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Showing posts with label terrorist attack. Show all posts
Showing posts with label terrorist attack. Show all posts

Sunday, November 4, 2012

Facebook Censorship of Navy Seals for Anti-Obama Benghazi Scandal.




ANTI-OBAMA BENGHAZI MEME GETS CENSORED FOR ‘VIOLATING FACEBOOK’S STATEMENT OF RIGHTS AND RESPONSIBILITIES’

Posted on October 30, 2012 at 8:52pm by Jason Howerton
Facebook reportedly took down an image, or a meme, posted by the Special Operations Speaks PAC (SOS) that was critical of President Barack Obama’s handling of the terrorist attack on the U.S. compound in Benghazi. You may have actually seen it before it was taken down — it had earned roughly 24,000 “likes.”
The meme, which can be seen below, shows both Obama and deceased al-Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden with the following message: “Obama called the SEALs and THEY got bin Laden. When the SEALs called Obama, THEY GOT DENIED.”
Anti Obama Benghazi Meme Gets Censored From Facebook
(Source: Breitbart.com)
It was first taken down and the account was issued a warning. The account was later suspended for 24 hours for defying the warning and re-posting the image — with the warning above it.
The message is based on reports that indicate CIA operatives in Benghazi were told to “stand down” rather than help after Americans on the ground in Libya attempted to call out for help. Reports also suggest that the White House situation room had access to a live feed of the chaos at the U.S. compound as well as real-time email updates from within State Department.
Breitbart.com’s Awr Hawkins reportedly spoke with Larry Ward, president of Political Media, Inc., the company responsible for the SOS Facebook account.
“We created and posted this meme on Saturday after news broke that Obama had known and denied SEALs the backup they requested,” Ward told Breitbart.com.
He continued: “Once the meme was up it garnered 30,000 shares, approx. 24,000 likes, and was read by hundreds of thousands of people — all within 24 hrs. On Sunday, I went into the SOS Facebook page to post something else and found a warning from Facebook that we had violated Facebook’s Statement of Rights and Responsibilities with our meme. So I copied the warning, put it on the meme as as caption, and re-posted the meme to the Facebook page.”
Anti Obama Benghazi Meme Gets Censored From Facebook
(source: Breitbart.com)
The re-posted meme was removed within 8 hours before Facebook suspended the SOS PAC’s account for 24 hours.
Is this a violation of free speech or did SOS violate Facebook policy?

Facebook Claims -- Accidental Mistake -- in Censoring Navy SEALS

By Bobby Eberle October 31, 2012 12:34 pm

It's just a fact that over the six weeks, the media have completely checked out from their responsibility to investigate and report on the tragedy and complete failure of leadership surrounding the attack on the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi, Libya. Now, Facebook has joined in the mix by pulling down a meme from Special Operations Speaks (SOS) PAC which is critical of Obama's handling of the situation. Oh, but wait... now they say it's just an "innocent mistake."
Here's the story. First, the SOS PAC put together a meme for distribution on Facebook. For those of you not familiar with the term, a meme describes a small piece of information which gets spread across the Internet. In many cases, a meme is an image with text associated with it. The meme created by the Special Operations Speaks PAC is shown below:
This image was posted on Facebook, and that's when the controversy began.
According to information on the SOS PAC web site, the meme spread quickly and "within 24 hours almost 30,000 people shared and hundreds of thousands viewed the meme." Then, it disappeared for an "unspecified violation of Facebook's terms of Rights and Responsibilities."
This, of course, raised a major red flag with the organization:
"It looks like Obama's liberal followers in Facebook HQ are terrified of how damaging the Benghazi scandal is for the President. We understand that Facebook can run their site however they'd like, but when they're trying to quietly squelch opposition to what is a clear leadership failure that resulted in the tragic deaths of some of our nation's heroes, they deserve the to be called out on it," said Larry Bailey, CAPT (SEAL), USN (Ret).
"We are paying advertisers on Facebook. It is outrageous that Mark Zuckerburg, founder of Facebook, who worked to elect Obama in 2008, would sell out patriots who made the ultimate sacrifice - all to serve the political ambitions of the man who let them die."
As reported at Breitbart.com, the media company responsible for posting the meme received a warning from Facebook and then a 24-hour suspension because the meme was still being displayed.
But the story doesn't end there. After being warned and then suspended, the SOS PAC received the following message from Facebook:
Hello,
A member of our team accidentally removed something you posted on Facebook. This was mistake, and we sincerely apologize for this error. We've since restored the content, and you should now be able to see it.
The Facebook Team
What is Facebook trying to do? Let's just say that the removal of the meme was a mistake. Was the 24-hour suspension a mistake too? The truth needs to come out about what happened in Libya, and the last thing we need is an organization like Facebook trying to impede the show of support for getting to the bottom of the story.



source: http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Peace/2012/10/30/Facebook-Censors-Navy-SEALS-To-Protect-Obama-on-Benghazi-Gate

Facebook censors Navy SEALs for claiming Obama denied them help

Published: 01 November, 2012, 00:13

Facebook page of Special Operation Speaks PAC
Facebook page of Special Operation Speaks PAC

Social media giant Facebook has removed a message by the Special Operations Speaks PAC (SOS), which shed negative light on US President Obama for denying a request for military support in Benghazi before the deadly attack on the consulate.
The message came in the form of a meme, accompanied by an image of Obama, smiling while holding his ears, next to an image of former al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden.
“Obama called the SEALs and THEY got bin Laden,” the meme states. “When the SEALs called Obama, THEY GOT DENIED.”
The message sheds light on Obama’s failure to provide backup when the SEALs called for it in Benghazi, shortly before four Americans were killed in an attack that killed the US Ambassador to Libya.
Sources who were present during the six-hour assault claim that military assistance, which was only two hours away, was requested and denied even when the CIA safe house was under attack. The assault has become a controversial topic, with the White House having been unclear about how much it actually knew about the attack and the motivations behind it.
SOS is an anti-Obama group consisting of “veterans, legatees, and supporters of the Special Operations communities of all the Armed Forces,” the Facebook page states. After the page garnered 30,000 shared and 24,000 likes for the meme in just 24 hours, it was deleted by Facebook.
(Image from facebook.com)
(Image from facebook.com)
Larry Ward, the administrator of the SOS Facebook page, said he received a message that he had violated Facebook’s Statement of Rights and Responsibilities with out meme.
“So I copied the warning, put it on the meme as a caption, and re-posted the meme to our Facebook page,” he told Breitbart News. But after reposting the image, it was removed again and the SOS account was frozen for 24 hours.
Ward believes the meme was removed because it offended Obama supporters – including, he believes, members of the Facebook staff. It was posted just days before the presidential election, and its high number of shares could have made it influential.
“It looks like Obama’s liberal followers in Facebook HQ are terrified of how damaging the Benghazi scandal is for the President,” said former Navy SEAL Larry Bailey in a press release by SOS. “We understand that Facebook can run their site however they’d like, but when they’re trying to quietly squelch opposition to what is a clear leadership failure that resulted in the tragic deaths of some of our nation’s heroes, they deserve the to be called out on it.”
But Facebook denies that it purposefully censored the message, claiming the two-time deletion was simply a mistake.
“A member of our team accidentally removed something you posted on Facebook,” an e-mail from the social media giant told SOS. “This was a mistake, and we sincerely apologize for this error. We’ve since restored the content, and you should now be able to see it.”
The restored image currently has about 11,000 shares and 7,000 likes.
Posted at 01:00 PM ET, 10/31/2012

Facebook admits error in censoring anti-Obama message

By 


Special Operations Speaks' meme against President Obama. (Special Operations Speaks - Special Operations Speaks)Larry Ward will concede that he “poked the bear.” As president of the D.C.-based Political Media Inc., Ward administers theFacebook page of a group called Special Operations Speaks (SOS), an anti-Obama group consisting of “veterans, legatees, and supporters of the Special Operations communities of all the Armed Forces.” Essentially hard guys who want the president out of office. “These are the toughest sons of a guns out there and they say what they mean,” says Ward.
On Saturday, Ward woke up and realized he needed to post something on SOS’s page. He checked the news, which was still buzzing with Friday’s report by Fox News that a request for military support from besieged U.S. personnel in Benghazi “was denied by the CIA chain of command.” Ward’s takeaway was that it had become “more evident that Obama was responsible for denying the troops backup.”
Time to cook up a meme. Ward settled on a provocative one: “Obama called the SEALs and THEY got bin Laden. When the SEALs called Obama, THEY GOT DENIED.” It worked. Over the next day or so, the thing had racked up 30,000 shares, says Ward, noting that it “was by far the best meme we’d had to date.”
The meme had a touch of the mischievous in it as well. It tagged the picture of President Obama to his Facebook campaign page, a move that officially alerted Team Obama that its guy had been featured in a photo on the SOS page. In other words, it was guaranteed to antagonize the president’s supporters. And that's pretty much what happened, in Ward’s version of events. The next steps came quickly:
*Likely driven by offended Obamaites, Facebook sent Ward a warning about the meme. Take it down, said Facebook. Ward didn’t comply.
*Facebook took down the image, with this explanation, as discussed on a Breitbart.com story on the matter:
We removed content you posted.
We removed the content you posted or were admin of because it violates Facebook’s Statement of Rights and Responsibilities.
*Ward re-posted the image along with Facebook’s rationale for removing it.
*Facebook took the image down again and froze the account for 24 hours, in effect stifling SOS on Facebook.
After all that censorship and bureaucracy, Facebook is now acknowledging that it was a mistake. Here’s the note that Facebook’s Andrew Noyes passed along to the Erik Wemple Blog: “This was an error and we apologize for any inconvenience it may have caused. They can feel free to repost the image.”
What a privilege!
There’s no question about the inconvenience: SOS is a group that’s trying to influence political behavior through open communication, something that Facebook is in business to defend and promote, not to crush. That it did so with just more than a week left before the election poses more of a crisis than an inconvenience for SOS. As Ward notes, SOS “invested a lot” in the Facebook page and spent 12 weeks building the thing.
As for the meme itself, it might draw a snicker or two from journalism’s fact-checking police. After all, the Fox News report alleged that the CIA “chain of command” had denied military assistance for U.S. personnel in Benghazi, not Obama himself. Whatever — the meme was miles inside the bounds of acceptable political expression, not to mention Facebook’s own standards. It’s almost an insult to the meme to examine it vis-a-vis those standards, but here goes anyhow.
Facebook says “You will not bully, intimidate, or harass any user.” SOS merely voiced an opinion.
Facebook says “You will not post content that: is hate speech, threatening, or pornographic; incites violence; or contains nudity or graphic or gratuitous violence.” SOS was fully clothed.
Facebook says “You will not develop or operate a third-party application containing alcohol-related, dating or other mature content (including advertisements) without appropriate age-based restrictions.” SOS was kid-friendly.
Mistakes happen, for sure, yet Facebook made three or four in quick succession, evidence that this wasn’t just a goof. “They warned us once. They censored it twice and then they suspended our account,” says Ward. (Under Facebook terminology, a suspension is more severe than merely freezing the ability of the user to post). The social networking site reportedly has automated systems that police its content, though Ward says he received word that the censorship in this case came from a human being, and he cites this e-mail as proof:
Hello,
A member of our team accidentally removed something you posted on Facebook. This was mistake, and we sincerely apologize for this error. We’ve since restored the content, and you should now be able to see it.
The Facebook Team
Brevity doesn’t work here, Facebook. An accounting of just why a perfectly reasonable, catchy and inoffensive post, customized for the Internet, triggered a multi-step clampdown requires more than a couple of sentences. Attempts to get a more detailed accounting of the SOS incident from Facebook have failed.
SOS booster and retired U.S. Navy SEAL Larry Bailey puts the situation this way: “It looks like Obama’s liberal followers in Facebook HQ are terrified of how damaging the Benghazi scandal is for the President. We understand that Facebook can run their site however they’d like, but when they’re trying to quietly squelch opposition to what is a clear leadership failure that resulted in the tragic deaths of some of our nation’s heroes, they deserve the to be called out on it,”

CENSORSHIP and yes yet another Exec Order!!

October 30, 2012
The news is sad isn’t it?  Just when you think you’ve heard it all something else comes along that puts more knots in your stomach.  It’s never ending!  The situation in America just keeps getting worse!  Here are some stories today that demonstrate what I’m talking about other than the hurricane damage…….
FACEBOOK’S CENSORS NAVY SEALS!
It appears that Facebook has censored a group of Navy Seals for mentioning Obama in a post.  The group is known as the Special Operations Speaks PAC (SOS).  The group posted a message on Facebook critical of Obama saying he denied backup forces to come to the aid of forces under attack in Benghazi.  The post demonstrated how the SEALS supported Obama in their mission to kill Osama bin Laden but when the SEALS needed help Obama was nowhere to be found.  Surprised?  I’m not!
Apparently Facebook does not believe in the constitutional right to free speech and instead they’ve chosen to do what any good BANANA REPUBLIC would do and that is protect the Dear Leader.  This is disgusting!  Will there be an outcry over this on Facebook?  I doubt it as most people will think “so what?” and forget the whole thing.  That is…..until Facebook censors one of their posts.  In the comments section of the below article you’ll find several comments people have left concerning how they’ve already been censored by Facebook especially when their post concerns Obama!  One person had a GREAT IDEA.  “Daniel Martin Gray” who identifies himself as an American citizen and Ex-Progressive posted a comment saying, “If they are going to give us the business, all we have to do is take our business ELSEWHERE!”  And that is exactly what should now happen.  People ought not to stand for this censorship!  They should abandon Facebook in groves and go elsewhere!  Hey, no people equals no business for Facebook!  YOU made Facebook and YOU can take them down!  If we don’t stop this censorship soon it will only grow worse.  Do you really want your children growing up in a NAZI AMERIKA?
Oh one last thing regarding Facebook….they have also censored Alex Jones today.  He put up a pic of bin Laden with words across his chest saying “Al-CIA-da”.  Facebook removed it saying it violated copyrights and temporarily suspended Jone’s account.  Again CENSORSHIP!
OBAMA’S LATEST EO SANCTIONS CORPORATISM OFFICIALLY!!
On Oct 26, 2012 Obama signed another of his infamous Exec Orders this time establishing a WH Security Partnership Council which is classical FASCISM or as Benito Mussolini called it CORPORATISM….the merging of State and Corporation.  The EO creates local partnerships between federal and private companies to “address homeland security challenges” whatever the hell that means.  You can read more about this FARCE at:

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Tuesday, October 9, 2012

Time for Obama to Admit to the 9/11 Benghazi Attack Being Planned...Not Because of a Video.


SHOCK MEMO: STATE DEPT. REMOVED SECURITY IN LEAD-UP TO BENGHAZI ATTACK

In a new foreign policy headache for the embattled Obama administration, a memo has now leaked from the White House detailing numerous ways in which the U.S. Embassy in Libya warned Washington about an upcoming attack, according to Jake Tapper of ABC News.
The memo comes from the embassy’s “security support team,” a group of 16 special forces soldiers assigned to protect the embassy who were inexplicably removed from Libya in August over their commander’s objections, just one month before the attacks in Benghazi. That commander, Lieutenant Colonel Andy Wood, will testify about their removal before the House Oversight Committee this week. CBS News provides more on Wood’s story:
Speaking to CBS News correspondent Sharyl Attkisson, Wood said when he found out that his own 16-member team and a six-member State Department elite force were being pulled from Tripoli in August – about a month before the assault in Benghazi – he felt, “like we were being asked to play the piano with two fingers. There was concern amongst the entire embassy staff.”[...]
Wood insists that senior staff in Libya, including Ambassador Stevens, State Department Regional Security Officer Eric Nordstrom, and himself, all wanted and had requested enhanced security.
“We felt we needed more, not less,” he tells Attkisson.
Asked what response their repeated pleas got from the State Department in Washington, Wood says they were simply told “to do with less. For what reasons, I don’t know.”
“We tried to illustrate… to show them how dangerous and how volatile and just unpredictable that whole environment was over there. So to decrease security in the face of that really is… it’s just unbelievable,” Wood tells CBS News.





ABC adds more on the leadup in its print report:
The State Department pushed the American diplomats to develop plans to transition its security staffing to one that incorporated more locally based assets, but its ability to do so was “severely limited by a number of factors,” the February memo states, including inconsistent support from the Libyan government, no reliable “armed, uniformed host government security at our residential and office compounds,” no “real progress on the policy framework required to support a transition to an armed locally engaged body guard force,” silence from the Libyan Minister of Interior when it came to formal U.S. “requests for firearms licenses, training sites, or static, host nation security.”
The request concludes: “Given the unstable security environment, projected staffing increases, lack of physical and technical security upgrades in place and continued high volume of VIP visits, Embassy Tripoli requests an extension” of the Security Support Team for four months, which “will allow us to implement the security transition plans recommended by the Department. A loss of SST now would severely and negatively impact our ability to achieve the Department’s policy and management objectives at this critical time in Libya’s transition.”
But ultimately the SST left and “they just had to make do with less security,” Wood told ABC News.
It should be noted that Lieutenant Colonel Wood does not speculate as to whether his presence, or the presence of his team, would have made a difference in the protection of Ambassador Chris Stevens. However, his revelations about being “asked to play the piano with two fingers” may strike some observers as damning enough without that specific speculative indictment.
Bombshell: Obama Administration Deleted State Dept. Memo From Internet After Discovering Al-Qaeda Was Behind Benghazi Attack

Posted by Jim Hoft on Thursday, September 27, 2012, 9:17 AM

Yesterday there were reports that the Obama Administration found out that Al-Qaeda was behind the Benghazi consulate attacks within 24 hours of the assault that killed four Americans.
So what was their first action?
Did they secure the compound? – No, that took over a week to get FBI agents to the consulate
Did they acknowledge it was an Al-Qaeda attack? No, Obama this week blamed the terror attack on a YouTube protest.
Here’s what they did – They scrubbed a damning State Department memo from the internet–
On Wednesday September 12, 2012 blogger Speak With Authority discovered that five days before 9-11, the US State Department sent out a memo announcing no credible security threats against the United States on the anniversary of 9-11.
The Overseas Security Advisory Council, who posted the memo, is part of the Bureau of Diplomatic Security under the U.S. Department of State.
Here is a screengrab of the memo at the OSAC website:

The OSAC memo said:
Terrorism and Important Dates
Global
9/6/2012
OSAC currently has no credible information to suggest that al-Qa’ida or any other terrorist group is plotting any kind of attack overseas to coincide with the upcoming anniversary of September 11. However, constituents often have concerns around important dates, holidays, and major events, Often times, these concerns are the result of increased media attention to the issue, rather than credible evidence of a terrorist plot.
But now it’s gone.
The State Department scrubbed the letter from its OSAC website.

The damning memo is gone.
How convenient. They flushed the damning memo down the internet memory hole.

More details emerge on U.S. ambassador's last moments

By Arwa Damon, CNN
updated 7:59 PM EDT, Mon September 17, 2012

New details emerge about Libya attack




















Benghazi, Libya (CNN) -- Three days before the deadly assault on the United States consulate in Libya, a local security official says he met with American diplomats in the city and warned them about deteriorating security.

Jamal Mabrouk, a member of the February 17th Brigade, told CNN that he and a battalion commander had a meeting about the economy and security.

He said they told the diplomats that the security situation wasn't good for international business.
"The situation is frightening, it scares us," Mabrouk said they told the U.S. officials. He did not say how they responded.

Mabrouk said it was not the first time he has warned foreigners about the worsening security situation in the face of the growing presence of armed jihadist groups in the Benghazi area.

The main building in the compound is in charred ruins.

The suite where the body of the ambassador was found was protected by a large door with steel bars; the windows had steel bars.

His body was recovered after looters broke into the room. It appears his security detail left him in the room while they tried to deal with the attack.

There are numerous questions about what happened at the consulate where protesters had gathered to demonstrate against the film "Innocence of Muslims," which reportedly was made in California by a filmmaker whose identity is unclear.

Chief among the questions is what happened to U.S. Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens, who went missing during the attack.
The State Department has not released details about how Stevens died, though numerous media reports have said the ambassador was taken from the consulate to the Benghazi medical center by locals.

He arrived at the hospital, according to the reports, unresponsive and covered in soot from the fire. A doctor was unable to revive him and declared him dead, the reports said.

According to one of the Libyan security guards who was stationed at one of the gates armed with only a radio, the assault began simultaneously from three directions.

Heavy machine guns and rocket -propelled grenades were used, according to the guard. He said masked men threatened to kill him at gunpoint for 'protecting the infidels. He declined to appear on camera for fear of repercussions.

 read more at http://www.cnn.com/2012/09/15/world/meast/libya-diplomats-warning/index.html?hpt=hp_t2

CBS: State Department Told Benghazi Consulate To Stop Even Asking For More Security


And if that's not bad enough: A State Department official told Congressional staffers almost immediately after the attack that it was pre-meditated terrorism.
n a briefing to Capitol Hill staffers delivered the day after the deadly Sept. 11 attack in Benghazi, a top aide to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said the killings appeared to be the result of a terrorist attack.Under Secretary of State for Management Patrick F. Kennedy -- who exercises responsibility for all department personnel, facilities, and operations, and who is one of the department's most respected civil servants, having served in his position under both the George W. Bush and Obama administrations -- delivered the assessment in an unclassified, half-hour conference call with staff aides to House and Senate lawmakers from relevant committees, and leadership offices, on the evening of Sept. 12. Capitol Hill sources described the call to Fox News.
And yet the White House went out insisting it wasn't pre-meditated, and was a "spontaneous protest" due to an "internet video."

source: http://minx.cc/?post=333628
ERIN BURNETT OUTFRONT
Interview with Rep. Darrell Issa; Warning Signs in Benghazi; The Final Factors
Aired October 2, 2012 - 19:00   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

ERIN BURNETT, HOST: OUTFRONT, next, did Washington reject repeated requests for increased security in Benghazi? That's what happened, according to House Republicans in a letter sent to Secretary Clinton today. One of the authors of the letter, Representative Darrell Issa comes OUTFRONT.

Plus, we're just about 24 hours away from the first presidential debate. What are they going to say? We've got advisers to both of them, Mitt and Barack OUTFRONT tonight, and how a lot of money is riding on tomorrow's debate -- a lot.

Let's go OUTFRONT.

Good evening, everyone. I'm Erin Burnett. OUTFRONT tonight, warning signs missed? That's what the Republican head of the House Oversight Committee is charging tonight in the lead up to the U.S. ambassador's death in Libya. He's calling for Congress to return for a special hearing next week. It was a three-page letter and in it, Darrell Issa listed 13 security incidents and threats in Libya over the past six months. Including in June, a pro Gadhafi Facebook page posted a picture of Ambassador Stevens and mentioned his running habits. The posting directed a threat against Stevens. Issa says Stevens stopped his morning runs for about a week and then resumed them.

In June, an IED was successfully placed at the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi, blowing a hole in the security perimeter gate, big enough for 40 people to go through. And in the weeks before the September 11th attacks, unarmed Libyan guards working at the consulate were warned by family members to quit their jobs, because of, quote, "rumors in the community of an impending attack". Those are just a few of the 13 things that Darrell Issa listed. And he also included this major allegation.

According to Issa, "multiple U.S. federal government officials have confirmed to the committee that prior to the September 11th attack, the U.S. mission in Libya made repeated requests for increased security in Benghazi. The mission in Libya, however, was denied these resources by officials in Washington." Now the State Department has responded to Darrell Issa's letter. Here is spokeswoman Victoria Nuland.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

VICTORIA NULAND, STATE DEPT. SPOKESWOMAN: We are now working through all of the documents, all of the information that is available to us in this department. We will see where we are on the 10th, but it is our intention to cooperate fully.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BURNETT: All right. Hillary Clinton also responded to Issa with a letter of her own. I have it here. She said she has established an accountability review board, which begins work this week to determine, and I want to quote her, I'll read here to you straight from the letter, "wants to determine whether our security systems and procedures in Benghazi were adequate, whether they were properly implemented and any lessons that may be relevant to our work around the world." Darrell Issa joins me now. Good to see you, sir, and appreciate your taking the time tonight.

REP. DARRELL ISSA (R), CHAIRMAN, OVERSIGHT AND GOVERNMENT REFORM COMMITTEE: Well thank you. And thanks for covering this.

BURNETT: Let me start, if I may, sir, with the serious allegation that you've made. And this one -- as I just read the quote from your letter. That the U.S. mission in Libya made repeated requests for increased security in Benghazi, which were denied. Where did you get that information?

ISSA: We got it from whistle blowers and from confirmation from an interview with the former regional security officer, what is called an RSO, who actually has over 66 separate incidents that he recorded. We're not making any allegations. We're taking the facts that were brought to us, putting them in perspective, and asking the question, and getting, quite frankly concerns from the individuals that themselves that were responsible for security. And we're doing it not just for what is a done and sad situation in Libya. But because with the Arab Spring going on around the Arab world, the question is what are we doing in these other countries? Will we be ready or could this happen again?

BURNETT: So do you know who denied the security that you're saying was repeatedly denied?

ISSA: Well, we have a number of documents we have requested. Secretary Clinton has said that she is going to cooperate and provide. Those exchanges -- we want to make sure we look at all of the documents fully, rather than just, if you will, whistle blower side of the story. And that's the nature of our committee, is we get a credible and verified allegation of a failure anywhere, and then we follow it up with full confirmation on both sides and that's what we expect to do between now and the 10th with the goal on the 10th to make sure this doesn't happen again in some other embassy or with some other foreign service personnel around the world.

BURNETT: So it's interesting, because I know you're referencing you know an individual that you have information from saying that there were multiple security incidents. But this issue of repeated requests being denied I think is really at the heart -- from -- of what the letter says today. And the reason I wanted to ask you about the sources is because the State Department is telling CNN tonight that security upgrades were actually made to the Benghazi mission in part in response to some of the security incidents that you reference in your letter. So what are you talking about? It sounds like they got more security.

ISSA: Well, first of all, we want to hear fully from the State Department. We want to understand how they evaluated the threat, why there were so few people. Remember that we're not investigating per se the details the day that the ambassador and his party were killed. But let's understand, clearly he had almost no security on that day. Clearly, this was in a consulate that had been breached earlier with a hole -- an explosive hole that was described as a hole --

BURNETT: True.

ISSA: -- that 40 people could run through. So we already kind of know the awful end result. We know there wasn't enough security. That's not our investigation. Our investigation is really about the signs and whether there's a process. And I think Secretary Clinton is saying she wants to do the same thing. And our hope is that between now and October 10th, we go a long way toward doing what we need to do and expecting it will continue after.

BURNETT: Why do you think it has taken so long for the administration to come out and say this was a terrorist attack? Obviously, they did so formally on Friday, the intelligence community.

ISSA: Well, I served on the Select Intelligence Committee. It's filled with very conservative people who will often tell you that there may be a threat, there may be a threat, and then when something happens, even if it fits all of their claims, they still want to double and triple check. So I give the administration as much as I can the benefit of the doubt for the slowness. Again, though, whistle blowers, multiple confirmed whistle blowers have told us that they saw and reported what they saw as coming together of al Qaeda and testing our missions and the British missions. And that's part of what we want to ask is are these warning signs ones that should have been heeded and are there similar ones in Beirut or in Oman or in any number of other countries in the Middle East.

BURNETT: I'm curious, because you know you sound so -- you're very calm here. Your letter though was -- you know -- like I said, there were some real smoking guns in that letter, the allegations that were in there and I'm curious, given how calm you are tonight, given that you say you want to work with the secretary of state, why was it that Elijah Cummings, the ranking member of your committee tells us that you didn't ask him to sign the letter. You know you didn't do this in a bipartisan fashion.

ISSA: Well, first of all, I expect that the hearing will be bipartisan. A number of the Democratic members have already told me they'll be attending. I just got off of "Fast and Furious". We're not a committee that we've seen much cooperation, even when there's real wrongdoing that we're running to ground. In this case, there wasn't time to meet our statutory requirements, our rule requirements. And quite frankly we had a meeting with state in which the -- Mr. Cummings, his representatives were there. We asked these questions. This letter is based on specific allegations from whistle blowers, confirmed by the regional security officer, and then put into a letter. So they're not allegations by us. They're actual statements by individuals who were on the ground, both in Tripoli and Benghazi. And we are pursuing this on a bipartisan basis. To be honest, Mr. Cummings was helpful when I called him and asked for this interview with the regional security officer and he helped make it happen the same day, so we do have a working relationship. We do not often sign on to letters partially because that can take several days --

BURNETT: And what about --

ISSA: But I think the letter is --

BURNETT: I just want to ask you -- sorry -- a final question though about the timing of this. Obviously, it's important to know who knew what, when, and if the ball was dropped. I don't know if there is any American, Democrat or Republican who would disagree with you on that, but why next week? Why ahead of the presidential election when you yourself just said look I understand that sometimes it takes time to get the final answers?

ISSA: Erin, we sent a letter on September 20th that wasn't responded to as of yesterday. Subcommittee Chairman Chaffetz sent that letter. So we started this right away. We continued pursuing it. But let's understand men and women are serving us overseas around the world. And if what happened in Libya happens again because we waited until after election, 30 or 60 days, then we haven't done our job. The secretary is working right now before the election. She has put together a panel to start looking at this. We're doing our job, too. And just because it's an election doesn't mean members of Congress shouldn't work, including fact-finding and that's what we're doing. We're doing it as timely as we can. Candidly, I would have preferred that the September 20th letter had been responded to sooner.

BURNETT: Fair enough. All right, well thank you very much, Chairman Issa. We appreciate your time tonight. So the question continues. Were warning signs missed? Well, the man who briefed Ambassador Stevens is standing by. But first was key intelligence about the attack in Benghazi left out of a memo used to brief Congress and the American people? Intelligence like the involvement of al Qaeda linked groups which CNN has reported U.S. intelligence knew about within 24 hours. Well last night CNN reported that the White House chose to leave out some intelligence from information shared with the public about the attack, the so-called talking points you've heard so much about.

The talking points that Ambassador Susan Rice used on Sunday talk shows that emphasized an initial assessment that the attack began as a spontaneous protest, that it didn't appear to be planned. The White House's National Security Council spokesman Tommy Vietor tells CNN the White House was not involved in writing that memo. Elise Labott has been following this story and she is back with us tonight. And Elise, I know you have been working fast and furious on this. What was the memo and what did it say?

ELISE LABOTT, CNN FOREIGN AFFAIRS REPORTER: Well Erin, what senior administration officials are telling us that they were speaking from unclassified talking points that were provided by the intelligence community based on preliminary intelligence assessments, which were used in the briefing members of Congress and speaking about it publicly. Now, we know, as you said, there was other information reporting from our sources saying there were indications of possible terror involvement. But National Security Council spokesman Tommy Vietor says they didn't have that information and in a statement I want to read to you he says "this was an intelligence community assessment based on the analysis of all of the available information."
source: http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/1210/02/ebo.01.html

Leaked memo shows plane was denied US Benghazi consulate

A leaked memo shows the US State Department rejected a request to retain a plane for its security team in Libya, raising further questions about the protection provided for diplomats in Benghazi.

Leaked memo shows plane was denied US Benghazi consulate
US Ambassador to Libya Chris Stevens was killed in an attack on the US Consulate in Benghazi
source: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/northamerica/usa/9590374/Leaked-memo-shows-plane-was-denied-US-Benghazi-consulate.html




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Wednesday, October 3, 2012

Comedian Jon Stewart Knows What's Up In Benghazi but Obama Still Doesn't...and WHO are YOU Voting for?



Comedian Stewart Mocks White House Response To Consulate Attack

Comedian Jon Stewart took aim at the Obama administration’s fumbled response to the recent attacks on the U.S. diplomatic outposts in Libya.
Stewart unveiled a new segment on Monday night called, “Do You Guys Ever Talk To Each Other Or…”
The satire mocked the uncoordinated response from President Barack Obama and his administration following the Sept. 11 attack on the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi that resulted in the deaths of four Americans, including U.S. Ambassador to Libya, J. Christopher Stevens.
The White House, through its press secretary, had initially declined to label the incident an act of terrorism, emphasizing the ongoing investigation. The administration also pointed to the anti-Islam video that had triggered violent protests throughout the Middle East.
Stewart then pointed to a host of others who did call it a terrorist attack, including Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.
Obama later appeared on The View, where he said the attack clearly wasn’t just a “mob action.”
“And?” Stewart asked. “Is there some middle ground? A cynic would argue he is unwilling to admit the embassy was hit by terrorists because it would make him look bad.”
A CNN report confirmed the assault as a terrorist attack after 24 hours.
“Well, two things apparently have become clear,” Stewart concluded. “The attack on our embassy was planned and coordinated. The response to it — not so much.”
Stevens, 52, was the first sitting U.S. ambassador to be killed in a violent attack since 1979.
Officials said the ambassador, who was stationed at the embassy in Tripoli, was visiting the consulate at the time of the attack. The apparent cause of his death was smoke inhalation, according to several U.S. officials briefed on the attack, although the State Department has not confirmed that.
Stevens and the other Americans were killed when a mob of protesters and gunmen overwhelmed the consulate, setting fire to it in outrage over a film that ridicules Islam’s Prophet Muhammad. Stevens died as he and a group of embassy employees went to the consulate to try to evacuate staff as a crowd of hundreds attacked the consulate, many of them firing machine-guns and rocket-propelled grenades.
By the end of the assault, much of the building was burned out and trashed.
article source:  http://atlantablackstar.com
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