The Convoluted Campaign Against Susan Rice

[struggle4progress]

By Margaret Carlson
Nov 28, 2012 6:30 PM ET

... It doesn’t make sense unless you’re just looking for conflict or are up for re-election. As it happens, McCain, the grumpy old man of the Senate, is often spoiling for a fight, and the ally of the man who defeated him four years ago is a satisfying target. And Graham, who must face voters in the red state of South Carolina in two years, already features his dispute with Rice in campaign ads ...

Rice did admit that she was wrong about what happened in Benghazi -- but that got lost when the story got a new twist. Acting Central Intelligence Agency Director Michael Morell, who accompanied Rice, said it wasn’t the director of national intelligence or the CIA that provided edited intelligence to Rice. It was the Federal Bureau of Investigation. After the meeting, the CIA changed its story and said that it did, in fact, change some details ...

If you believe Rice was relying on intelligence given to her, whether it was collected jointly or separately -- or even if it helped paint a picture of what happened that the White House liked -- doesn’t really matter. On Benghazi, Rice will always be the messenger, not an actor. It will be left to Pickering to sort out who did what to her talking points ...

Then again, this story is getting pretty convoluted. It’s hard enough to know what really happened in Benghazi in September. It’s harder still to implicate Rice in some kind of cover-up. This week’s events will undoubtedly provide more fodder for another round of Sunday-morning talk shows. But the story McCain and Graham are trying to sell is getting harder and harder to swallow.

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-11-28/the-convoluted-campaign-against-susan-rice.html

[gateley]

1. Last night Rachel tossed out that maybe they want Kerry's Senate seat so are supporting

him and fighting Rice. Makes sense to me.

[Joanie_in_MiddleMass]

2. Kerry's Seat

Just because Brown beat Coakley and lost to Warren by just a few (8?) points does not mean he'd win against anyone else. Coakley ran a miserable campaign, and Warren's was not a whole lot better. Brown's campaign this time was juvenile. There are several Congresspeople here in Mass. who are used to campaigning and can do it well, who could quite easily whip Brown in a short (special election) race. I don't want to lose my new CongressWoman, Niki Tsongas, but she DID win by a substantial margin here in one of the reddest towns in Mass, in a town where no other Dem (including Obama) with opposition even came close to winning. Her name helped, but she also campaigned hard, especially in the red towns who were added to her former district. Jim McGovern campaigned hard as well, in his new district, even tho he had no opponent. I just mention these 2 as I saw them a lot out here campaigning.

I don't really want Kerry to leave his Senate seat, think he might serve Obama and himself better where he is now, as head of Foreign Relations ( not sure who would succeed him or Lugar there). But if he does, I think it is silly to obsess on Brown getting back into the Senate, coz, really, he is a poor candidate and unless the Dems pick another bad candidate (like the "what me, shake hands in the cold?" type), I doubt he'd be anything close to a shoe-in. And I have a hard time believing that this is at the root of the GOP Senators' attack on Susan Rice. Not that any thing else makes a whole lot more sense at this point.

[gateley]

5. I also heard Randi Rhodes say that Deval Patrick would probably win Keyrry's seat

If he does join the administration.

Who knows? Politics!

[John2]

3. Why Don't Senator Kerry

take over the Senate? Isn't it about time for Harry Reid to pass the torch?

[struggle4progress]

4. I have no idea what you are talking about, possibly because

you have no idea what you are talking about