Benghazigate
November 29, 2017 — Paul Mirengoff
President Trump has nominated Joseph McManus to be the U.S. ambassador to Colombia. McManus is an experienced diplomat, having spent 30 years in the foreign service. I don’t doubt that he’s a capable man. However, critics point out that McManus was one of Hillary Clinton’s top aides at the State Department and was deeply involved in the State Department’s initial response to the Benghazi attack. In addition, he became entangled
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January 26, 2017 — Paul Mirengoff
Josh Rogin of the Washington Post reports that “the entire senior level of management officials resigned Wednesday, part of an ongoing mass exodus of senior Foreign Service officers who don’t want to stick around for the Trump era.” The departing officials are Patrick Kennedy, the Department’s long-serving undersecretary for management; Assistant Secretary of State for Administration Joyce Anne Barr; Assistant Secretary of State for Consular Affairs Michele Bond; and Ambassador
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October 19, 2016 — Paul Mirengoff
Patrick Kennedy, the State Department official who tried to get the FBI to change email classifications in exchange for helping the FBI meet its staffing needs in Bagdhad, is what they used to call a “fixer.” A fixer is not quite the same thing as a henchman. Cheryl Mills played that role at the Clinton State Department. Kennedy has been a fixer in both Democratic and Republican administrations. But until
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August 30, 2016 — Paul Mirengoff
I hadn’t intended to write two Hillary Clinton email posts tonight. However, news that FBI investigators recovered 30 Benghazi-related emails from Hillary Clinton’s wiped server is potentially too important not to comment on right away. Government lawyers told U.S. District Court Judge Amit Mehta today that some of the 30 recovered emails relating to Benghazi — they didn’t say now many — were not included in the 55,000 pages previously
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July 7, 2016 — Paul Mirengoff
Fresh off of the FBI director’s statement that she was extremely careless in handling top secret information, Hillary Clinton went to Atlantic City yesterday to attack Donald Trump. Standing in front of a shuttered building with faded letters spelling “Trump Plaza,” Clinton said: “When everything fall apart, people get hurt and Donald gets paid.” There’s a corresponding anti-Clinton speech/photo op to be produced. But it won’t be. Benghazi is too
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June 29, 2016 — Paul Mirengoff
Yesterday, I linked to the additional views that Reps. Jim Jordan and Mike Pompeo presented in connection with the report of the House Select Committee on Benghazi. I’m told that a major reason for submitting additional views was the unwillingness of Trey Gowdy, chairman of the committee, to present any conclusions in his report. Gowdy and the chief investigator decided just to present the facts — no conclusions. If they
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June 28, 2016 — Paul Mirengoff
The House Select Committee on Benghazi has issued its report. The 800-page document is the result of an investigation that, according to the committee, encompassed 81 new witnesses and 75,000 pages of new documents. The report covers every aspect of the Benghazi scandal — the “before,” the “during,” and multiple phases of the “after.” At Hot Air, Larry O’Connor provides a good summary and Ed Morrissey homes in on the
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March 29, 2016 — Paul Mirengoff
Judge Royce Lamberth of the U.S. district court in Washington D.C. today became the second federal judge to order discovery regarding Clinton emails. Both cases were brought by the invaluable Judicial Watch. As we have discussed, Judge Emmet Sullivan, a Clinton appointee, has already granted Judicial Watch discovery on the Clinton email matter in separate litigation. Judicial Watch’s discovery plan in that case seeks the testimony of eight current and
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March 10, 2016 — Scott Johnson
Hillary Clinton was lying as fast as she can at the debate moderated by Jorge Ramos and others in Miami last night. Jointly hosted by Univision and the Washington Post, this is to be the Dems’ final debate. The Economist has a good account of the proceedings in “Bernie Sanders and Univision force Hillary Clinton to the left.” Ramos confronted Clinton with video of Patrica Smith saying that Clinton lied
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January 22, 2016 — Scott Johnson
Daniel Henninger devotes his weekly Wall Street Journal column to 13 Hours. The column is “’13 Hours’: It’s political” (accessible here via Google, I hope). Henninger’s column marks an important contribution to the discussion. Among other things, Henninger writes: The movie “13 Hours: The Secret Soldiers of Benghazi” opened last week, and the cold-water machines have been hosing it. No one cares about Benghazi anymore, the conventional sniffing goes, because
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January 20, 2016 — Paul Mirengoff
Scott reports that “13 Hours,” Michael Bay’s film about the Benghazi attacks, attracted only a small crowd at the Grandview Theater in St. Paul, Minnesota. Nationally, though, the movie seems to be doing well. It earned around $20 million during the holiday weekend. That’s not quite as good as “Lone Survivor” ($25 million) and nowhere close to “American Sniper” ($107 million), both of which opened during the corresponding weekend. But
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January 20, 2016 — Scott Johnson
We went to see the film 13 Hours at the Grandview Theater in St. Paul this past Saturday evening. Paul Mirengoff gave a good account of the film here. Paul’s post states what I have to say in greater detail and more articulately than I will. I only want to urge readers to see the film in a theater while you still can and to add these comments. The movie
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January 13, 2016 — Paul Mirengoff
Last night, I attended a showing of “13 Hours,” Michael Bay’s movie about the Benghazi attacks. The movie will be out next week. I believe our readers will find it very much worth seeing. Let’s start by discussing “13 Hours” qua movie and then move on to the politics of it. “13 Hours” succeeds as cinema despite (or maybe for me because) it doesn’t follow the usual Hollywood formula. There
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January 6, 2016 — Scott Johnson
Tom McLaughlin was part of the Conway Daily Sun group that interviewed Hillary Clinton on December 29, 2015, at the newspaper’s New Hampshire office. The Daily Sun posted its article on the interview here: Sun Columnist Tom McLaughlin said she told an Egyptian diplomat the Benghazi attack was planned and not a protest but that she told family members of the deceased that the attack was the result of a
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January 2, 2016 — Paul Mirengoff
The question all but answers itself, I should think. Here’s why it’s being asked: On September 14, 2012, at a memorial service for the victims of the Benghazi attacks, Hillary Clinton spoke with members of the victims’ families. At least three of these people say that Clinton talked about the alleged role in the attack of a video produced by Nakoula Basseley Nakoula. Charles Woods, the father of former Navy
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December 3, 2015 — Paul Mirengoff
I don’t think any serious observer believes that Susan Rice’s false claim in September 2012, presented on network talk show after network talk show, that the Benghazi attacks were the product of a video originated with Rice. Rice was merely our ambassador to the U.N. at the time. Thus, she had no responsibility for the security of the compound in Benghazi, and was not in a good position to assess
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October 29, 2015 — John Hinderaker
This morning, Marco Rubio appeared on CBS’s This Morning program. Host Charlie Rose appeared to be appalled by Rubio’s statement in last night’s debate that Hillary Clinton lied about Benghazi. For most of us, this is like saying that the Sun rose in the East, but to Rose it was evidently a new idea. So he tried to defend Hillary, unsuccessfully. Marco gave him chapter and verse, briefly and effectively:
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