Benghazi: Where Was President Waldo During Attack?

 

IBDEditorials.com

Benghazigate: The lack of a timeline for what the commander-in-chief was doing the night terrorists murdered our ambassador to Libya and three others is an "irrelevant fact," according to a key White House aide.

Playing the role Sunday of former U.N. Ambassador Susan Rice, who last Sept. 16 went on all five talk shows to parrot the administration line that Benghazi was provoked by a video, was White House senior adviser Dan Pfeiffer.

Following in Rice's footsteps, he announced that the details of where President Obama was and what he was doing that fateful night were an "irrelevant fact."

"Fox News Sunday" host Chris Wallace tried to pin down why we have pictures of Obama sitting in the Situation Room the night Osama bin Laden was killed, but on the night Ambassador Christopher Stevens and three other Americans were killed we don't have so much as an artist's sketch.

"The president was kept up to date on this as it was happening throughout the entire night, from the moment it started till the end," Pfeiffer said.

So he didn't go to bed that night to rest up for his Las Vegas fundraiser the next day? Pfeiffer wouldn't elaborate.

Pressing Pfeiffer to fill in the blanks, Wallace noted that Obama was with Defense Secretary Leon Panetta and Joint Chiefs Chairman Martin Dempsey in a previously scheduled meeting on the afternoon of Sept. 11, around the time the Benghazi attack started.

And Hillary Clinton, the secretary of state at the time, said she spoke to the president at 10 p.m. on the night of the attack.

"The question here is not what happened that night," Pfeiffer responded to Wallace. "The question is what are we going to do to move forward ensuring that this doesn't happen again."

Undaunted, Wallace told Pfeiffer, "You didn't answer my question. What did the president do that night?"

To which Pfeiffer answered: "He was kept — he was in constant touch that night with his national security team and kept up to date with the events as they were happening."

Really? When? Where? By whom?

Wallace tried again: "When you say his national security team, he didn't talk to the secretary of state, except for the one time when the first attack was over. He didn't talk to the secretary of defense. He didn't talk to the chairman of the Joint Chiefs. Who was he talking to?"

Maybe he was talking to himself in his sleep, for all we have are the assurances of paid staffers.

At one point an exasperated Wallace said:

"Here's the point, though. The ambassador goes missing, ends up the first ambassador in more than 30 years killed. Four Americans, including the ambassador, are killed. Dozens of Americans are in jeopardy.

"The president at 4 o'clock in the afternoon says to the chairman of the Joint Chiefs to deploy forces. No forces are deployed. Where is he while all this is going on?"

Under questioning from South Carolina Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham, Panetta could not explain why the president spoke with him only once on Sept. 11 during the attack, and never called back for any updates for more than seven hours.

We don't know — and despite Secretary Clinton's subsequent rant, it still matters now. And despite Pfeiffer's obfuscation, it is highly relevant.

When Clint Eastwood talked to an empty chair at the GOP National Convention last summer, everyone laughed. Well, there was an empty chair in the Situation Room the night of Sept. 11, 2012, when four Americans were being murdered by terrorists, and no one is laughing.

It's called dereliction of duty, Mr. Pfeiffer.