I haven't read the whole thing yet, but this Newsweek piece by investigative reporter Kurt Eichenwald (who also wrote the definitive takedown of the NY Times over the Hillary Clinton "criminal inquiry" debacle back in July) is a thing of beauty:
Benghazi Biopsy: A Comprehensive Guide to One of America’s Worst Political Outrages
Moussa Koussa.
That is the name of the “classified source” in an old email from Hillary Clinton released last week by Republicans purportedly investigating the 2012 attack on the American consulate in Benghazi, Libya. Under the instructions of the Benghazi committee’s chairman, Republican Representative Trey Gowdy of South Carolina, Koussa’s name was blacked-out on the publicly issued email, as Republicans proclaimed revealing his identity would compromise national security. The media ran with it, saying Clinton had sent classified information through her personal email account.
But the CIA never said the name was secret. Nor did the Defense Intelligence Agency or the FBI. No, Koussa’s role as an intelligence source is about as classified as this column. He is the former intelligence chief and foreign minister of Libya. In 2011, he fled that country for Great Britain, where he provided boodles of information to MI6 and the CIA. Documents released long ago show Koussa’s cooperation. Government officials have openly discussed it. His name appears in newspapers with casual discussions about his assistance. Sanctions by the British and the Americans against Koussa were lifted because of his help, and he moved to Qatar. All of that is publicly known.
Read the whole thing; it's a jaw-dropper.
More to come when I've finished it myself.
Eichenwald doesn't pull any punches. A quick example:
The awesome power of government—one that allows officials to pore through almost anything they demand and compel anyone to talk or suffer the shame of taking the Fifth Amendment—has been unleashed for purely political purposes. It is impossible to review what the Benghazi committee has done as anything other than taxpayer-funded political research of the opposing party’s leading candidate for president.
For now, I'm just posting a few snippets to give a sense of the piece:
Republicans have communicated to global militants that, through even limited attacks involving relatively few casualties, they can potentially influence the direction of American elections. The Republicans sent that same message after the Boston Marathon bombing, where they condemned Obama for failing to—illegally—send the American perpetrators to Guantanamo, among other things.
You want jaw-dropping? Try this:
Eventually, Gowdy’s questions turned to emails that Blumenthal had sent to Clinton. The former secretary of state had said publicly that they were unsolicited emails from an old friend. In question after question, Gowdy grilled Blumenthal about the definition of unsolicited. The meaning of the word, Gowdy proclaimed, was “unwanted”—yet Clinton had clearly made statements in her emails that she appreciated Blumenthal’s input. The congressman persisted with his incorrect definition to prove Clinton lied about a topic unrelated to Benghazi until Blumenthal’s lawyer suggested looking up unsolicited in the dictionary (it means “not requested,” as the Democrats later pointed out). Gowdy immediately moved on to another topic unrelated to the Benghazi attack.
Oh, and yes, of course the bullshit "Clinton under criminal investigation" NY Times story makes an appearance:
Other false stories repeatedly found their way into the press. There was the “criminal investigation of Hillary Clinton” article that appeared in The New York Times; once the story was knocked down, the Times sheepishly acknowledged its sources included officials from Congress. (The “Clinton is under criminal investigation” story has continued; she’s not.) The Daily Beast falsely reported that Blumenthal testified he was in Libya on the day of the Benghazi attack.
...as do the
22 MILLION EMAILS which
DISAPPEARED from the Bush Administration:
Senior White House staffers and presidential advisers did the same thing during the Bush Administration; at least 88 officials—including the White House Chief of Staff and Karl Rove, the president’s senior advisor—used personal emails to conduct official business over a private internet domain called gwb43.com, which was maintained on a server at the Republican National Committee. More than 22 million of those emails were deleted.
Finally, Eichenwald concludes:
Ambassador Stevens and the three other men who died on that terrible day in Benghazi are not shiny objects to be dangled for political entertainment. They are American heroes. Serve their memories: Disband this inexcusable Benghazi committee, throw out the buttons and bumper stickers and fundraising letters. Allow the dead to finally rest in peace.
If he doesn't win a Pulitzer for this, there's something very wrong in the world.
