By Rick Manning
The fact that the politically motivated lane closures on the George Washington Bridge is still getting national attention should be a text book for Republicans on how to run a negative campaign against your opponents.
The Democrats in New Jersey had a plan and they are executing it rapidly, aggressively and without apology.
The day after emails were released showing that New Jersey Governor Chris Christie’s top staff was involved in the lane closure order, the Democrats were ready to pounce with a Senate Committee hearing featuring the already fired staff member, the Obama Administration’s U.S. Attorney for New Jersey is opening an investigation, and trial lawyers have announced class action lawsuits getting into the news cycle. This was followed by Meet the Press moderator David Gregory setting an impossible standard for Christie to meet when he tweeted, “Isn’t the burden for him to prove he didn’t create an atmosphere where underlings thought this was okay?”
Now, the New Jersey Senate Democrats are publicly speculating about impeaching Christie over closing two lanes on the bridge that is a major artery into Manhattan, and the Obama Administration has opened another front by launching an investigation on his handling of a Hurricane Sandy tourism ad campaign.
It is a long way from the arm in arm walks on the beach with Obama right before the presidential election.
Compare this with the fifteen month long congressional Benghazi investigation which has ground to a halt leaving Republican Frank Wolf begging the Speaker for a Special Committee to investigate the stonewalled scandal that left four Americans dead.
A full six months have passed since Hillary Clinton dismissed all culpability over her failure to act when American lives were at risk with the infamous, “What difference does it make?” line.
In the time wasted by the Speaker in pursuing Benghazi, the New York Times has even been allowed to write the definitive Hillary 2016 cover piece on the scandal, reasserting the blatantly false claim that the September 11, 2012 attacks were nothing more than reactions to a poorly made video on YouTube.
All the while, the nation as a whole has largely moved on – buffeted by IRS and NSA scandals hardly even remembering that a U.S. Ambassador and three others were murdered, and no one knows who made the decision to not send help.
No one outside of the White House knows what Obama was doing from the time the siege began around 5 pm EDT and ended around midnight. Incredibly, there don’t appear to have been a flurry of meetings, phone calls, situation updates and all those things that occur in Tom Clancy books.
All we are left with are questions about both Obama and Hillary’s whereabouts when the crisis was occurring, and a lingering report that the White House power behind the throne, Valerie Jarrett, made the decision to not send in rescue units.
Amazing that New Jersey Democrats have made more progress in a short while on getting to the bottom of what caused a traffic jam in an attempt to damage Chris Christie, then Republicans have in finding out the truth of what our Administration’s response was and who made the decisions on Benghazi.
Maybe the Republicans are still trying to figure out Whitewater, and when they get done with that, will turn their full attention to who did what and when did they do it, as our consulate was being attacked.
It is time for a special committee to get to the truth on Benghazi, the survivors deserve nothing less.
Rick Manning is the Vice President of public policy and communications for Americans for Limited Government.
