Obama's spin on Benghazi attacks mirrors Bin-Laden raid untruths

We now see exactly the same pattern emerging with the attack on the US consulate in Benghazi, Libya and the killing of the US ambassador. For a full week now, administration officials have categorically insisted that the prime, if not only, cause of the attack was spontaneous anger over the anti-Muhammad film, The Innocence of Muslims.

Last week, White House spokesman Jay Carney insisted that "these protests, were in reaction to a video that had spread to the region." On Friday, he claimed:

"'This
is a fairly volatile situation, and it is in response not to US policy,
not to, obviously, the administration, not to the American people. It
is in response to a video ? a film ? that we have judged to be
reprehensive and disgusting. That in no way justifies any violent
reaction to it. But this is not a case of protests directed at the United States, writ large, or at US policy. This is in response to a video that is offensive and ? to Muslims.'"

On Sunday, UN ambassador Susan Rice, when asked about the impetus for the attack, said that
"this began as, it was a spontaneous ? not a premeditated ? response to
what had transpired in Cairo," and added: "In Cairo, as you know, a few
hours earlier, there was a violent protest that was undertaken in reaction to this very offensive video that was disseminated." In other interviews, she insisted that the Benghazi violence was a "spontaneous" reaction to the film.

Predictably,
and by design, most media accounts from the day after the Benghazi
attack repeated the White House line as though it were fact, just as
they did for the Bin Laden killing. Said NPR on 12 September: "The US ambassador to Libya and three other Americans were killed in an attack on the US consulate in Benghazi by protesters angry over a film that ridiculed Islam's Prophet Muhammad." The Daily Beast reported
that the ambassador "died in a rocket attack on the embassy amid
violent protests over a US-produced film deemed insulting to Islam." To
date, numerous people believe
? as though there were no dispute about it ? that Muslims attacked the
consulate and killed the US ambassador "because they were angry about a
film".

As it turns out, this claim is almost certainly false. And now, a week later, even the US government is acknowledging that, as McClatchy reports this morning [my emphasis]:

"The Obama administration
acknowledged for the first time Wednesday that last week's assault on
the US consulate compound in Benghazi that left the US ambassador to
Libya and three other Americans dead was a 'terrorist attack' apparently
launched by local Islamic militants and foreigners linked to al-Qaida's
leadership or regional allies.

"'I would say they were killed in
the course of a terrorist attack,' said Matthew Olsen, director of the
National Counterterrorism Center, told the Senate Committee on Homeland
Security and Governmental Affairs.

"It was the first time that a senior administration official had said the attack was not
the result of a demonstration over an anti-Islam video that has been
cited as the spark for protests in dozens of countries over the past
week .'The picture that is emerging is one where a number of different individuals were involved,' Olsen said." [My emphasis]

Worse, it isn't as though there had been no evidence of more accurate information before Wednesday. To the contrary, most evidence from the start
strongly suggested that the White House's claims ? that this attack was
motivated by anger over a film ? were false. From McClatchy:

"The
head of Libya's interim government, key US lawmakers and experts
contend that the attack appeared long-planned, complex and
well-coordinated, matching descriptions given to McClatchy last week by
the consulate's landlord and a wounded security guard, who denied there
was a protest at the time and said the attackers carried the banner of
Ansar al-Shariah, an Islamist militia."

Indeed, Libya's president has spent the week publicly announcing that there is "no doubt" the attack was planned well in advance and had nothing to do with the video.

CBS News reported Thursday morning that there was no anti-video protest at all at the consulate. Witnesses insist, said CBS, "that there was never
an anti-American protest outside of the consulate. Instead, they say,
it came under planned attack." That, noted the network, "is in direct
contradiction to the administration's account of the incident." The
report concluded: "What's clear is that the public won't get a detailed
account of what happened until after the election."

There is a cover up of Watergate significance here.

hold it there mister... the president told me that it was over a youtube... it is unpatriotic to examine the issue any further or question his version of the facts. who do you think he is? Bush? if you value your free speech you will shut the fuck up... or you will be silenced as an enemy of the state. now go to media matters and don't come back until you agree.

A distinction without a difference. The attacks were most certainly planned. The attacks were most certainly intended to kill the Ambassador. He was an easy target. He walked the streets of Libya with courage doing his job. The counter demonstrations have began. People are forcing the radicals out. This man's courage was winning the battle in the middle east. He was a dangerous man for Al Queda, the industrial/military complex, and indeed even Israel. If true democratic change happens and moderate muslims create secular government and not autocratic theocracies.....Al Queda wilts away, the industrial/military complex loses profits, and Israel cannot argue that Iran is full of lunatics. No if the people in Iran rise up the paradigm changes.

I think President Obama and Secretary Clinton's statements were dead cinch correct from the beginning, but without a doubt the UN ambassador clearly was incorrect on her analysis on meet the press when I watched it last week. President Obama and his wise choice of an Ambassador in Libya is kicking asz in foreign policy. Other than Fox News who is beating the war drum, most the world recognizes that war will not win this battle. It will be won at the street level, and today the good guys are kicking asz. The Libyan people are kicking the extremist out of the city. The street vendor who started this revolution simply wanted economic freedom. The ambassador and the risks he took were and remain the solution for America. This battle has to be taken to Iran. We do not need the idiots like Shawn Hannity telling Senator Demint who has stellar conservative credentials that we need to cut all aid to Libya and Egypt.....Senator Deimint was speechless at the shear stupidity of shawn beating the war drum, when he explained that 1.5 billion of that aid goes to Egypt's continuing compliance with the Camp David accords.

No these events that are unveiling as we speak go to my conclusion that Obama may be a failure on domestic policy, but he has nailed foreign policy and contrary to the Fox attempt to make a distinction without a difference.....they will be silent about the people throwing the radicals out. Obama is winning the battle and we are not throwing our grandchildren's future away with needless war. To all those who think by design, or like Fox and Egyptian TV to manipulate the masses with smoke and mirrors.....it is not going to happen....people are thinking....they are thinking about what is best for America....not Al Queda, not the military industrial complex, and not for Israel.....and Fox News and their attempt to twist the truth of what is happening on the streets of Libya.....well I think time will show the American people who the traitors are among us.

Government: the only enity in the world where failure not only promotes it's continued survival but in deed allows it to grow larger and fail even greater in it's ...."and I say this laughing my ass off"'.......service to the people.

Obama is fail of epic magnitude.