WashPost Book Review Absolves Hillary for Benghazi -- Or Does It?

February 7th, 2014 7:56 AM

Friday's Washington Post included a book review of  the new Hillary book "HRC" by Politico's Jonathan Allen and Amie Parnes. The reviewer was Liza Mundy, a former Post reporter who's written a gooey Michelle Obama biography.

"Her diplomatic achievements were of course marred by Benghazi," wrote Mundy in the second-to-last paragraph. Mundy helpfully explained the authors didn't find her "personally to blame," and yet....

Her diplomatic achievements were of course marred by the tragedy of Benghazi, where Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens and three other Americans were murdered. The book concludes, plausibly, that Hillary was not personally to blame for inadequate security at the diplomatic compound, but the fact that Stevens was there in the first place was the result of her philosophy of “expeditionary diplomacy,” which holds that the United States should have a presence even in dangerous places.

Allen and Parnes drew some attention for reporting that Hillary had an "enemies list" of Democrats who endorsed Obama in 2008 and not her, despite favors the Clintons had provided:


In a quiet office in her shuttered campaign headquarters in Arlington, a pair of Clinton loyalists are finishing a detailed Excel spreadsheet listing names and behavioral specifics of friends and betrayers. The gradations of loyalty and disloyalty are ranked at one point on a scale of one to seven, one being assigned to lawmakers who stuck with Hillary through thick and thin, seven going to those showing unforgivable treachery — often Democratic members of Congress who were expected to endorse her but broke for Obama; or, worse, allies for whom the Clintons had raised money or done other favors — like writing letters to get their kids into some fancy school — only to be jilted in the rush to the junior senator from Illinois.

The late Ted Kennedy does not fare well in their accounting, and neither do John Lewis or Chris Dodd or John Kerry. Virginia’s Jim Moran better be glad he has decided to retire from Congress altogether. Claire McCaskill — well, let’s just say that there is a special seat by hell’s fire reserved for the Missouri senator, who broke down in penitential weeping after she commented, on national television, that she would not want her daughter near Bill Clinton. But her greater sin was being the first female senator to endorse Obama. “Hate is too weak a word to describe” how Hillaryites still feel about her. One aide’s observation that the Clintons are “into loyalty” wins the award for epic understatement.