It appears as if, a month prior to the election, Republicans in Congress are attempting to score some political points via the Libya attacks. Unfortunately for them, I don't think they've thought this strategy all the way through and it will likely place their party in just as negative a light as Democrats, if not an even more negative one.
Darrell Issa, Republican representative of California and chairman of the House Oversight Committee, held a hearing earlier today regarding the attacks on the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi, Libya.
Utah Republican representative and member of Issa's committee, Jason Chaffetz, stated this morning that the hearing was regarding security that "didn't meet the basic, minimum standards required for a facility such as the one we had in Benghazi." He added that we have to "make sure it doesn't happen in other places around the world."
When asked by CNN's Soledad O'Brien if he had voted to cut federal funding for security at U.S Consulates like the one in Benghazi, Chaffetz responded with, "Absolutely. Look we have to make priorities and choices in this country... When you're in tough economic times, you have to make different choices. You have to prioritize things."
Washington Post columnist, Dana Milbank, picked up on this and reported the following:
"For fiscal 2013, the GOP-controlled House proposed spending $1.934 billion for the State Department's Worldwide Security Protection program - well below the $2.15 billion requested by the Obama administration. House Republicans cut the administration's request for embassy security by $128 million in fiscal 2011 and $331 million in fiscal 2012. (Negotiations with the Democrat-controlled Senate restored about $88 million of the administration's request.) Last year, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton warned that Republicans' proposed cuts to her department would be 'detrimental to America's national security' - a charge Republicans rejected.
[Paul] Ryan, Issa and other House Republicans voted for an amendment in 2009 to cut $1.2 billion from State operations, including funds for 300 more diplomatic security positions. Under Ryan's budget, non-defense discretionary spending, which includes State Department funding, would be slashed nearly 20 percent in 2014, which would translate to more than $400 million in additional cuts to embassy security."
So House Republicans are basically blaming the Obama administration for the attacks at the U.S Consulate in Benghazi due to insufficient security, when they themselves voted to cut federal funding for that very security. That makes a lot of sense...
By this logic, if Republicans cut education funding a great deal and saw declining test scores among students, they'd blame the teachers. If they took away practice time from a college basketball team and the team started to head south in the standings, they'd blame the coach. If they vote down a measure which would increase security at the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi, Libya and it gets attacked, they'd blame the president, and that's exactly what they did.
http://maddowblog.msnbc.com/_news/2012/10/10/14342096-the-gops-embassy-security-problem?lite
Darrell Issa, Republican representative of California and chairman of the House Oversight Committee, held a hearing earlier today regarding the attacks on the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi, Libya.
Utah Republican representative and member of Issa's committee, Jason Chaffetz, stated this morning that the hearing was regarding security that "didn't meet the basic, minimum standards required for a facility such as the one we had in Benghazi." He added that we have to "make sure it doesn't happen in other places around the world."
When asked by CNN's Soledad O'Brien if he had voted to cut federal funding for security at U.S Consulates like the one in Benghazi, Chaffetz responded with, "Absolutely. Look we have to make priorities and choices in this country... When you're in tough economic times, you have to make different choices. You have to prioritize things."
Washington Post columnist, Dana Milbank, picked up on this and reported the following:
"For fiscal 2013, the GOP-controlled House proposed spending $1.934 billion for the State Department's Worldwide Security Protection program - well below the $2.15 billion requested by the Obama administration. House Republicans cut the administration's request for embassy security by $128 million in fiscal 2011 and $331 million in fiscal 2012. (Negotiations with the Democrat-controlled Senate restored about $88 million of the administration's request.) Last year, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton warned that Republicans' proposed cuts to her department would be 'detrimental to America's national security' - a charge Republicans rejected.
[Paul] Ryan, Issa and other House Republicans voted for an amendment in 2009 to cut $1.2 billion from State operations, including funds for 300 more diplomatic security positions. Under Ryan's budget, non-defense discretionary spending, which includes State Department funding, would be slashed nearly 20 percent in 2014, which would translate to more than $400 million in additional cuts to embassy security."
So House Republicans are basically blaming the Obama administration for the attacks at the U.S Consulate in Benghazi due to insufficient security, when they themselves voted to cut federal funding for that very security. That makes a lot of sense...
By this logic, if Republicans cut education funding a great deal and saw declining test scores among students, they'd blame the teachers. If they took away practice time from a college basketball team and the team started to head south in the standings, they'd blame the coach. If they vote down a measure which would increase security at the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi, Libya and it gets attacked, they'd blame the president, and that's exactly what they did.
http://maddowblog.msnbc.com/_news/2012/10/10/14342096-the-gops-embassy-security-problem?lite
Comments
Post a Comment