The shifting Benghazi narrative

For crying out loud, what happened there, who knew what, and when, and why wasn’t it more secured? This is the first time since 1979 that a US ambassador was assassinated, and it’s a major story.

In the week that I’ve been out of commission but fully on top of the news, there’s been so much. So let’s take it chronologically.

On October 9th, HuffPo was reporting that the ‘official’ narrative broke down under scrutiny.

The deadly September attack on a U.S. consulate in Libya was not precipitated by an anti-American protest, as had originally been reported, the State Department disclosed Tuesday night. According to reports from ABC and the Associated Press, the State Department now acknowledges that “gunfire and explosions near the front gate” were the first signs of danger precipitating the attacks that killed Ambassador Christopher Stevens and three other Americans.

This revelation stands in contrast to the story originally reported by the Obama administration and others, who claimed that a protest against the anti-Islam film “The Innocence of Muslims” outside the American consulate was co-opted by violent extremists.

False. Totally false. Demonstrably false, as it would turn out to be.

The next day, ABC News’ Jake Tapper grilled White House Press Secretary Jay Carney, who withered under the questioning.

Jake Tapper of ABC asked White House spokesman Jay Carney if President Obama shot first and aimed later when he blamed the Benghazi attacks on a video.

“President Obama shortly after the attack told 60 Minutes that regarding Mitt Romney’s response to the attacks as specifically in Egypt, the president said that Romney has a tendency to shoot first and aim later. Given the fact that so much was made out of the video, that apparently had absolutely nothing to do with the attack in Benghazi, that there wasn’t even a protest ousiden the Benghazi post. Didn’t President Obama shoot first and aim later?”

It has only gotten curiouser since then.

The White House and Obama campaign deflected with a silly talking point about Gov. Mitt Romney wanting to do away with Big Bird, to the point where even the Sesame Street creator had to issue a response.

Sesame Workshop is a nonpartisan, nonprofit organization and we do not endorse candidates or participate in political campaigns. We have approved no campaign ads, and, as is our general practice, have requested that both campaigns remove Sesame Street characters and trademarks from their campaign materials.

But it was really aimed at the Obama campaign, which was using it to the hilt, to divert attention from the important issues, like Benghazi. And when they had to address that, they did so reluctantly, with excuses.

But quickly they were exposed as excuses. Though ABC News’ Martha Raddatz was perceived as more sympathetic to the Democrats, as moderator of the Vice-Presidential debates last Thursday she opened with a challengd for VP Joe Biden.

I would like to begin with Libya. On a rather somber note, one month ago tonight, on the anniversary of 9/11, Ambassador Chris Stevens and three other brave Americans were killed in a terrorist attack in Benghazi. The State Department has now made clear, there were no protesters there.

RADDATZ: It was a pre-planned assault by heavily armed men. Wasn’t this a massive intelligence failure, Vice President Biden?

Biden said they would bring justice to the men who did this, get to the bottom of it, and “wherever the facts lead us…we will make clear to the American public, because whatever mistakes were made will not be made again.”

Investigations have begun in Congress, the media got pulled in once Biden claimed the White House had no knowledge of Ambassador Stevens requesting more security, with a jarringly dissconnected reference to ‘the administration’ doing one thing and ‘the White House’ not knowing about it, though they consitute the one and same Executive Branch of government. And headlines reported that apparently they were throwing Secretary of State Hillary Clinton under the bus.

Monday, she seemed to comply, for whatever reason.

Hillary Clinton has taken responsibility for the deadly security breach at the US diplomatic mission in Benghazi, saying the buck stopped with her and not the White House.

The secretary of state took the blame in an interview to CNN on Monday night in what will be seen as an attempt to deflect Republican attacks on Barack Obama over the affair on the eve of the second presidential debate.

There is so much more to this story. And I trust, or at least hope, it will come out.