"Ambassador (Susan) Rice propagated a falsehood that the attacks were 'spontaneous,' the outcome of a protest 'spun out of control,' and the result of a YouTube video."
—From a Nov. 19 letter to President Barack Obama opposing the potential nomination of Rice for Secretary of State, signed by nearly 100 Republican members of the U.S. House of Representatives, including Mississippi Reps. Steven Palazzo and Alan Nunnelee.
Why it stinks: The "attacks" the letter refers to occurred Sept. 11 in Benghazi, Libya, where Ambassador Christopher Rice and three other Americans died.
This is political grandstanding of the first order. The letter doesn't actually accuse Rice of doing anything wrong, unless you could construe repeating information provided to her by the U.S. Intelligence community as "wrong." Instead, it talks about perceptions: "Ambassador Rice is widely viewed as having either willfully or incompetently misled the American public," the letter states, though who is doing the viewing is not revealed.
To date, no evidence has surfaced that Rice either concealed information or distorted it any way (and evidence has surfaced showing that the CIA didn't want to tip its hand). The information has "since been shown to be seriously flawed, but that's not Rice's fault," wrote the Washington Post.
A WaPo reader put it this way: "Since she presumably does not operate a private intelligence agency, sensible people will wonder what else she could have said." Indeed.
More stories by this author
- EDITORIAL: Gov. Reeves Needs to Take ‘Essential’ Seriously for COVID-19 Social Distancing
- EDITORIAL: City Needs to Name Officers Who Shot Citizens Without Delay
- EDITORIAL: Free Press Is Not Here to Comfort the Powerful; We're Here for Truth
- EDITORIAL: Dear Mississippi Politicians, Criminal Justice Reform Is More Than Rhetoric
- EDITORIAL: Transparency in Officer Shootings Needs to Improve, Not Worsen
Support our reporting -- Follow the MFP.
