Benghazi might not be over as an issue in 2016 after all. At least not if Rand Paul has anything to say about it.

Courtesy of The Hill:  

Paul, a likely 2016 presidential contender, criticizes potential rival Hillary Clinton, who was secretary of State during the attacks, and vows to seek the truth about Benghazi. 

"This new Benghazi ‘intelligence’ report is little more than a C.Y.A. attempt designed to protect incompetent politicians and government agents at the expense of justice for the victims of September 11, 2012," Paul writes in an op-ed for Breitbart, a conservative website, using an acronym for "cover your ass." 

The report in question was issued by the House Intelligence Committee before Thanksgiving, and counters several claims made by some Republicans critical of the Obama administration's handling of the 2012 attacks that killed four Americans in Benghazi. 

The report found that "there was no intelligence failure prior to the attacks," "no evidence" of a stand down order to U.S. personnel responding to the assault and no CIA operation to secretly ship arms from Benghazi to Syria. 

Paul expresses skepticism at the report’s findings.

Now this is important because lately Rand Paul has been working pretty hard to portray himself as far less wingnutty than we know him to be. (Remember Paul has a fifteen year relationship with professional lunatic Alex Jones, and was once a frequent guest on his radio show.)

So for Paul to ignore the fact that this is just the latest of several investigations into Benghazi, all of which turned up no evidence of malfeasance on the part of the White House, nor any attempt to launch a coverup.

Now personally I expected certain individual to speak out against these findings, and so they have including Senator Lindsey Graham ("Full of crap!"), former Congressman Allen West, and various other Right Wing types. However I thought that Rand Paul was attempting to resist the conspiratorial whispers from the voices in his head and continue straightening his hairpiece and trying to play the grownup.

However I believe I may have given him too muhc credit. Take a look at how he justifies his reticence in accepting the findings of the report: 

"None of these accusations contain even a modicum of truth?" he asked. 

He points to a Fox News report that U.S. security personnel said the top CIA officer in Benghazi prevented them from responding faster, and to multiple articles on arms smuggling from Libya to Syria. 

"The Obama Administration has tried to paint members of Congress who ask these questions as somehow being extreme or crazy — and perhaps the House Intelligence Committee will now follow suit," Paul writes. "But remember, this is the same administration that called the investigation into the IRS scandal a product of a 'conspiracy theory.' "

So to support his faith that there really is a Benghazi scandal, despite the fact that his has been debunked, Paul turns to the IRS "scandal," which has also been debunked.

Awesome plan.

Senator Lindsey Graham responds to report by the Republican led House Intelligence Committee exonerating the White House over Benghazi as you might expect: "I think the report is full of crap."

Courtesy of The Hill: 

Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) on Sunday blasted a House GOP-led investigation that recently debunked myths about the 2012 Benghazi attack. 

“I think the report is full of crap,” Graham said on CNN’s “State of the Union.” 

After Graham was asked whether the report exonerates the administration, he initially ignored the question, and then eventually said “no.” 

The House Intelligence panel, Graham said, is “doing a lousy job policing their own.” Graham didn’t clearly pinpoint why he dismissed the report’s findings, but suggested its information was provided by people in the intelligence community who had previously lied to Congress about the attack. 

“I don’t believe the report is accurate given the role [former CIA deputy director] Mike Morell played in misleading the Congress on two occasions,” Graham said. 

Host Gloria Borger said the report found no one lied. 

“That’s a bunch of garbage,” Graham replied.

I swear if this keeps up Graham might have to go lie down on his fainting couch with a chilled mint julip. 

After all what part of "Benghazi! Benghazi! Benghazi!" did this intelligence committee not understand?

Republican led House investigative committee finds there is no Benghazi scandal. Gee, really?

Courtesy of Mother Jones:

 The House Select Intelligence Committee—controlled by Republicans—has been investigating the Benghazi attacks in minute detail for two years. Today, with the midterm elections safely past, they issued their findings. Their exoneration of the White House was sweeping and nearly absolute. So sweeping that I want to quote directly from the report's summary, rather than paraphrasing it. Here it is: 

The Committee first concludes that the CIA ensured sufficient security for CIA facilities in Benghazi....Appropriate U.S. personnel made reasonable tactical decisions that night, and the Committee found no evidence that there was either a stand down order or a denial of available air support.... 

Second, the Committee finds that there was no intelligence failure prior to the attacks. In the months prior, the IC provided intelligence about previous attacks and the increased threat environment in Benghazi, but the IC did not have specific, tactical warning of the September 11 attacks. 

Third, the Committee finds that a mixed group of individuals, including those affiliated with Al Qa'ida, participated in the attacks.... 

Fourth, the Committee concludes that after the attacks, the early intelligence assessments and the Administration's initial public narrative on the causes and motivations for the attacks were not fully accurate....There was no protest. The CIA only changed its initial assessment about a protest on September 24, 2012, when closed caption television footage became available on September 18, 2012 (two days after Ambassador Susan Rice spoke).... 

Fifth, the Committee finds that the process used to generate the talking points HPSCI asked for—and which were used for Ambassador Rice's public appearances—was flawed.... 

Finally, the Committee found no evidence that any officer was intimidated, wrongly forced to sign a nondisclosure agreement or otherwise kept from speaking to Congress, or polygraphed because of their presence in Benghazi. The Committee also found no evidence that the CIA conducted unauthorized activities in Benghazi and no evidence that the IC shipped arms to Syria. 

It's hard to exaggerate just how remarkable this document is. It's not that the committee found nothing to criticize. They did. The State Department facility in Benghazi had inadequate security. Some of the early intelligence after the attacks was inaccurate. The CIA should have given more weight to eyewitnesses on the ground. 

But those are routine after-action critiques, ones that were fully acknowledged by the very first investigations. Beyond that, every single conspiracy theory—without exception—was conclusively debunked. There was no stand down order. The tactical response was both reasonable and effective under the circumstances. The CIA was not shipping arms from Libya to Syria. Both CIA and State received all military support that was available. The talking points after the attack were fashioned by the intelligence community, not the White House. Susan Rice followed these talking points in her Sunday show appearances, and where she was wrong, it was only because the intelligence community had made incorrect assessments. Nobody was punitively reassigned or polygraphed or otherwise intimidated to prevent them from testifying to Congress.

Okay does anybody else feel that this should be national news on ALL cable and network news outlets? Including Fox?

And not only that I feel that the Republicans should also apologize to President Obama and Hillary Clinton for essentially accusing them of allowing Americans to die and treason.

Of course that would never happen. But it should.

So I guess the Republicans will now simply shift their focus to attacking Obamacare again and suing the President for doing his job.

Different shit, same bunch of assholes.