POLITICS - I was going to write about the reunion tour of the Captain and Tennille of the Republican noise machine, Victoria Toensing and Joe DeGenova, but I see that Charlie Pierce has already admirably done the honors (after taking everyone on an extremely entertaining trip down memory lane to Iran-Contra and Whitewater-Lewinsky land.)
...they have not lost their touch for fact-free slander.
"I'm not talking generally, I'm talking specifically about Benghazi - that people have been threatened," Toensing said in an interview Monday. "And not just the State Department. People have been threatened at the CIA." Toensing declined to name her client. She also refused to say whether the individual was on the ground in Benghazi on the night of Sept. 11, 2012, when terrorist attacks on two US installations in the Libyan city killed four Americans, including US Ambassador to Libya Chris Stevens.
She's not talking generally. She just declines to get into the relevant specifics. And, in case you were wondering if The Puke Funnel was still operational, the president got asked about Toensing's allegations at his press conference yesterday by Ed Henry, of Fox News. Apparently, bells went off at Media Matters, too.
If you're wondering what the plans outside the Congress are to stymie the president's second term. (Which is not to say there aren't willing congresscritters lining up, too.) I think we have a pretty good idea already. We learn nothing. We truly do not. I expect any day now, we'll be hearing about cattle futures and who moved Vince Foster's body to Tripoli.
Charlie Pierce knows his wingnut scandals better than anyone. But I think he's missed something here: they didn't drag out Toensing and DeGenova by accident. And that's because this is only marginally about Obama's second term.
I've got one word that explains it: Hillary.
These people are Clinton character assassination specialists. And the right sees Benghazi as a Clinton scandal. Just watch Fox news for any half hour slot in a 24 hour period and it will come up. It's already become a punchline --- and a mantra.
(Digby is the pseudonym of progressive political blogger Heather Parton from Santa Monica, California who founded the blog Hullabaloo… where this commentary first appeared.)
-cw
CityWatch
Vol 11 Issue 36
Pub: May 3, 2013
