In an interview with Chris Wallace yesterday, David Axelrod dodged some pointed questions about President Obama’s intelligence briefings after the Benghazi attack:
Here’s a partial transcript, via Powerline:
Q. How soon after the attack did the President meet with the National Security Council, with people from state, with people from the…, the Director of National Intelligence, with all of the various people to try to sort out what happened in Benghazi?
A. Look. We are sorting out what happened there. Understand that the President the day after the attack called it an act of terror and charged everyone with responsibility for getting to the bottom of what happened.
Q. Yes, the president made a statement and then he went to a fundraiser in Nevada. Question: Before he went to the fundraiser in Nevada, did he meet with his National Security Council to try to sort out the shifting stories. Because State says they never said it was a spontaneous demonstration; Intel, you are quite right, did. Did he meet with the National Security Council before he went campaigning in Nevada?
A. Chris, I assure you that the president was in contact with all those who had information and responsibility in the national security chain about this incident.
Intelligence did say, in unclassified CIA talking points to Congress, that the Benghazi attack was a spontaneous reaction to the Cairo protests over the anti-Islam video. The problem is, that narrative was contradicted by the initial intelligence report, according to Reuters’s Mark Hosenball:
The stream of intelligence flowing into Washington within hours of the Benghazi attacks contained data from communications intercepts and U.S. informants, which were then fashioned into polished initial assessments for policymakers. …
The report did not allege the attacks were a reaction to the anti-Muslim film, but acknowledged it was possible that the attackers sought to use an outbreak of violence in Cairo over the film, which insulted the Prophet Mohammad, as a pretext for attacks. …
Yet on September 15, administration officials, relying upon what they said was other information from intelligence agencies, circulated to members of Congress a set of talking points prepared by the CIA that purported to summarize what U.S. intelligence knew.
The talking points said: “The currently available information suggests that the demonstrations in Benghazi were spontaneously inspired by the protests at the U.S. embassy in Cairo and evolved into a direct assault against the U.S. diplomatic post in Benghazi and subsequently its annex.”
There is an important distinction to make between the CIA talking points — the information the administration chose to emphasize — and the actual intelligence, which reportedly included plenty of evidence in the first hours that the attack was carried out by a militant group with al-Qaeda ties. Even if the intelligence was as muddled as the White House claims, why didn’t President Obama stay in Washington to try to get a handle on the situation on September 12, instead of flying off for a fundraiser in Nevada? Axelrod won’t answer the question directly, which tells you this issue is going to be a political problem for them.
Axelrod, i.e. Master Wormtongue
I am so tired of looking at the worn out dirty, nasty Chicago Politicians that make up the Obama Administration… A four year old would recognize that the attack on the consulate was a terror attack. I am sick and tried of the lying these people are doing. If I was Hillary I would watch out because he is the one that is going to be thrown under the bus.
am still waiting for Woodward and Zeleny to respond to 'where are the investigative reporters' on Benghazi. nSomehow that bit from FNS roundtable has gotten ZERO echo. n n
Alana, imagine you are a 19-year old college kid, and you have 1000 cans in your dorm room, each wrapped with paper so you can't see what they are (classified). You sort though the pile, unwrap two and say "see, it is "Diet Coke" — I don't have any beer here." n nIn research terms, this is the "outlier" — while almost all of them are actually Bud Lite, a couple aren't and when you have the decision as to what to declassify, there is no way for the RA to know that you didn't just present the only two that weren't beer — which is exactly what everyone would expect a 19-year-old to do. n nNow had you let the RA do the picking you would be looking at statistical probabilities and the rest, but when you can decided what you will hide and what you won't, one must presume that you are hiding the most damaging information and releasing that which makes you look best. n nAnd if you searched hard enough, you probably could find someone who believes that Elvis is still alive. That is the problem with taking just one piece of intelligence outside of the larger context. So if the Boy President orders his minions to find this person, and they do, what exactly does that mean? Is it "proof" that Elvis is alive, or a "cherry picked" outlier? n nAlana, this is why any declassified intelligence supporting what the Boy President (or *any* President) wants it to support is moot. Think of the underaged college kid with 9998 cans of beer hidden behind paper wrappings and her not telling anyone about those when she proudly proclaims that two of the cans are Diet Coke, and of course she doesn't have any beer in her dorm room… n nThis is where character and reputation matters. More than anything else, this is the damage that Bill Clinton did with the Monica matter — an honorable man would have resigned because of self respect — instead Bill Clinton sold his honor for his continued tenure in office.
PM Begin resigned and kept his mouth shut after the Lebanon War. It is disgusting that Obama and others do not resign. Actually, it is dangerous. Their plan is to destroy the world.
What do you call a reclining heap of excrement? n nWhy does that accurately describe everyone in the Obama administration?
It takes time to massage the info (for the public) needed to place Pr. O in a good light. nThe Al Capone mafia takes its time. nPr. O agenda requires independence from the congress. Reason for all the executive nominations.