A White House Secret

Thanks to Judicial Watch, a few e-mails about Benghazi were released on a FOIA request.  You can read these at http://www.judicialwatch.org/press-room/press-releases/judicial-watch-benghazi-documents-point-white-house-misleading-talking-points/

A couple of things to note when reading:  (1) Quite a few people are involved in a decision to make a statement about anything in the White House, yet a series of articles were published by various press sources before that coordination could be completed.  Lots of people talk too much about these sensitive things.  People we never heard of, but would love to further identify, are on the CC line of some of these e-mails.  (2) Susan Rice took the heat for what was said, but people other than her created the words.  It is easy enough to go back to one of those news shows and compare them to the words written in the "prep" she was supposed to have been given.  She got her words exactly right.  (3) People were so intent on making the White House look good, that they forgot what they are there for.  It reminds me of the comments by Warren Buffet, last week, when he said he disagreed with some Board decisions, but went along.  The reaction from the news media was startling in their criticism of his view that it was OK to go along now and again, not raise your objections, or have them noted.  Boards and White Houses are supposed to have due diligence, but nothing more.  (3) Third, a favorite saying of late, "facts in evidence do not matter to the case".

I have been researching the persuasion of the Internet and came across Joe Keohane's article from the Boston Globe, July 2010.  Researchers have long known that the wishful thinking of people engaged in a situation is that more facts produce a better quality analysis of events.  Facts, as Keohane says, don't necessarily change our minds.  http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/ideas/articles/2010/07/11/how_facts_backfire/

The chains of e-mail go from the popular thought that Benghazi was the indicator of an outbreak of demonstrations, one of which ended our Ambassador's life, to the truth as we know it now.  It had nothing do with a movie seen by Muslims who reacted to its contents, but that does not stop many people from still voicing that same line.  Facts in evidence do nothing to change their minds.  Amazon books: