Chickamagua

When a gap opens in enemy lines, the timing is always critical. Anybody ready to ride?

9 comments:

bthun said...

I'm ready for popcorn and beer...

This ought to be fun to watch.

Go Hill!

E Hines said...

The Mail article, to which Before it's News linked, is both dated and contradicted, in some ways importantly and in some ways trivially, by this State Department conference call press conference, which gives a nearly blow by blow account.

Separately, Fox News' Wendell Goler is reporting on an interview conducted this afternoon/evening within which Secretary Clinton takes full responsibility for the Libya fiasco, saying among other things, "The buck stops with me."

Clinton's current denial concerning the movie-as-cause is born out by the transcript and the question/answer at the end; although as BiN pointed out, she still has to explain her earlier waffling about the movie's role.

Eric Hines

Grim said...

The account you link to suggests that they abandoned the compound without the ambassador. That's a hell of a decision to have been made on its own.

E Hines said...

Yeah, I've been concerned about that from the start when it came out that they'd "lost track" of him.

I don't know what was happening then--only those who were there do--but while the thing looks bad, I'm not ready to cast aspersions without better data. Nor am I suggesting that you are.

Eric Hines

bthun said...

I kinda sorta heard the breaking news report with W. Goler while chanting over the skillet of fixins this evening...

The report struck me as though Hill accepted a qualified measure of full responsibility aka buck stoppage. Unless I was completely addled by the smell beef stroganoff, I heard it mentioned that Hill noted how many people are involved in security and then she went on to assure us that the folks who are/were... ah, responsible, really, truly responsible for security, will be dealt with appropriately.

Before the dust settles on this cluster _____ a good deal of popcorn may be required.

Grim said...

I still say it's a hole in the lines. Let's ride into it.

E Hines said...

I'm all for that.

It just sounds to me like Clinton is both stepping up ("my responsibility") and digging Obama ("buck stops with me.")

Maybe I'm just over-remembering Ed Henry's question of Jay Carney, "So, the buck stops with State?" when Carney said Biden's "who us?" remark in the debate was limited to Obama and Biden's lack of knowledge.

Eric Hines

bthun said...

"I still say it's a hole in the lines."

I agree.

The Buck Stops Here announcement strikes me as being calculated to be a J. Reno maneuver. One that will result in no real consequence damaging Hill's political bivouac.

Nor can I see how Hill assuming the position will benefit the Ø's standing with anyone other than his base, those who know no better, and obamaphone recipients.

IMHO, the partisans should continue to fire for effect at the final logical destination for the Buck while applying heat on Hill to disclose what the Ambassador was doing there. The House will, I hope, continue to hold hearings on the matter and ask Hill & Co to reconcile the denied requests for additional security in light of the intel, the previous attacks, and the known terrorists activities in the area, etc., etc., etc.

Saddle up!

Texan99 said...

That song always reminds me of:

"Come fill up your cups with treacle and ink
"And anything else that is pleasant to drink
"Put mice in the coffee and cats in the wine
"And we'll welcome Queen Alice with 90 times 9."

I think Hillary decided that someone should look like the adult in this relationship, and it would help her in 2016. "The buck stops with me" is pretty withering.

As for leaving the ambassador behind, the details of that Curl link I posted the other day make it pretty clear that's what they did. Sean Smith and the ambassador were in the safe room when the attackers set the nearby room on fire, causing the safe room (which was connected by a grating) to fill up quickly with thick smoke from burning furniture. After the attackers moved away, two good guys tried to get them out, and managed to drag Smith out, but presumably he already had succumbed to smoke inhalation. They kept trying to crawl back in for the ambassador, but finding that there was zero visibility and no air to breathe, they had to give up, knowing he couldn't be alive. They then all escaped to the annex, where later they took "precise mortar fire," and two more Americans were killed.

The first word they had of the ambassador's body was from the hospital, where doctors found his cellphone and started calling numbers on it trying to reach someone who could identify him. Someone clearly dragged his body out of the safe room after the smoke cleared out. That must have been when the pictures were taken of him being dragged away -- the ones where the man had his cellphone in his teeth so he could use his hands to hold up the body.