By Rich Lowry
Tuesday, February 12, 2013
The Obama White House is to be congratulated. It has
executed one of the most effective stonewalls in recent memory over the
Benghazi attack last September 11 that killed our ambassador to Libya and three
others. Its handling of the aftermath of the debacle is a model example of the
power of obfuscation and delay. Future high-ranking officials please take note:
This is how it is done.
All the smart PR gurus say it is best to release bad news
as soon as possible “to get ahead of the story,” as the phrase goes. The Obama
White House wasn’t foolish enough to follow this hackneyed advice. It advanced
laughably implausible explanations for the attack from the first and has
refused to provide a full accounting of its handling of it to this day.
The price it has paid for its lack of forthrightness is
basically nil. Ambassador to the U.N. Susan Rice, a prominent mouthpiece for
the initial spin (that the attacks were prompted by an offensive video),
couldn’t become secretary of state, although that might not have been in the
cards anyway. But every good stonewall needs someone willing to take one for
the team. Thank you, Ambassador Rice.
The imperative for the White House was, first, to try to
deny that the assault was a coordinated terrorist attack lest that undermine
its anti-terror credentials and, second, to push further consideration of the
matter past the November election. After that, there would be, by definition,
no electoral consequences from more fallout. And it all would be “old news.”
So the Accountability Review Board report from the State
Department was scheduled to hit . . . in December. When asked about Benghazi
during the campaign, the president could aver, “Nobody wants to find out more
what happened than what I do.” White House spokesman Jay Carney repeatedly said
that the matter was under the fullest possible review by the Accountability
Review Board, which would keep on reviewing all the way until the week before
Christmas.
Of course, President Barack Obama always knew what he did
or did not do during the course of the eight-hour attack that started at the
consulate and continued at a safe house, where two security personnel were
killed. If he had covered himself in glory, surely he or someone close to him
would have let reporters know.
Instead, nothing. Time passed, and he won reelection.
When Congress got around to its Benghazi hearings during the past few weeks,
“Benghazi” had become a watchword for right-wing obsessiveness and lack of
perspective. Polite commentators could barely suppress a snicker when uttering
the word.
Last week, outgoing secretary of defense Leon Panetta
revealed under questioning that after a previously scheduled meeting with the
president at the White House at 5 p.m. at the outset of the attacks, he had no
other communication from the president or anyone else at the White House the
rest of the night. Neither, according to his own testimony, did chairman of the
Joint Chiefs Martin Dempsey. This raises the question of what President Obama
was doing during the long hours of an attack that killed a U.S. ambassador for
the first time since 1979.
Or it should raise the question. The press isn’t much
interested in asking it. Given the opportunity to query the president directly
in his joint interview with President Obama and Secretary of State Hillary
Clinton, Steve Kroft of 60 Minutes stuck to more pressing matters, like any
sense of guilt Clinton might feel about not preventing the attacks.
Republican senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina vows
to hold up Obama-administration nominees until he gets answers. His
determination is admirable, but by now, no one really cares. The stonewall
worked, alas. PR experts might want to rewrite their rules, at least for
clients who can count on a compliant press. Benghazi was a fiasco. The handling
of its aftermath by President Obama and his team was brilliant. I guess that’s
why they call him the commander-in-chief.
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