Republicans Don't Love America

The last 60 Minutes show on Benghazi reawakened my concern that Republicans are more concerned about shovelling money to their contractor friends than they are about protecting the United States.  According to 60 Minutes, the man responsible for protecting the Ambassador was not an American, but a retired British military man.  During the Iraq war, the Republicans did not trust American Marines to protect the the Embassy, but hired their buddies who ran Blackwater.  Blackwater turned out to be so corrupt and inept that its headquarters had to leave the United States.

Further muddying the waters in Benghazi was the fact that the post there was not a normal Foreign Service post.  It was not an embassy nor a consulate, but some kind of special mission, the main purpose of which was to provide cover for clandestine CIA activity which was being carried out in a much more secure "safe house" distant from the mission building.  Apparently the CIA was more concerned about itself than about the Ambassador at the mission.  The CIA officers apparently let Ambassador Stevens die in the mission building while they hunkered down in their safe house.  I think it is despicable that Congressman Issa has been attacking the State Department for what was the cowardice of CIA officers and outside-hire mercenaries.  Basically Amb. Stevens' security team locked him in a jail cell in a burning building and left him there while they took refuge in the CIA safe house.

The other thing that never gets discussed is why Libya was so unsafe.  Libya was supposed to be a victory for the new American approach to regime change in the Middle East, but instead it has turned into a quagmire where the American Ambassador is killed and al-Qaeda is strengthened by acquiring new recruits and a new base of operations.  What about all of Qaddafi's weapons that have gone missing, probably now in the hands of terrorists across Africa?  American interests were better served by Qaddafi, than by the new terrorist-linked government that the US installed.  Sen. John McCain and his fellow Republican hawks are as responsible for Amb. Stevens' death as anybody not directly involved in the fighting at the Benghazi mission.

This is a black page in the history of American diplomacy.