s quite a juggling act, and one that will cost dearly if you are exposed.
Clearly there are a number of reasons why she lost so badly.
I’m guessing that most shocking, and frankly, embarrassing to her is that the iconic feminist of all feminists lost the vote of women.
If you’re the self-proclaimed savior of women who claims to have spent an entire lifetime championing women’s rights and are running on a campaign platform of the same, to lose the vote of your people has to be the biggest blow of all.
But when one considers Hillary’s inability on the campaign trail to successfully address accusations about smearing women who accused her husband of sexual abuse and rape, and enabling his bad behavior toward women, one is not convinced that she has ever been a friend to women.
Further, it’s not wise to try to guilt women into voting for you. While women may like to play the guilt trip on their kids, and even their husbands, they don’t like it being played on them. So trotting out Madeline Albright to threaten women with going to hell if they didn’t vote for Hillary was bound to backfire.
To make matters worse, when Gloria Steinem steps in and makes a profoundly sexist accusation and blames young women’s hormones for not supporting Hillary, it shouldn’t be surprising that those young women get righteously pissed off about being treated in such a condescending manner.
Simply put, Hillary Clinton cannot win by simultaneously campaigning on a platform of feminism and women’s rights, and at the same time, insult the intelligence of the very women she hopes to convince.
To young girls and women across the country, I say: do not let others define you. Do not listen to anyone who says you have to vote a certain way or for a certain candidate because you’re a woman. That is not feminism. Feminism doesn’t shut down conversations or threaten women. It is not about ideology. It is not a weapon to wield against your political opponent. A feminist is a woman who lives the life she chooses and uses all her God-given gifts. And always remember that a leader is not born, but made. Choose leadership.
I have been trying to write a proper review of the new film 13 Hours: The Secret Soldiers of Benghazi, based on the book by Mitchell Zuckoff and screenplay by Chuck Hogan, but have been unable to pull it together. I attribute that to still being overwhelmed by it, as it is quite simply, that fine of a movie. Gripping, harrowing, agonizing, and heroic. It’s all of that and more.
As I sat in the packed theater, I watched the events unfold on screen with a silent dread because I knew I wasn’t just watching a piece of fiction created up by some Hollywood screenwriter, or something based on a true story, but was, in fact, watching the true story of what happened that fateful night in 2012. And I knew how it would end.
Further, knowing how those ultimately responsible for the safety of Ambassador Stevens and the Americans at the CIA compound dodged and lied to the public concerning the attacks, made it that much more difficult to watch.
While the film is not political in the sense that it doesn’t specifically mention Hillary Clinton or President Obama, there are several exchanges between characters that raise the vexing questions we’ve repeatedly asked: Why was there no assistance provided to the team of operators as they tried to save the ambassador and tried to fight off repeated attacks by Al Ansar and Al Qaeda terrorists (and with that, *why was the stand-down order given?)? Why wasn’t there enough security assigned to the ambassador when it was quite obvious his geographical location, and the residence itself, were both extremely unsafe and dangerous? And why were the attacks blamed on a video? The moments were enough to enrage viewers all over again.
Now briefly: the lead characters are superbly brought to life by very skillful actors, especially John Krasinski (Jack Silva) and James Badge Dale (Tyrone ‘Rone’ Woods), who fleshed out their characters so well, both as operators in a very dangerous place and as family men, that as a viewer who already knew the ending, I nonetheless was willing all of them to survive the night so they could make it back home. The surrounding characters are equally well acted, and if an intense loathing of a character is an indicator of acting abilities, David Costabile’s turn as CIA annex chief “Bob” takes the cake.
Everything, from the taut writing, stellar acting, locations, sound, and urgent tempo of the film worked to great effect.
Yesterday on CNN, Jake Tapper asked Hillary Clinton if she planned on seeing the movie. Clinton answered that she was too busy campaigning. But now having watched the movie, I think that no matter how much Clinton keeps trying to convince the American people that she is a serious and worthy candidate, if enough people see the film, there is little doubt that the true story of what happened during those 13 hours of chaos in Benghazi will undoubtedly impact her chances for the presidency. She should be very concerned. Even those generally supportive of Clinton have referred to it as the movie Hillary Clinton doesn’t want you to see. And for good reason.
I think this is an important movie. As someone who was fairly well informed about Benghazi before seeing the movie, and now having watched it play out on the big screen brimming with raw emotion and intense sights and sounds, I can say that it has made everything all the more real and impacting. It sounds silly, but it evoked an emotional response on a different level having a face to go with the name and a serious visual taste of the awfulness of that night. Consider how much more the impact might be to those with just a “network news” level of knowledge about Benghazi. Finally, seeing what really happened contrasted with the claims made by the State Dept. and the White House, one is aghast (all over again) by the outrageous dishonesty. Especially the dishonesty of Hillary Clinton. The woman who wants to be our next president.
I’ll just note, too, that in reading several reviews of 13 Hours from mainstream media outlets, one might suspect there is a move afoot to quickly dismiss the movie and get it out of the public eye as quickly as possible. Now, why do you think that might be??
13 Hours: The Secret Soldiers of Benghazi (2016)
Directed by Michael Bay
Rated R | 144 minutes
Go see it.
*Do not miss David French’s excellent piece on the “stand down order” in Benghazi.
To hear Hillary Clinton tell it, she was named for Sir Edmund Hillary, the conqueror of Mount Everest — even though she was already 6 years old when he made his famous ascent.
On a visit to war-torn Bosnia in 1996, she claimed she and her entourage landed under sniper fire and had to run “with our heads down to get into the vehicles to get to our base” — although videos of her arrival show her waltzing serenely across the tarmac, waving to the crowd.
She blamed the 2012 attack on American diplomatic and intelligence-gathering installations in Benghazi on “a disgusting video” when she knew almost from the first moment that it was a jihadist assault that took the lives of four Americans, including the ambassador to Libya.
No wonder the late William Safire, writing in The New York Times in 1996, at the height of the Whitewater investigation, called her a “congenital liar.” Said Safire: “She is in the longtime habit of lying; and she has never been called to account for lying herself or in suborning lying in her aides and friends.”
The Tweet apparently violates a CNN policy prohibiting their reporters from editorializing on “partisan” issues.
Whether prompted by Ms. Labott’s indiscretion or whether the timing is purely coincidental, conservative outlets such as the Daily Caller are reporting that Labott was unusually receptive to and accommodating of suggestions from one Philippe Reines, a Hillary! Clinton aide turned State Department flack turned Hillary! Clinton aide. On the morning that The Once and Future Inevitable Next President of the United States was being grilled in the Senate over her behavior during the Benghazi imbroglio, Labott and Reines begin an email correspondence which has been uncovered by a Freedom of Information Act request by Gawker Media. At one point in the exchange Labott seems to refer back to a previous conversation she had with Reines, asking him in an email message, “are you sure rand paul wasn’t at any hearings?” Within five minutes, she sends out this tweet:
Sen Paul most critical on committee of Clinton, but a little late to the #Benghazi game.Not sure he was at many of the 30 previous briefings
A few hours later when Her Majesty’s testimony had wrapped up, Labott emails Reines to pass along her congratulations on Hillary!’s testimony: “She was great. well done. I hope you are going to have a big drink tonight.”
Still later that evening, Reins emails Labott to mention that he has another tweet to suggest (it should be noted here that, like his boss, Deputy Assistant Secretary of State Philippe Reins appears to have a fondness for conducting government business on private email servers). She responds, “What did you suggest. [sic] I didn’t see it.” He replies, “Pin,” which appears to refer to a private messaging system. Labott makes a promise to “get back to you,” then six minutes later tweets out the following:
Clinton: I tried to be transparent. I could have joined the 18 ARBs, kept it classified and then said goodbye. That is not who I am.
The Rand Paul campaign has naturally jumped all over the story of the CNN reporter colluding with the State Department employee (and Clinton aide) to ensure sympathetic coverage. As of this writing, CNN has not commented upon the situation and Elise Labott remains on suspension for one more week.
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