Occam and the Benghazi Conspiracy

Conspiracy or stupidity, doesn't matter.

This started out as a comment on PoliNation, but grew and got transplanted here. The subject was, the murderous attack on the embassy at Benghazi was, as Aussie put it, "meant to be an incident which would end by Obama being considered as the great negotiator."

Three words: Blind Sheik.

Is there a name for that rule, don't attribute to conspiracy what can be explained by stupidity? Who really knows why Barbados was heavily fortified and Benghazi was abandoned? With the folks at State (Russian reset button!), it could be any kind of Utopian idealism, Bagdad-Bobbish there are no terrorists in Benghazi mentality, behind a clusterfluke of errors of judgment gone wild.

Next up the chain of possibility, though, practically has to be a really bad conspiracy that totally blew up in their faces. Not unprecedented for this Machiavellian administration. (Can you say Fast & Furious boys and girls? I know you can! ) In fact, the circumstantial evidence suggests the manner of conspiracy was heavily telegraphed, so much so, it sort-of overrules Occam's first choice.

If it seems unlikely that these people are so insane that they would even think of such a thing, much less attempt it, consider that this administration demonstrably values no life, foreign or domestic, born or unborn, that a classic symptom of this personality type is, not necessarily out to hurt anybody, but if it's necessary, not bothered one bit. A small-scale Carter hostage situation, a blind Sheik swap, ta-da, Obama is not-Carter, and the terrorists get their mastermind back. In O's mind, that spells, everyone wins. Then, the operation blew up, Obama got betrayed because, actually, everybody hates him but the Muslims, ironically, most of all. But the _residential arse is covered, it was all just this video, absolutely unpredictable that anything like this could happen on the 11th anniversary of 9/11. And the absurd story still is, the Administration had no idea it would happen and didn't know we had poor security at Benghazi.

To suggest they're as good at conspiratorial shenanigans as they are at sloganeering (Win The Future!) is to give them the benefit of the doubt. The alternative is they're totally incompetent altogether. Which is one of those "either way..." things, like Holder denying he knew about F&F. Either way, you're not the person for the job, to say the least.