The Benghazi Cover-up
UNORDERED MATERIAL
Methods Of The Madness
This is as good a time as any to mention some of the tactics of deceit that get used in a cover-up such as this. Let’s first define our terms. What’s a cover-up?
For a working definition and description, I’ll use what Wikipedia has posted for November 16th.
A cover-up is an attempt, whether successful or not, to conceal evidence of wrongdoing, error, incompetence or other embarrassing information. In a passive cover-up information is simply not provided; in an active cover-up deception is used.
One of the primary tactics used by the people perpetrating a cover-up is denying that a cover-up exists at all. As arch-villain and master of deceit Keyzer Soze said in the film The Usual Suspects:
“The greatest trick the Devil ever pulled was convincing the world he didn’t exist.”
Speaking of masters of deceit, let’s talk about the Clintons for a moment. Let’s harken back to the halcyon days of the Clinton Lewinsky scandal.
President Bill Clinton’s performance was a Master’s Class in the art of the cover-up. You had parsing, innuendo, discrediting, behind the scenes intimidation, feigned outrage, plausible deniability and more. The world was able to see the full range of what power, lust, power-lust, a fine Ivy League legal education and absolutely no ethical basement was capable of.
Of course, I’m not bringing up Bill Clinton as a random example; Benghazi is a Clinton scandal as much as it is an Obama scandal. It’s got Clintonian cover-up fingerprints everywhere. Look no further than the heavy involvement of Clinton created Media Matters for America, which I’ll discuss in depth later.
But I want to discuss the Lewinsky scandal for a moment because today, we all know that Bill Clinton was lying. That’s settled fact. Whether you think the offense was major or minor, we know that Bill Clinton had a sexual relationship with Monica Lewinsky. We also all know that he and his wife Hillary Clinton used a variety of tactics and techniques to mislead the American people about that fact.
In the public’s mind right now, whether Benghazi is a scandal of any sort is far from settled fact. In fact, you may be among those who remain skeptical that there’s a cover-up at all.
So, under the assumption you’re reserving judgment on Benghazi, let’s find a place where we can agree about some other topic. I’m using Clinton / Lewinsky as our common ground.
So, the first thing to point out is simple: these people will lie. They’d done it before, shamelessly and without concern for victims. Hillary Clinton was an active part of the Lewinsky cover-up.
Of course, because Hillary Clinton has lied in the past doesn’t mean she is lying now. People can and do lie all the time and that doesn’t invalidate anything and everything they say.
Still, there’s a real qualitative singularity about the way the Clintons lied in the Lewinsky scandal. Many men cheat on their wives. Few use every means at their disposal to actively destroy and discredit the woman they cheated with. Few use a public forum and acting skills to lie to the world about their cheating, as Pres. Clinton did with his finger wagging “I did not have sexual relations with that woman” scene. That is some epic, ubermensch level lying.
Part of the problem with the Clintons and Barack Obama is simple. They are lawyers.
I don’t mean this as a pithy insult. I mean it is actually part of the problem. The esteemed reference source The Urban Dictionary has a good summary of the lawyer problem in a section on ‘plausible deniability’:
Because many lawyers are in politics, they brought this lower standard of ethics and integrity with them. This is why they rarely put anything controversial in writing. This is also why they most often have you talk to an underling or an agency bureaucrat so they can plausibly deny knowledge of the conversation or be able to say the underling or bureaucrat misstated their position.
Clinton-Lewinsky also showed the war mentality of the Clintons. They are ruthless, vicious and constantly looking for a political edge. Again, many men cheat. Few have their wives denigrate the people who accuse them of an affair as being part of a vast conspiracy. As Hillary Clinton told Matt Laer in 1998:
I do believe that this is a battle. I mean, look at the very people who are involved in this — they have popped up in other settings. This is — the great story here for anybody willing to find it and write about it and explain it is this vast right-wing conspiracy that has been conspiring against my husband since the day he announced for president.
The same people who believed Bill and Hillary Clinton then are likely the same people who believe Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton now.
The arguments they use are fallacious. Let’s go over a few of them, which are commonly very weak:
- “Well, what about Bush and Cheney?” This is a simple non-sequitur; an attempt to change the subject. No rhetorical value.
- “The only people talking about Benghazi are right-wing nut jobs.” Ad hominem; nothing more than an insult.
- “I read Dylan Davies lied on 60 Minutes, so Benghazi is discredited.” Fallacy of hasty generalization. One person lying about one subject doesn’t disprove other statements made about that subject.
Copyright Lee Stranahan 2013
LeeStranahan.com
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