Understanding The Benghazi/Chappaquiddick Connection

By Christopher G. Adamo – On July 18, 1969, while most Americans were feverishly devouring the unfolding events of America’s first manned moon landing, the late Senator Edward “Ted” Kennedy was doing what cretins typically do. He was tooling around in the backwaters of coastal Massachusetts with Mary Jo Kopechne, a young political aid, who was not his wife. This was after throwing a reunion party for the “Boiler Room Girls” a group of women (including Kopechne) who had participated in the presidential campaign of Robert Kennedy.

Most of the tragic events that followed are well known. Kennedy vehemently denied that he had been drinking alcohol. Yet he drove off the road and into a tidal channel, leaving Kopechne trapped in the vehicle where she eventually suffocated. It was nine hours before Kennedy reported the accident to anyone. Forensic investigation revealed that Kopechne could have been rescued after more than an hour, had help arrived in time.

In the aftermath of the Chappaquiddick incident, Kennedy went on to serve one of the most distinguished careers in the United States Senate, eventually being given the title of “Lion of the Senate” by his colleagues. On his death in August of 2009, he was eulogized as a noble statesman. And since that time, it has of course been considered poor form to speak ill of so dignified an individual.

Nevertheless, the ugly reality of Chappaquiddick, and the emptiness of Kennedy’s soul and conscience that it revealed, should be considered as telling evidence of the true nature of American liberalism. Having moved on to other acts of hedonism throughout his later life, the manner in which his colleagues, and the left-leaning ones in particular, were willing to laud him is a testament to their own ethical bankruptcy. And the pattern still fits to this day, with the entire atrocity ofBenghazi and its aftermath standing as incontrovertible proof.

Had Ted Kennedy possessed even a modicum of concern for the plight of Kopechne, he could well have gotten sufficient help in time to secure her safety. But the amassed evidence of his words and actions throughout the entire night of July 18 revealed that he was fixated solely on how the scandal would adversely affect his own political fortunes. In the days following, though publicly expressing remorse and contrition, he clearly had no intention of owning up to his actions. The notion that he, Ted Kennedy, had not consumed any alcoholic beverage at his own party was but a single glaring example of his consuming disingenuousness.

Furthermore, his initial public appearances in the wake of the event were embarrassingly self-focused, shamelessly trivializing the death of a young woman, while attempting to cast himself as the pitiable victim, brooding a week later in a televised speech “whether some awful curse did actually hang over all of the Kennedys.” Extra legal judicial action by which he successfully evaded any jail time only added more evidence of his privileged status and total lack of remorse.

Rolling forward to September 11, 2012, and the horrific atrocities that occurred at the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi Libya, it becomes disturbingly clear that the elevated status of liberals, at least in their own minds, has not been confined to the Kennedy dynasty. Neither is their reptilian level of callous indifference to others, including other liberals. Even a brief review of the Benghazi episode, and the real motivations, concerns, and actions of the Obama cabal will reveal abundant evidence to support such a contention.

From the moment word reached the White House that the American consulate in Benghazi Libya was under siege by Islamic terrorists, Obama Administration officials knew they had reason to worry. Barack Obama had incessantly and gratuitously “spiked the ball” over the success of the U.S. Navy Seal mission to kill Osama bin Laden, the master-mind of the September 11, 2001 attacks on the World Trade Center and Pentagon. Obama had repeatedly invoked the bin Laden mission as political leverage, essentially claiming that by it he had achieved victory in the War on Terror. Such a large scale coordinated assault against an American diplomatic outpost would constitute proof that his proclamations on the end of the terror war were bogus. And with the 2012 presidential election only weeks away, he could not afford the liability of such news.

So the decision was made to flatly deny any terrorist assault was occurring, even to the point of refusing available military aid to the besieged diplomatic corps. The deplorable result of that callous verdict was the torture, death, and mutilation of Chris Stevens, America’s Ambassador to Libya, along with three other Americans. Yet the cruel and hard-hearted policy of keeping the military at bay, in hopes of minimizing negative news coverage of the actual resurgence of Islamic terrorism and Obama’s complicity in it, represented only a tiny portion of the scandal and malfeasance associated with the Benghaziattacks.

In an act appallingly reminiscent of the cold, dispassionate conduct of Ted Kennedy back in 1969, Obama boarded Air Force One even as the extent of the attacks was being learned, and flew to Las Vegas for a campaign fundraiser, as if to create the notion that he was somehow unconnected with the event and therefore not to be held responsible. Meanwhile, the best and brightest of the Obama Administration were busily concocting a ridiculous cover story, involving a kooky small-time anti-Muslim video, as the supposed explanation for Islamist brutality that defied Obama’s rosy promises of having defeated and neutralized the threat of Islamic terror.

Consequently, no individual or organization charged with the protection of American diplomats has ever been held accountable for the obvious lapses in security that left Stevens and his associates vulnerable, and eventually cost them their lives. And no actual culpability is ever likely to be assigned, since the trail would lead directly back to the highest levels of the Obama White House.

Among the greatest affronts of this sordid affair was the deflection by then Secretary of State Hillary Clinton during a Senate investigative committee hearing: “What difference, at this point, does it make?” hysterically spewed as if the only wrongful injury of the entire Benghazi debacle was that inflicted on her by those Senate inquisitors. Clearly, by her words and her demeanor, Clinton was striving to emulate Ted Kennedy in the victim role, dismissing the needless death of underlings as an inflammatory distraction. Yet the contributing factors of the Benghazi disaster, and the political calculations that rendered the lives and safety of Americans inconsequential do make a “difference” in the character of those officials whose inept and self-serving ways set the stage for the event.

On Sunday, it was reported that the Iraqi city of Fallujah had fallen to al Qaeda. Territory secured from Islamist monsters, at the cost of American lives, has now been needlessly ceded back to them. As America’s buffer against the encroachment of Muslim terrorist organizations is crumbling, and the likelihood of a new wave of attacks continues to grow, Barack Obama is playing golf in Hawaii and Hillary Clinton is making plans to retake the White House in 2016. Indeed, “What difference at this point does it make?”

Christopher G. Adamo is a resident of southeastern Wyoming and has been involved in state and local politics for many years. He writes for several prominent conservative websites, and has written for regional and national magazines. He is currently the Chief Editorial Writer for The Proud Americans, a membership advocacy group for America’s seniors, and for all Americans. His contact information and article archives can be found at www.chrisadamo.com, and he can be followed on Twitter @CGAdamo.

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