“13 Hours” and Hillary Emails – What Matter Most

By Ed Hoffman

If you heard anything about the magazine National Review last week, it was probably that it published columns by 20 leading conservative thinkers urging readers not to vote for Donald Trump. But did you hear about the magazine’s in-depth reporting on the latest shoe to drop in the Hillary Clinton email scandal? If not, you should – because it matters a whole lot more.

As National Review writer Andrew McCarthy reported on January 23, the investigation into Clinton’s email activities while she acted as Secretary of State has uncovered hundreds of secret intelligence communications transmitted over her private, unsecured e-mail system – and the most recent development is that some of these contained special access program (SAP) information.

What is the SAP classification? Essentially, it’s what we laymen would refer to as top secret. As McCarthy wrote, “(SAP) indicates defense secrets of the highest order, the compromise of which can destroy vital intelligence programs, get covert agents killed, and imperil national security.” And the presumed Democrat party nominee for President thought those secrets – again, secrets that can get covert agents killed and imperil national security – could be shared via an unsecured, personal email account.

But really, should we be surprised? This is the same Secretary of State who had the horror of the Benghazi terror attack happen on her watch – an attack that was covered up with a phony story about being instigated by a YouTube video. As the movie “13 Hours: The Secret Soldiers of Benghazi” depicted, a drone camera flew overhead, broadcasting the attack on our American consulate in progress so that operations with access to State Department resources could watch the events unfolding – and yes, those operations included the White House. The six “secret soldiers” at the CIA annex a few miles away were forced to undertake a desperate defense of Ambassador Chris Stevens and his staff inside our diplomatic compound, and they did it all on their own.

As we now know, this defense was not backed up by any U.S. fighter planes; if it was, officials testified in the Benghazi hearings, this could have scared the 150 attackers into fleeing. On that note: Remember how we were told the nearest fighter planes were in Italy, and because there were no assets nearby to support them, it would have taken hours to get those planes in the air? Well, one of my employees attended a “13 Hours” screening in San Diego where a military pilot spoke – a military pilot who happened to be sitting in an F-16 somewhere in the world that fateful night. His plane had taken off and was in the air, on its way to Libya until someone ordered him to return to base and stand down – in other words, he was ordered to not respond to our guys in harm’s way.

The truth was, he said, those planes weren’t just in Italy; they were also in Germany and Croatia, and they were sitting there ready to go – that is, until they were told to stand down. So, add that to the pile of lies you’ve been fed about Benghazi. Somebody in our government made a conscious decision to say no, don’t send anybody from not one, but three different locations. Somebody said no, don’t fly into Libyan airspace to scare off these Islamic militants and protect the Americans under attack.

Then the next day, somebody said yes. Yes, let’s concoct a fictional story about a YouTube video initiating this murderous mess. Was that someone Hillary Clinton? We don’t know for sure, but she certainly went along with it even though she knew it was a lie (because thanks to her clear disregard for secure email communications, we have access to emails where she told people, including her own daughter, that the event was a terror attack). Was that someone Barack Obama? We don’t know that for sure either, but he certainly went along with it as well, even though he knew it was a lie too.

If you haven’t been following the Hillary email scandal or the Benghazi hearings, at the very least you should go see “13 Hours.” It’s more important than the Superbowl, the Oscars and yes, Donald Trump. It’s more important because it depicts the mortal danger Americans have experienced under the watchful eyes of Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama.

Ed Hoffman is host of The Main Event on AM590, which airs Saturday 9:30 AM- 10:30 AM and Sunday 4:00 PM- 5:00 PM. Follow him on Twitter @EdHoffman, and like him on Facebook by searching The Main Event 590.