JMS's Chronology of the Bengazi Raid and "cover-up"

[skinsmarydu]

So, I'm never sure how this works.

IF the left unfairly badgered Bush on things like this, then why are the right doing it now?

Is it that they want to be petty and childish? If it weas wrong then, detrimental to the country, treasonous as some said then, why is that not the case now? 2 wrongs make a right again?

Or, if Bush was badgered over things that were as legitimate as the right wants benghazi to be, why was THAT wrong then... or is it that benghazi is as legit as the right wants to paint the left's complaints during his terms?

Ridiculous. I'd expect this immature crap out of first graders, not HALF THE FRIGGIN' COUNTRY.

~Bang

Hubby & I continue to marvel at the immaturity as well, but then, we come to our senses.

We remember that half the friggin' country hates him simply because his skin is of a certain pigmentation. So, when they do step over the edge of stupid, we have to reign in our "shocked" faces.

[ABQCOWBOY]

I don't think most of what you are saying is particularly accurate when you really look at the details:

All the more reason to have all of the evidence presented. I understand that many don't accept certain things on both sides. This is why all of the info has to come out.

I think there might have been some evidence that it was a terrorists attack, but there was also evidence that it wasn't really a terrorists attack and was a result of the YouTube video and Ansal al-Sharia pretty quickly DENIED it was a planned terrorists attack and essentially denied direct involvement. In fact, they were saying it was a spontanous attack:

http://www.longwarjournal.org/threat-matrix/archives/2012/09/ansar_al_shariah_issues_statem.php

"Ansar al-Shariah Brigade didn't participate in this popular uprising as a separate entity, but it was carrying out its duties in al-Jala'a hospital and other places where it was entrusted with some duties. The Brigade didn't participate as a sole entity; rather, it was a spontaneous popular uprising in response to what happened by the West."

Well, at 6:07 ET, the day of the attack, the State Dept. sent an e-mail to the WH, the FBI, the Pentagon and other Government Agencies saying it was Ansar al-Shariah, which is a known terrorist linked to Al Qaeda. That's not in question. The link you present does not deny this other then to say that it was not soley Al Queda. That may or may not be true, I don't know but it is irrelevant to the central fact that it was a terrorist attack and it was known by the WH and all other agencies involved prior to the attack being over. To say otherwise is simply untrue. It had nothing, at all, to do with any Youtube video and it has already been proven that there was no MOB at the Consulate that somehow got out of hand and transformed into an attack. This attack was well planned and well orchestrated.

I'm not sure what you mean by the talking points were "ginned" up, and I'm not sure of what evidence you have of that, especially in the context of it not being the result of a demonstartion.

The talking points that were released by the WH that did not reflect what the CIA originally reported. With regards to the demonstration, I am referring to the Congressional Report that stated that there was no truth to the talking points stating that it was a demonstration that got out of hand.

http://www.speaker.gov/sites/speaker.house.gov/files/documents/libya-progress-report.pdf

At 2:30 ET, there was no evidence, what so ever, of any demonstration at the Consulate. This can be confirmed by the statements of Turkish Diplomats that were present at the time as well as State Department Officials who provided a daily briefing report from the Consulate. There was no mob, as was reported by both Rice and the WH. At 3:00 PM ET, Ambassador Stevens goes to bed with no sign of anything irregular. At 3:40 PM ET, the first reports of activity are reported. This was not a MOB seen that that got out of hand. It was a coordinated attack and what was reported as the sole called "YouTube" driven demonstration was completely false. The WH and all other agencies new it before it was ever reported.

I suspect you should probably vete your news sources a bit better.

Thank you for the advice. I would recommend the same to you.

---------- Post added May-17th-2013 at 11:21 AM ----------

So far the only one's caught doctoring evidence is the GOP.

This is completely inaccurate but at this point, I am not going to convince you to admit it. There is plenty of proof out there that the WH and the State Dept. lied but you first have to be willing to accept that premise.

---------- Post added May-17th-2013 at 11:24 AM ----------

You can read both emails for yourself and see that someone altered them to make it appear that the State Department said things they didn't say. Or, you could close your eyes.

Also, I like the fall back to GWB being persecuted... nice one.

Another good fallback was that the democrats would change the constitution to allow an alien elected. Can you tell me what part of the constitution has been amended since Obama was first elected? I'm all ears.

PM me when you write "democrats are worse," so i can have a good chuckle.

It seems to me that you entertain yourself. I will leave you to it.

[mcsluggo]

..... We know that the truth was not told by the WH, that is not in question. What we don't know is the intent. It is reasonable to ask why we were lied to. That is why the all important "IF" is used in many of my posts. I don't feel as though I am an unbalanced poster, with regards to President Obama. I do, however, feel as though people have the right to know exactly what happened and to understand why the decision to be less then truthful were made. That is not unreasonable to ask.

This post is pure comedy gold... and i suspect that you HONESTLY don't even have an inkling to that fact.

[The Evil Genius]

I'm sorry. Darrell Issa's involvement in the "investigation" tells me everything I need to know about it.

[twa]

I suspect you should probably vete your news sources a bit better.

Perhaps you should read yours

the rest of the piece is more informative than a terrorist press release.

[ABQCOWBOY]

No. I did not.

Years ago, I was offered and almost accepted a Foreign Service Commission. I understand how this stuff works.

I appreciate your honesty here. I will not claim that I fully understand what is going on but, I do believe that, in light of what we know now, it is not unreasonable to ask for answers.

Why did you not accept the posting? I know that risk to both you and you family, is understood when considering such postings but I ask you, do you see the problem with not doing everything that can possibly be done to prevent what happened in Benghazi? Some may see the death of the Ambassador and the Seals as tragic but acceptable. I do not feel that way. I feel as if it was preventable but more to the point, I feel as if it is an imperative to go to any lengths to prevent such occurrences if at all possible. You can not have foreign services members worried that the U.S. will not be there if needed, to say nothing of our troops. I just feel like it's a part of the promise we make to these folks in return for their service. Perhaps I am wrong there but I do not believe I am.

I'm not sure what the solution to the dilemma is, but if you are trying to suggest that Darrell Issa's statements about politically-charged matters discussed in private can be taken at face value, I would suggest going back and reading some of what Darrell Issa regularly says about, well, everything.

Issa is not the issue. The point is that all of the evidence needs to be heard and that can't be done in a public forum. We can't have it both ways. We can't have the one hand demanding for a public council if you know that all information, much of it critical to providing answers, can not be presented in that forum. I think it has to be private to get all of the questions answered.

---------- Post added May-17th-2013 at 11:36 AM ----------

This post is pure comedy gold... and i suspect that you HONESTLY don't even have an inkling to that fact.

Believe what you wish but these facts have already been established. It is up to you to decide to accept them or not.

[Larry]

Ahh but we do have proof that the GOP doctored White House emails in order to create a controversy.

Just pointing out that I don't believe that we have any proof that the changes were made by the GOP.

(I think it's pretty likely that the person doing so was of that political leaning. But that's a long way from convicting an organization.)

Works both ways.

[Tulane Skins Fan]

We know that the truth was not told by the WH, that is not in question. What we don't know is the intent. It is reasonable to ask why we were lied to. That is why the all important "IF" is used in many of my posts. I don't feel as though I am an unbalanced poster, with regards to President Obama. I do, however, feel as though people have the right to know exactly what happened and to understand why the decision to be less then truthful were made. That is not unreasonable to ask.

That's not right, frankly. When those hearings were held everyone said "based on information we have to date..." and they told them what information they had that was unclassified. No one lied.

Let's back this story up though and try this one time.

A terrible event happened at a diplomatic post in one of the most unsecure countries in the world at the time. Unfortunately, 4 American's died due to the attack. Conflicting information led to the initial belief that the attack was spurred by demonstrations in the street. This was reported on talking points. In the next days, it became more clear that this was a coordinated terrorist attack. Less than a week after the attack, the administration and everyone associated with the attack acknowledged that this was a terrorist attack by al qaeda and like forces.

And since that time, people have claimed that everyone and their assistant LIED for four ****ing days about what happened in a place with no stable government on the other side of the world. What the **** is everyone's problem! You are furious that for four days you couldn't get your ****ing fix of terrorist news?

Its not as if Obama acknowledged this was a terrorist attack AFTER the election. It was front and center during the election. Give this whole "we need the whole truth" bull**** a rest. We don't know everything that goes on in war zones and, you know what, we never will.

Stop attaching any sort of intent to this. But back up and think about what this terrible mistake actually caused: a delay of less than a week in reporting the cause of the attack. Holy ****!

[PeterMP]

Well, at 6:07 ET, the day of the attack, the State Dept. sent an e-mail to the WH, the FBI, the Pentagon and other Government Agencies saying it was Ansar al-Shariah, which is a known terrorist linked to Al Qaeda. That's not in question. The link you present does not deny this other then to say that it was not soley Al Queda. That may or may not be true, I don't know but it is irrelevant to the central fact that it was a terrorist attack and it was known by the WH and all other agencies involved prior to the attack being over. To say otherwise is simply untrue. It had nothing, at all, to do with any Youtube video and it has already been proven that there was no MOB at the Consulate that somehow got out of hand and transformed into an attack. This attack was well planned and well orchestrated.

The talking points that were released by the WH that did not reflect what the CIA originally reported. With regards to the demonstration, I am referring to the Congressional Report that stated that there was no truth to the talking points stating that it was a demonstration that got out of hand.

http://www.speaker.gov/sites/speaker.house.gov/files/documents/libya-progress-report.pdf

At 2:30 ET, there was no evidence, what so ever, of any demonstration at the Consulate. This can be confirmed by the statements of Turkish Diplomats that were present at the time as well as State Department Officials who provided a daily briefing report from the Consulate. There was no mob, as was reported by both Rice and the WH. At 3:00 PM ET, Ambassador Stevens goes to bed with no sign of anything irregular. At 3:40 PM ET, the first reports of activity are reported. This was not a MOB seen that that got out of hand. It was a coordinated attack and what was reported as the sole called "YouTube" driven demonstration was completely false. The WH and all other agencies new it before it was ever reported.

The question isn't what do we know now, but what was known at the time.

And some sources were saying it wasn't a spontaneous protest and others were saying it was.

You can't simultaneously say they should have known that Ansar al-Shariah was involved because they admitted so it must have been a terrorists attack and ignore that Ansar al-Shariah was also saying it was the result of a spontaneous protest.

The NYT was reporting that people on the ground in Libya were saying their actions were due to the video and Libya's Interior Ministry was saying that he actually withdrew security because he didn't want to inflame people that were up-set about the video and make the situation worse:

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/13/world/middleeast/us-envoy-to-libya-is-reported-killed.html?pagewanted=all

The original CIA talking points said it was a demonstration that got out of hand and tied to the protests in Egyp, which were related to the YouTube video.

And that was the FIRST bullet point.

[Larry]

We know that the truth was not told by the WH, that is not in question. What we don't know is the intent. It is reasonable to ask why we were lied to. That is why the all important "IF" is used in many of my posts. I don't feel as though I am an unbalanced poster, with regards to President Obama. I do, however, feel as though people have the right to know exactly what happened and to understand why the decision to be less then truthful were made. That is not unreasonable to ask.

1) Could you please be specific as to this claim of "We know that the truth was not told by the WH, that is not in question."?

2) As to your claim of balance and all that, could you point us at all of the posts you've made, demanding equal levels of access into the decision to invade Iraq? Cause I'm an Old Fart, and my memory seems to be fading. I don't recall anybody, let alone you, demanding, say, access to all emails, by every single person in the Executive branch, in which the topic was discussed, and not only every single document, but every revision of every document.

[deejaydana]

Now's the time for JMS to log back on and remove the quotation marks in the OP Title surrounding the words cover up.

[Larry]

What proof is there that help could've arrived in time, mind you, AFTER the attack had begun?

I haven't seen a lot of people dispute this assertion. That there were some assets, which could have mede it to the fight, before the fight was completely over.

(Now, the implied claims that, if only those assets hadn't been leashed, then these deaths could have been prevented? And that the people making the decisions knew that the teams would have arrived in time? Well, far as I;m aware, nobody has even attempted to prove those. Just to try to hint at it real strongly, and to act like they've been proven.)

Didn't the GOP-controlled House vote "no" on more funding for embassy security?

Yes, they did. OTOH, I haven't seen any attempt to demonstrate that that vote actually affected anything, here.

It's a true statement. But not really relevant, near as I can tell.

---------- Post added May-17th-2013 at 02:24 PM ----------

Did you ask posters to do the same when GWB was in office?

Did you?

---------- Post added May-17th-2013 at 02:29 PM ----------

We remember that half the friggin' country hates him simply because his skin is of a certain pigmentation.

OT, and simply a statement of personal opinion, but I think your opinion is quite a bit off.

Granted, I think that Obama's race is part of the reason for the hatred of him, but I also think it's pretty much guaranteed that if Hillary had won, she'd have received roughly the same level of hatred.

But, OT, and just unsupported personal opinion.

[Predicto]

I appreciate your honesty here. I will not claim that I fully understand what is going on but, I do believe that, in light of what we know now, it is not unreasonable to ask for answers.

Why did you not accept the posting?

Because my wife also is an attorney, and she did not want to give up her career and follow me around the world as a diplomat's wife.

I know that risk to both you and you family, is understood when considering such postings but I ask you, do you see the problem with not doing everything that can possibly be done to prevent what happened in Benghazi? Some may see the death of the Ambassador and the Seals as tragic but acceptable. I do not feel that way.

This is what you do not seem to be understanding here. NO ONE here feels that it is acceptable. No one here feels that nothing should be done. No one here claims that mistakes were not made.

The push back you are getting here, and the reason that the Benghazi "scandal" isn't making any headway anywhere except in the far right and the conservative media, is entirely because of the presumptions that are being made about deceit, and bad motivation, and all the rest of the things that turn a tragedy into a "scandal." The Right has been trying to make this into "Benghazigate" from the beginning, the same way they did with Fast and Furious,but the story doesn't make any sense.

The reason that this is happening is because the far right assumes, up front, that Obama is bad and therefore does bad things for bad motivations all the time, and we can just assume lying and bad motivation and then cast about for facts to support the assumptions. In this world view, there is no room for nuances like imperfect information, bureaucratic inertia, multiple opinions, diplomatic concerns, tactical decisions not to place troops in harms way without sufficient support and information, etc. None of those things exist. All that exists is an opportunity to nail Obama, somehow.

I feel as if it was preventable but more to the point, I feel as if it is an imperative to go to any lengths to prevent such occurrences if at all possible. You can not have foreign services members worried that the U.S. will not be there if needed, to say nothing of our troops. I just feel like it's a part of the promise we make to these folks in return for their service. Perhaps I am wrong there but I do not believe I am.

.

No one thinks you are wrong. No one is arguing about that. It is almost intellectually dishonest to pretend that they are.

[ABQCOWBOY]

What proof is there that help could've arrived in time, mind you, AFTER the attack had begun?

It was re-fueling that was not possible.

Didn't the GOP-controlled House vote "no" on more funding for embassy security?

Rachel Maddow said it was a terrorist attack on her show, and explained it's retaliatory effects ON THAT VERY NIGHT. Those of us who watch real news/journalism knew what was going on all along. We (of course), were watching that night, but it's in her archives for everyone else.

The locations of at least two units, able to be on scene in anywhere from 3 to 6 hours. The entire re-fueling statement was misleading because neither unit would have required re-fueling of the necessary aircraft. The bigger concern would have been withdrawal of forces once committed. However, both units were trained to operate in country with little to no support. The idea would have been to fend off the attack, which could have been accomplished, until more support could have been brought to bear had that been necessary.

With regards to the GOP House Vote, yes they did vote no but that was because it was attached to a rider that the GOP did not want to approve. In fact, later in the year, the GOP supported an increase for funding of that budget and also keep in mind, it was not a decrease of cut of funding. It was originally a budget increase of 330 million that was voted against. The total budget that was ultimately approved was 2.37 Billion in 2012. That was slightly less then the 2.61 Billion originally requested. If the point you are trying to make is that it was the Budget Restraints that were the reason, well, I don't think that is accurate. The request for more people went back at least 3 years, prior to that attack so if it was a budget issue, then clearly it pre-dated the budget vote you are referring to. More to the point, forces could have easily been increased, if even temporarily, to bolster security at the Consulate. If nothing else, we could have simply removed personnel prior to 9/11, especially in light of the fact that a bombing had already taken place there. The point I am trying to make is that this should really not have been an issue as to why we did not take steps to insure safety IMO.

[Predicto]

Now's the time for JMS to log back on and remove the quotation marks in the OP Title surrounding the words cover up.

Wait, what? Do you even read the same threads as the rest of us?

[deejaydana]

Wait, what? Do you even read the same threads as the rest of us?

I certainly did Friendo. Is the Administration covert or are they simply bumbling. Obama wants the electorate to buy into activist govt yet when stuff blows up his fall back position is 'heck I don't know how this happemed!" It's a muddled message at best.

[Dan T.]

This is what you do not seem to be understanding here. NO ONE here feels that it is acceptable. No one here feels that nothing should be done. No one here claims that mistakes were not made.

The push back you are getting here, and the reason that the Benghazi "scandal" isn't making any headway anywhere except in the far right and the conservative media, is entirely because of the presumptions that are being made about deceit, and bad motivation, and all the rest of the things that turn a tragedy into a "scandal." The Right has been trying to make this into "Benghazigate" from the beginning, the same way they did with Fast and Furious,but the story doesn't make any sense.

The reason that this is happening is because the far right assumes, up front, that Obama is bad and therefore does bad things for bad motivations all the time, and we can just assume lying and bad motivation and then cast about for facts to support the assumptions. In this world view, there is no room for nuances like imperfect information, bureaucratic inertia, multiple opinions, diplomatic concerns, tactical decisions not to place troops in harms way without sufficient support and information, etc. None of those things exist. All that exists is an opportunity to nail Obama, somehow.

I had to quote this for emphasis. This encapsulates my overriding view of the issue.

[Larry]

Well, at 6:07 ET, the day of the attack, the State Dept. sent an e-mail to the WH, the FBI, the Pentagon and other Government Agencies saying it was Ansar al-Shariah, which is a known terrorist linked to Al Qaeda. That's not in question.

And it also said . . . ?

That may or may not be true, I don't know but it is irrelevant to the central fact that it was a terrorist attack and it was known by the WH and all other agencies involved prior to the attack being over. To say otherwise is simply untrue. It had nothing, at all, to do with any Youtube video and it has already been proven that there was no MOB at the Consulate that somehow got out of hand and transformed into an attack. This attack was well planned and well orchestrated.

Could you also provide some support for these claims?

(Maybe it's the same claim as the previous quote, I can't tell.)

The talking points that were released by the WH that did not reflect what the CIA originally reported.

I'm assuming that this means you have access to "The talking points that were released by the WH", and "what the CIA originally reported". Could you please provide them to us? In full?

With regards to the demonstration, I am referring to the Congressional Report that stated that there was no truth to the talking points stating that it was a demonstration that got out of hand.

Well, gee. We have a disparity between what the President said, hours after the attack, and what the Republican Party wrote, months later. This clearly proves that the President, at the time, knew that what he was saying was untrue.

[Predicto]

The locations of at least two units, able to be on scene in anywhere from 3 to 6 hours. The entire re-fueling statement was misleading because neither unit would have required re-fueling of the necessary aircraft. The bigger concern would have been withdrawal of forces once committed. However, both units were trained to operate in country with little to no support. The idea would have been to fend off the attack, which could have been accomplished, until more support could have been brought to bear had that been necessary.

Yes, and there are massive risks to such a blind operation with no back up. That is why we pretty much never do them. Add in an uncertain return on the risk, and lack of information on the size of the attack, and an immediate tactical decision had to be made as to whether it was feasable to send them, and someone made it. That is not a scandal.

The whole freaking idea that Obama would prefer to have the ambassador dead because it would give him some sort of unexplainable political advantage is utterly, utterly ridiculous. It only makes sense if you suspend your logic center in favor of your partisanship center.

---------- Post added May-17th-2013 at 11:44 AM ----------

I certainly did Friendo. Is the Administration covert or are they simply bumbling. Obama wants the electorate to buy into activist govt yet when stuff blows up his fall back position is 'heck I don't know how this happemed!" It's a muddled message at best.

So, when you write a post that asserts that a "cover up" has been proven, you really meant to say that maybe mistakes were made?

To me, those are two extremely different things.

[ABQCOWBOY]

]This is what you do not seem to be understanding here. NO ONE here feels that it is acceptable. No one here feels that nothing should be done. No one here claims that mistakes were not made.

The push back you are getting here, and the reason that the Benghazi "scandal" isn't making any headway anywhere except in the far right and the conservative media, is entirely because of the presumptions that are being made about deceit, and bad motivation, and all the rest of the things that turn a tragedy into a "scandal." The Right has been trying to make this into "Benghazigate" from the beginning, the same way they did with Fast and Furious,but the story doesn't make any sense.

The reason that this is happening is because the far right assumes, up front, that Obama is bad and therefore does bad things for bad motivations all the time, and we can just assume lying and bad motivation and then cast about for facts to support the assumptions. In this world view, there is no room for nuances like imperfect information, bureaucratic inertia, multiple opinions, diplomatic concerns, etc. They don't exist. All that exists is an opportunity to nail Obama, somehow.

No one thinks you are wrong. No one is arguing about that. It is almost intellectually dishonest to pretend that they are.

No, respectfully, you are wrong here. The difference here is that you view my opinion as attacking Obama. I view it as reasonable, in light of the untruths that have already been told by this administration with regards to Benghazi.

There are many posters here who won't even acknowledge many of the facts that are not in question. It is hard for me to accept that it is I who is being intellectually dishonest on this issue. However, if that is what it appears as to you, then you have my apology for that.

Regardless, we are owed the entire truth IMO. I hope you can understand why I believe this.

[Predicto]

No, respectfully, you are wrong here. The difference here is that you view my opinion as attacking Obama. I view it as reasonable, in light of the untruths that have already been told by this administration with regards to Benghazi.

There are many posters here who won't even acknowledge many of the facts that are not in question. It is hard for me to accept that it is I who is being intellectually dishonest on this issue. However, if that is what it appears as to you, then you have my apology for that.

Regardless, we are owed the entire truth IMO. I hope you can understand why I believe this.

I too believe we are owed the entire story. Please stop pretending that anyone disagrees.

Nevertheless, I believe the "untruths" are in your own mind (even though you appear to genuinely believe they exist). They were placed there by the heavily colored sources of information you consume, which tell you that any ambiguity or difference of opinion necessarily demonstrates deceit rather than imperfect information, bureaucratic inertia, multiple opinions, diplomatic concerns, etc.

"Deceit" can be created in the human mind in any situation if one listens to biased sources of information that happen to agree with one's own preexisting political leanings.

To convince other people, however, there needs to be evidence rather than speculation, and most importantly, the underlying story has to make sense. This one doesn't, which is why it isn't flying anywhere except places like Breitbart.

[ABQCOWBOY]

And it also said . . . ?

I don't know, what else did it say?

Could you also provide some support for these claims?

(Maybe it's the same claim as the previous quote, I can't tell.)

Yes, it was related but to answer, there are multiple reports that confirm that a MOB was not the source of the attack. That's what I was getting at.

I'm assuming that this means you have access to "The talking points that were released by the WH", and "what the CIA originally reported". Could you please provide them to us? In full?

I have them, as reported by CBS. Here is the link to the original talking points submitted by the CIA and a timeline of subsequent changes to those talking points.

http://abcnews.go.com/images/Politics/Benghazi%20Talking%20Points%20Timeline.pdf

Well, gee. We have a disparity between what the President said, hours after the attack, and what the Republican Party wrote, months later. This clearly proves that the President, at the time, knew that what he was saying was untrue.

Correct. However, I would clarify you statement by saying that the President stuck to his narrative on MOB Flash as late as the 24th of Sept, almost two full weeks after the attack. It was not simply a question of hours after.

[Predicto]

I don't know, what else did it say?

Yes, it was related but to answer, there are multiple reports that confirm that a MOB was not the source of the attack. That's what I was getting at.

And multiple reports that it was, and people disagreeing. That is called the fog of war.

I have them, as reported by CBS. Here is the link to the original talking points submitted by the CIA and a timeline of subsequent changes to those talking points.

http://abcnews.go.com/images/Politics/Benghazi%20Talking%20Points%20Timeline.pdf

Larry said: "Well, gee. We have a disparity between what the President said, hours after the attack, and what the Republican Party wrote, months later. This clearly proves that the President, at the time, knew that what he was saying was untrue."

Correct. However, I would clarify you statement by saying that the President stuck to his narrative on MOB Flash as late as the 24th of Sept, almost two full weeks after the attack. It was not simply a question of hours after.

I don't think you recognized the sarcasm in Larry's post.

[ABQCOWBOY]

I too believe we are owed the entire story. Please stop pretending that anyone disagrees.

I am not pretending anything. I am simply stating the facts as have been presented. You seem to think that by doing his, this somehow translates into me believing that I am the only person who wants this. That's not an accurate conclusion. Please try to be more accurate.

Nevertheless, I believe the "untruths" are in your own mind (even though you appear to genuinely believe they exist). They were placed there by the heavily colored sources of information you consume, which tell you that any ambiguity or difference of opinion necessarily demonstrates deceit rather than imperfect information, bureaucratic inertia, multiple opinions, diplomatic concerns, etc.

Right, it's the sources that are the problem. OK, and I'm the one who is trying to create a less then true narative. OK.

"Deceit" can be created in the human mind in any situation if one listens to biased sources of information that happen to agree with one's own preexisting political leanings.

If I may, what sources are you using to get factual info on this issue?

To convince other people, however, there needs to be evidence rather than speculation, and most importantly, the underlying story has to make sense. This one doesn't, which is why it isn't flying anywhere except places like Breitbart.

Fair enough, the next time I reference Brietbart as a source, feel free to chastise me. Agreed?

---------- Post added May-17th-2013 at 01:29 PM ----------

And multiple reports that it was, and people disagreeing. That is called the fog of war.

The Fog Of War for who? The Fog of War for people sitting 5000 miles away in Washington DC? I don't think so. I actually understand what the term "Fog Of War" is. That is not it.

I don't think you recognized the sarcasm in Larry's post.

Doubtful but you are welcome to come to your own conclusions on that.

[PeterMP]

Perhaps you should read yours

the rest of the piece is more informative than a terrorist press release.

My point though is you can't take part of a source that agrees with your opinion (they were involved) and ignore the rest (it was because of the video).

If their press release is evidence that they did it, then that it is also evidence that it is spontaneous and because of the video.

Or you can simply ignore all of it as an unreliable source.