Within hours of the attack on the consulate, Gov. Romney jumped in front of the cameras to take advantage of the situation for political gain. It wasn't just predictable. He said he would do it.
Here's a donor's question and Gov. Romney's answer from his May 2012, 47% speech.
Audience member: I think that had to do with the fact that the Iranians perceived Reagan would do something to really get them out. In other words [unintelligible]…and that's why I'm suggesting that something that you say over the next few months gets the Iranians to understand that their pursuit of the bomb is something that you would predict and I think that's something that could possibly resonate very well with American Republican voters.
Romney: I appreciate the idea. I can't—one of the other things that's frustrating to me is that at a typical day like this, when I do three or four events like this, the number of foreign policy questions that I get are between zero and one. And the American people are not concentrated at all on China, on Russia, Iran, Iraq. This president's failure to put in place a status forces agreement allowing 10-20,000 troops to stay in Iraq? Unthinkable! And yet, in that election, in the Jimmy Carter election, the fact that we have hostages in Iran, I mean, that was all we talked about. And we had the two helicopters crash in the desert, I mean that's—that was—that was the focus, and so him solving that made all the difference in the world. I'm afraid today if you said, "We got Iran to agree to stand down a nuclear weapon," they'd go hold on. It's really a, but…by the way, if something of that nature presents itself, I will work to find a way to take advantage of the opportunity.
Read that last sentence again, "if something of that nature presents itself, I will work to find a way to take advantage of the opportunity." He is telling the donor that if an event like the Iran hostage crisis or a tragedy like the failed rescue occurs, he will take advantage of the 'opportunity'.
And sure enough, when the Benghazi attack occurred he tried to take advantage of the 'opportunity'. Before the details of the attack were known, before the State Department or the White House had made a statement -- because they did not know what had, or was happening, in fact on the night of the attack, Romney said:
I also believe the Administration was wrong to stand by a statement sympathizing with those who had breached our embassy in Egypt instead of condemning their actions. It's never too early for the United States Government to condemn attacks on Americans, and to defend our values.
At about the same time, the talking monkey, Reince Priebus, Chairman of the Republican National Committee, tweeted "Obama sympathizes with attackers in Egypt. Sad and pathetic."
People from all sides of the political spectrum condemned Romney for his stupid comments and flagrant attempt to gain from a terrorist attack and the deaths of US officials.
Hoping not to lose the 'opportunity', Romney and his political advisers came up with a new angles of attack and constructed a story that the administration intentionally misrepresented the events and negligently reduced embassy security funding.
The episode says a lot about Romney's character. The terms crass opportunist and reprehensible come to mind.