In spite of that, President Obama and members of his administration for days afterwards pretended that the attack was in reaction to the video. Go here to read a first-rate time line put together by the Washington Post blog. Why the lie? Several reasons.
1. Osama dead and General Motors alive- One of the few foreign policies successes of the Obama administration was the killing of bin Laden. A successful al-Qaeda attack on the anniversary of 9-11 undercut this in a huge way.
2. Now we have to do something?- In the midst of the Presidential campaign the last thing Obama wanted was to admit that this was a terrorist attack. Such an admission would require that he take action. In fact Obama has done precious little in the aftermath attack. More than two weeks after the attack, the FBI still has not examined the attack site at Benghazi.
3. Appeasement –The Mohammed video bogeyman allowed Obama to do what his preferred policy is to the jihadists: pretend that if we bend over backwards not to offend Muslims, everything will be sweetness and love between Islam and the West.
4. Diversion- Focusing on the video allowed the Obama administration, with the active assistance of unpaid Obama press agents the Mainstream Media, to avoid initially answering embarrassing questions, such as I suggested be asked here.
5. Because They Can- A Republican President who attempted the types of lies and stonewalling that Obama and his administration have engaged in subsequent to the Libyan attacks, would now be experiencing an unending drum beat of strident criticism from the Mainstream Media that would probably destroy his chances for re-election. Obama? Most of the Mainstream Media will run perfunctory stories hidden amidst endless stories about Romney gaffes. It is good to have an obedient media that cares far more about ensuring the re-election of the President than in breaking actual news stories.
Update: Unbelievable! The Obama administration is still trying to tie in the Mohammed video with the Benghazi attack. Ed Morrissey at Hot Air gives us the absurd details:
“It ain’t lying if it advances the agenda.” Yogi Bubba
Donald,
This search for the total evil of Obama is going to give you a heart attack…and I mean that literally. It’s already got T. Shaw changing the spelling of his last name. Let’s take Hitler. He was evil but he was not guilty therefore of every sin one could imagine. It was possible for Christians to sinfully slander Hitler by accusing him of sins outside his actual sins. An evil man is not a free target wherein slander no longer applies. Appease jihadists? Obama’s family is permanently in danger from Al Qaeda for the Bin Laden go ahead. I believe Al Qaeda will eventually strike them even decades from now. Obama either gets credit for all the Al Qaeda his people have killed or none of your favorite presidents get credit for anything they did.
“One of the few foreign policies successes of the Obama administration was the killing of bin Laden.”
I’d say that’s credit.
You are correct in saying that attributing sin/guilt falsely regardless of the evil extent of the individual so attributed is wrong. Bearing false witness is a sin, period, and about whom that witness is given has no impact on the sin itself, although it will certainly play a part in any atonement or penance.
But the opposite is also true: it is equally wrong to excuse evils/sins by dint of an outstanding good. Hitler and the Nazis gave the world a number of excellent and still very useful technical advancements (VW Bug, anyone?) but that does not excuse him or them from the atrocities of the Holocaust or the guilt of starting the most costly war the world has ever known.
So, Don did give credit where it was due, but that does not mean he has to give a pass to everything else about this administration that has gone so woefully, dangerously wrong.
Rubbish Bill from beginning to end. My heart is in excellent condition as attested to by my Doctor earlier in the week. I have never claimed that Obama is the embodiment of evil, but rather a fairly typical hack politician from Chicago. As to Obama and the topic of this post, there is no charitable explanation of what he did in the wake of the Benghazi attack, none. The attacks on al-Qaeda by Obama have been for purely domestic political considerations and because al-Qaeda can no more be made peace with than a treaty can be established with a pack of rabid dogs. His Cairo speech of June 4, 2009 illustrates his true policy, and contains such gems as these:
“I have come here to seek a new beginning between the United States and Muslims around the world; one based upon mutual interest and mutual respect; and one based upon the truth that America and Islam are not exclusive, and need not be in competition. Instead, they overlap, and share common principles – principles of justice and progress; tolerance and the dignity of all human beings.
I do so recognizing that change cannot happen overnight. No single speech can eradicate years of mistrust, nor can I answer in the time that I have all the complex questions that brought us to this point. But I am convinced that in order to move forward, we must say openly the things we hold in our hearts, and that too often are said only behind closed doors. There must be a sustained effort to listen to each other; to learn from each other; to respect one another; and to seek common ground. As the Holy Koran tells us, “Be conscious of God and speak always the truth.” That is what I will try to do – to speak the truth as best I can, humbled by the task before us, and firm in my belief that the interests we share as human beings are far more powerful than the forces that drive us apart.
Part of this conviction is rooted in my own experience. I am a Christian, but my father came from a Kenyan family that includes generations of Muslims. As a boy, I spent several years in Indonesia and heard the call of the azaan at the break of dawn and the fall of dusk. As a young man, I worked in Chicago communities where many found dignity and peace in their Muslim faith.
As a student of history, I also know civilization’s debt to Islam. It was Islam – at places like Al-Azhar University – that carried the light of learning through so many centuries, paving the way for Europe’s Renaissance and Enlightenment. It was innovation in Muslim communities that developed the order of algebra; our magnetic compass and tools of navigation; our mastery of pens and printing; our understanding of how disease spreads and how it can be healed. Islamic culture has given us majestic arches and soaring spires; timeless poetry and cherished music; elegant calligraphy and places of peaceful contemplation. And throughout history, Islam has demonstrated through words and deeds the possibilities of religious tolerance and racial equality.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/04/us/politics/04obama.text.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0
Obama has rose colored glasses for Islam and dark colored glasses for the US. I pity those unable, or unwilling, to grasp this truth.
Readers who want more than the Bin Laden kill…go here…
http://abcnews.go.com/politics/t/blogEntry?id=14638964
Libyan Lie sounds like a good song title.
Well, duh. ABC news. Silly us.
“MSM’s so-called journalists do not report and will not so much as ask or investigate anything that does not advance the big liberal lie).
Faked but accurate. For the liars truth, facts, realities, and history do not exist. They are putty in their hands. They use them to make a point, to do good as they see it. And whatever they need to twist or omit is justified by their purity of intentions – and they always have the purest of intentions – Exterminate the unborn! Sanctify sodomy! Sexual exploitation of young women! False but justified.
Hate-filled liars despise facts and truth. They rely on hysterics, insults, lies and weeping and gnashing of teeth to advance their horrid ideas and destructive policies. The state-run MSM and PBR/S also eschew facts and truth, which are not susceptible to their calumnies, distortions, distractions, exaggerations, omissions, and outright lies.
Readers can check the interview here of Ali Soufan. one of few FBI who spoke Arabic back in the day of 2001 and who actually interrogated terrorists and received the FBI directors award for Excellence in Investigative work. He broke with CIA people on the need for waterboarding and was on O’Reilly refuting a CIA person with whom he disagreed on effectiveness of rapport versus torture. He praises Obama for the kills but also for broadening international contacts in the war on terrorism…hopes that a Romney group would not reverse the latter and gives Obama an A minus with criticsms near the end of the interview:
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2012/09/11/former-fbi-agent-ali-soufan-on-bin-laden-s-death-war-on-terror.html
Except CIA official Jose Rodriquez denies that Soufan was actually effective. In fact he points out how terrorists mocked him.
If Soufan were impartial, he’d rate Obama F-minus for intelligence: both military and IQ. E.G., the well-planned, organized/inside job diplomatic murders in Libya:
Obama propaganda 24/7 said the Osama slaying was a huge victory: spucatum tauri.
So what if Ali Soufan is/was against water-boarding (it’s one trick pony time again):
I think Instapundit: “A thoroughly documented new report on the impact of US drone campaign was released by NYU School of Law and Stanford University Law School. Entitled “Living Under Drones: Death, Injury and Trauma to Civilians From US Drone Practices in Pakistan”, the report details the terrorizing effects of US drone assaults as well as the numerous, highly misleading public statements from US officials about that campaign. The study’s purpose was to conduct an “independent investigations into whether, and to what extent, drone strikes in Pakistan conformed to international law and caused harm and/or injury to civilians”.
And there is this:
“…American progressives cheered loudly when a similar question was posed by Al Gore in a widely celebrated 2006 speech he gave on the Washington mall denouncing the Bush/Cheney assault on civil liberties:
“‘If the president has the inherent authority to eavesdrop on American citizens without a warrant, imprison American citizens on his own declaration, kidnap and torture, then what can’t he do?’
“What has always amazed me about that is that, there, Gore was merely decrying Bush’s mere eavesdropping on Americans and his detention of them without judicial review. Yet here Obama is claiming the power to decide who should be killed without a shred of transparency, oversight, or due process – a power that is being continuously used to kill civilians, including children – and many of these same progressives now actually cheer for that.”
Lesseee: Ali Soufan – Muslim?
Dulce Islami inexpertis.
Ironic Bill that the interview of the very self serving Ali Soufan, who has been doing his best to stay in the public eye since he went public in 2009, was published on September 11, 2012, the date of the Benghazi attack and contains this nugget:
“For the first time you have Muslim countries, European countries working together hand in hand,” Soufan explains. “It was clearly outlined in Obama’s speech in Cairo, [which] in the Middle East was viewed as ‘the time of unilateral action is not going to be there anymore.’ What he decided to focus on upon creating these partnerships to counter violent extremism, talked about human security, economic development, education, literacy, women’s rights, a lot of these issues.””
Yeah, as Cairo and Benghazi demonstrated that day Obama has done a bang up job in getting Muslim countries on our side.
Bill,
“Yogi Bubba” was a play on Yogi Berra (“It aint bragging if it’s true.”).
You’re correct. I could not possibly have more disrespect for the racist autocrat currently slumming in the White House.
It is very hard to Trust Obama, his administration.
The double speak flows….well like bung-lava!
“We will draft a sensible conscience clause…”, “the Savings from not being in Afganistain…”, I’m upset.
Trust is important, and my trust in his words and actions are low. His “trust account is empty” and I agree with Don’s 5 points.
Donald,
I don’t think “countries” that are newly forming have perfect riot prevention techniques or terrorist preventions techniques…since even the US has had its riots and terrorist incidents.
Here’s Judge Napolitano of Fox interviewing Soufan and at the end calling his book “great”. O’Reilly also interviewed him on Fox and that interview was respectful too. This Fox…Fox…not the NY Times..
http://video.foxbusiness.com/v/1160137357001/eyewitness-to-the-war-on-terror/
Baloney Bill. The so-called Libyan government can’t even protect our FBI agents to go to the attack scene in Benghazi two weeks after the attack.
http://hotair.com/archives/2012/09/28/fbi-probe-in-benghazi-as-close-as-400-miles-away/
As for Cairo, if you don’t think the Muslim Brotherhood government was involved in the riots at our embassy I have some swamp land down in Florida to sell you. Then we have Pakistan, that grand American ally, holding a public holiday for violent protests over the Mohammed film, while the Transport Minister of Pakistan places a bounty for the murder of the maker of the Mohammed film.
Napolitano is an isolationist and paleocon who believes that Abraham Lincoln was a tyrant. I view his opinion in the same awe as I would that of a bag lady screeching obscenities on the street. As for O’Reilly, not one of the great intellects of our day, he interviewed both Soufan and Jose Rodriquez and appeared to give greater credence to Rodriquez for what little that is worth.
Sounds awfully like the darling of conservatives, Leo Strauss.
The truth actually MPS is that almost all conservatives in America have never heard of Leo Stauss, let alone hailed him as their darling.
Sounds awfully like the darling of conservatives, Leo Strauss.
I am not sure what you meant by this, but Leo Strauss in this country is a bogey in a deeply stupid discourse. This man, now nearly 40 years deceased, was a philosophy professor with almost no involvement in political discussion at any level. There were a couple of subcabinet officers in the Bush Administration who had taken a couple of courses from him during their undergraduate years and a widely admired critic of higher education (Allan Bloom) was a student and disciple of Strauss. That is the extent of the conduit of his ideas to contemporary Republican politics. It has not prevented the addle-pated in the palaeo nexus from positing some high level cabal of initiates manipulating public policy (with William Kristol as the exalted cyclops). Unless you are pleased to be mistaken for a latter-day manifestation of the tendencies that gave you the John Birch Society, I would suggest you not bring up the name Leo Strauss.
By denying Strauss’s influence Art and Don are demonstrating their complete allegiance to Strauss, because as we all know true Straussians are the ones most adamant in denying his influence. The fact that few outside of higher educational circles even claim to know who the man is therefore a sure-fire sign that the man’s philosophy completely permeates modern society.
(That was sarcasm for the sarcasm impaired.)
“The so-called Libyan government can’t even protect our FBI agents to go to the attack scene in Benghazi two weeks after the attack.”
Then how is CNN wandering around Bengazi picking up the odd diary left behind by the movers? The Admin has no intention of investigating this or any other inconvenient terror attack. They are in the process of accelerating the release of terrorists from Gitmo. They are going to keep the FBI in Tripoli until 2013 or 2017 depending.
As I said somewhere else, there is also the issue that the Libyan government is permeated with Al Qaeda types as well as Brotherhood types.
Philosophy prof? Clueless clowns making up stuff about stuff.
Last Phil class I attended was a final x in May 1970. The clueless clown asked me “Are you in the right place?” I was and I wasn.’t. I passed the useless required course and got my three vacuous credits.
Bottom line Obama and stooges are 24/7 lying.
I was being flippant.