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The Watcher’s Council

The Council has spoken, the votes have been cast and the results are in for this week’s Watcher’s Council match-up.

“What did President Obama know about what happened in Benghazi and when did he know it?” The old Watergate question surfaces again.

This week’s winner, Joshuapundit’s Heart Of Darkness – The Real Benghazi Coverup, was written before a new slew of e-mails leaked that showed the White House knew that Benghazi was a terrorist attack launched by an al-Qaeda affiliated militia within 2 hours, before it was known that the staff in the besieged Benghazi consulate communicated with the White House directly by phone as soon as the attack was launched and that the attack was watched in real time by the White House with a video signal relayed by an overhead drone. And as this week’s Non-Council winner reveals, that the trapped men could very possibly have been rescued.

Nevertheless, this week’s winner takes a look at the unanswered questions about Benghazi and the rotten heart of the coverup, the real reasons the Obama Administration chose to essentially lie to the American people about what happened that night in Libya and what it means. Here’s a slice:

The CIA is apparently not willing to fall on its sword to protect President Obama, Secretary Clinton , Ambassador Rice, and the rest of the Obama Administration.

It’s now been leaked by officials within the Obama Administration that the CIA Head of Station in Libya reported within 24 hours that the attack on Benghazi that left four Americans dead was carried out by al-Qaeda and associated groups, that it was a planned operation, and that it had nothing to do with any protest or unrest over a video.

The linked story, which is essentially an AP rewrite says ‘It is unclear who, if anyone, saw the cable outside the CIA at that point and how high up in the agency the information went.’

‘Unclear’? It obviously went to various places – to the head of the CIA General Petraeus, to Obama’s NSC Tom Donilon, and to Hillary Clinton as head of the State Department at the very least. That’s how these things are routinely handled. Are we to believe Joe Biden and President Obama that nobody told them, and the entire attempt to spin this for nine days as a ‘protest’ over a video was due to misinformation and intelligence failure?

Or Hillary Clinton’s claim that she didn’t know either and that the obscene spin put on this was due to ‘ the fog of war’?

The AP does their best to shield the Administration, like always. They even repeated the falsehood Obama told at the last debate (with an assist from ‘moderator’ Candy Crowley) that he referred to Benghazi as a terrorist attack during his speech the day after in the Rose Garden, something I debunked previously.

But even if one takes a large leap in logic to assume that no one in the administration knew for certain what had happened, how does that explain the certainty with which the president and his minions declared for 8 days that what happened in Benghazi was a protest over a poorly made video on YouTube that turned violent?

How does it explain the deliberate removal of special forces security teams from Libya and the denials of Ambassador Stevens’ own repeated requests for more of it? Even his request for a barbed wire fence around the Benghazi consulate was denied.

How does it explain situating an unprotected consulate and staff in Benghazi, known to be a hotbed of al-Qaeda and associated militias? Even the International Red Cross pulled out months before the attack because of the security situation. If the Red Cross knew, if most European intelligence bureaus like Britain’s M15 knew, why didn’t our own intel?

The answer of course, is fairly simple. None of it adds up.

What does add up is an attempt at a political coverup, and it possibly goes even deeper than just shielding the president and his administration from charges of gross incompetence during an election year when President Obama is chest pounding over his supposed foreign policy expertise.

In our non-Council category, the winner was Bing West with First, Aid the Living submitted by Joshuapundit. It details not only what happened in Benghazi but the Obama Administration’s failure to send in Special forces troops to rescue the men trapped in the Benghazi compound when they knew the attack was going on and it could easily have been done. And it shows plainly why Barack Obama is unfit to be commander-in-chief. Do read it.

Okay, here are this week’s full results. The Razor, The Political Commentator and The Colossus of Rhodey were unable to vote this week, but none of them were subject to the mandatory 2/3 vote penalty for not voting:

Council Winners

• *First place with 3 2/3 votes! Joshuapundit – Heart Of Darkness – The Real Benghazi Coverup
• Second place with 1 2/3 votes – The Right Planet – Mr. President, Here’s What Offends Me…
• Third place with 1 1/3 vote – Gay Patriot – Only people who call gay Republicans “faggots” sit on political left
• Fourth place *t* with 1 vote – The Mellow Jihadi – The Appearance of Competence
• Fourth place *t* with 1 vote – The Noisy Room – A Red and Present Danger
• Fifth place *t* with 2/3 vote – Bookworm Room – Romney, even if he didn’t win the debate, walked out of the debate a winner
• Fifth place *t* with 2/3 vote – The Glittering Eye – The Endorsements Are Coming In
• Fifth place *t* with 2/3 vote – The Razor – Rural Justice
• Fifth place *t* with 2/3 vote – Rhymes With Right – Zero Tolerance Gone Crazy
• Sixth place *t* with 1/3 vote – GrEaT sAtAn”S gIrLfRiEnD – Austere Challenge 2012
• Sixth place *t* with 1/3 vote – The Political Commentator – “Bar Stool Economics” helps to explain taxes Obama-style!

Non-Council Winners

• *First place with 3 1/3 votes! – Bing West – First, Aid the Living submitted by Joshuapundit
• Second place *t* with 1 1/3 votes – The Investigative Project On Terrorism – A Red Carpet for Radicals at the White House submitted by The Watcher
• Second place *t* with 1 1/3 votes – Seraphic Secret – Debate #3: The Statesman and the Community Agitator submitted by The Watcher
• Third place with 1 vote – Swampland – The Election’s Real Foreign Policy Issue: War with Iran submitted by GrEaT sAtAn”S gIrLfRiEnD
• Fourth place *t* with 2/3 vote – Emmaus Ministries – Col. Davy Crockett on Government Welfare submitted by The Right Planet
• Fourth place *t* with 2/3 votes – Right Wing News – Interviewing Stephen Moore On The Truth About Opportunity, Taxes, and Wealth In America submitted by The Mellow Jihadi
• Fourth place *t* with 2/3 vote – BBC Watch – BBC interviewee’s support for Greta Berlin’s antisemitic videos submitted by Simply Jews
• Fourth place *t* with 2/3 vote – Glenn Greenwald/Comment Is Free – The remarkable, unfathomable ignorance of Debbie Wasserman Schultz submitted by The Glittering Eye
• Fourth place *t* with 2/3 vote – Prairie Pundit – Foreign election ‘observers’ warned to abide by Texas law submitted by Rhymes With Right
• Fourth place *t* with 2/3 vote – Human Events – Obama’s “Horses and Bayonets” Insult Backfires submitted by VA Right!
• Fifth place *t* with 1/3 vote – Sultan Knish – Obama’s Last Stand submitted by The Noisy Room
• Fifth place *t* with 1/3 vote – White House Dossier – Romney’’s Brilliant Maneuver submitted by Bookworm Room
• Fifth place *t* with 1/3 vote – Yid With Lid – Here Comes the Obama Hit Squad! submitted by The Independent Sentinel

See you next week! Don’t forget to tune in on Monday AM for this week’s Watcher’s Forum, as the Council takes apart one of the provocative issues of the day and weighs in… don’t you dare miss it. And don’t forget to like us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter… ’cause we’re cool like that!