New testimony on Benghazi

The Obama administration botched its immediate response to last September’s deadly attacks on the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi, Libya, then misled the public about them, according to State Department officials testifying this week before a House committee. Gregory Hicks, the Libyan embassy’s deputy chief of mission, said he tried to get military assistance to Benghazi as the attacks were underway, but that troops in Tripoli were ordered not to fly there. The attacks left four Americans dead, including Ambassador Chris Stevens.

Hicks said he briefed then–Secretary of State Hillary Clinton during the search for Stevens, and that he had told Washington earlier that evening that the consulate had been attacked by terrorists, not by angry protesters, as U.N. Ambassador Susan Rice later claimed on five Sunday morning talk shows. “I never reported a demonstration,” he said. “I reported an attack.” Mark Thompson, a coordinator in the State Department’s counterterrorism bureau, said he believed the White House willfully lied about the attacks.

Now it’s more obvious than ever that the White House was quickly informed about the deadly, sustained attack in Benghazi, said Jed Babbin in Spectator.org. Yet “they did nothing,” even though the military had a “host of assets” just hours away. Republicans now have a “‘where’s the beef?’ question” on Benghazi: Why didn’t the Obama administration “attempt to rescue Americans under fire”?

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Actually, it did, said Dave Weigel in Slate.com. A CIA response team was on the scene before the attacks were over. This is a “disagreement about tactics,” not a cover-up. This hearing wasn’t really about Benghazi, said Howard Fineman in HuffingtonPost.com. Its sole purpose was to embarrass the president and “tarnish Clinton’s lofty image as the early 2016 frontrunner.”

These officials do “seem credible,” said Alex Seitz-Wald in Salon.com.But Republicans are discrediting themselves by “pushing bogus story lines” on Benghazi, and trying to turn it into a second Watergate. The GOP has cried wolf on Benghazi so often that whatever minor scandal they do eventually dig up, mainstream America is unlikely to care.