The question all but answers itself, I should think. Here’s why it’s being asked:
On September 14, 2012, at a memorial service for the victims of the Benghazi attacks, Hillary Clinton spoke with members of the victims’ families. At least three of these people say that Clinton talked about the alleged role in the attack of a video produced by Nakoula Basseley Nakoula.
Charles Woods, the father of former Navy SEAL Tyrone Woods, says that Clinton blamed the video and even told him that she was going to have Nakoula arrested. Nakoula was, in fact, arrested.
Similarly, Kate Quigley, the sister of Glen Doherty, says that Clinton told her the video was to blame. “She knows that she knew what happened that day and she wasn’t truthful,” Quigley insists.
Finally, Patricia Smith, mother of Sean Smith, also insists that Clinton said the attack was because of the video. She has repeatedly accused Clinton of lying.
Clinton, however, denies saying anything about the video to these family members.
During an editorial board meeting with The Conway (N.H.) Daily Sun, Clinton was asked about an interview she recently had with ABC News’ George Stephanopoulos in which she denied that she told family members of the Benghazi victims during a Sept. 14, 2012 memorial service at Andrews Air Force Base that the film “Innocence of Muslims” was the catalyst for the attack. . . .Daily Sun columnist Tom McLaughlin pressed Clinton on the conflicting claims. “Somebody is lying,” McLaughlin said during the editorial meeting. “Who is it?“Not me, that’s all I can tell you,” Clinton replied.
But there are good reasons to conclude that it is Clinton who is lying. First, it’s three against one. Woods, Quigley, and Smith all say that Clinton blamed the video. Are all of them lying?
Second, Woods, Quigley, and Smith have no reason to make up a story about what Clinton told them. What does it get them?
Clinton, by contrast, has an excellent reason falsely to deny what they say. By September 14, the blame-the-video narrative had fallen apart. Indeed, we know that Hillary herself never bought it, having told her daughter that this was a terrorist attack.
That she nonetheless peddled the narrative to close relatives of the Benghazi victims is hugely embarrassing, and indeed disgraceful, especially for a presidential candidate. Hence, the need to deny that she peddled it.
Third, Hillary was publicly talking about the video the day before the service for the victims, and on other days shortly before and after. On September 13, she denounced the video as “disgusting and reprehensible,” and added “but as I said yesterday, there is no justification, none at all, for responding to this video with violence.” This statement certainly implies that, in her view, the violence of September 11 was a response to the video.
Three days after making these comments (and two days after the memorial service), Susan Rice, appearing on four networks, blamed the video for the Benghazi violence. That same day, Clinton aide Jake Sullivan sent her an email about Rice’s appearances. Far from disagreeing with Rice’s explanation of the Benghazi attacks, Sullivan said that Rice “did make clear our view that this started spontaneously and then evolved.”
Given Team Clinton’s embrace of the blame-the-video narrative on September 12, 13, and 16, it’s easy to credit the accounts of three witnesses who say Hillary also embraced it on September 14.
Fourth, Hillary Clinton has a long record of dishonesty. Twenty years ago, as Jonah Goldberg reminds us, William Safire wrote: “Americans of all political persuasions are coming to the sad realization that our first lady — a woman of undoubted talents who was a role model for many in her generation – is a congenital liar.” Since then, this realization has been reinforced repeatedly.
So in case my initial question didn’t answer itself, for these four reasons it seems obvious that the person who is lying about what Hillary Clinton said to the Benghazi victims’ family members is Hillary Clinton.
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