Senator Rand Paul addressing Secretary of State Hillary Clinton: "I'm glad that you're accepting responsibility. I think that ultimately with your leaving, you accept the culpability for the worst tragedy since 9/11, and I really mean that. Had I been president at the time, and I found that you did not read the cables from Benghazi, you did not read the cables from Ambassador Stevens -- I would have relieved you of your post. I think it's inexcusable."
Instead of responding with something like: "What's inexcusable is your reckless and irresponsible accusation Senator!" which Rand was probably hoping for by crudely baiting Hillary like that, but Secretary Clinton responded coolly, calmly and to the point. She also included this pointed jab at the Republicans incessant witch hunts:
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton: "The reason we put into affect an accountability review board is to take it out of the heat of politics and partisanship and accusation and put it into the hands of people with no stake in the outcome."
Rand Paul at the Benghazi Hearing
By Juliet Lapidos
Prior to this morning’s hearing on Benghazi, Senator Rand Paul swore he’d press Secretary of State Hillary Clinton over the attack that left four Americans dead. He said she would have to accept full responsibility, and went so far as to compare Mrs. Clinton’s alleged failings with those of government itself: “That’s the problem with government — government is anonymous and so no one is accountable.”
That Mrs. Clinton had previously accepted responsibility for the attack, and did so again in her prepared remarks this morning, didn’t faze him. He just upped the ante. “I’m glad that you’re accepting responsibility,” he said. “I think that ultimately, with your leaving, you accept the culpability for the worst tragedy since 9/11.” Casualties in Iraq and Afghanistan apparently don’t count.
He also brought up a terrifying counterfactual. If he’d “been president at the time” of the attack, he said, he would have fired Mrs. Clinton.
Its pretty obvious that the Republicans have been obsessing about the attack in Benghazi since the day it happened in hopes of finding something, anything to damage the Obama Administration with. And this latest round makes Republicans look like the small petty opportunists that they are. Especially Senators
Ron Johnson and Rand Paul.