Does the name Bradley Podliska ring a bell?
Bradley Podliska, a Major in the Air Force Reserve, was the Benghazi staff member who accused the panel of firing him because he refused to go after Hillary Clinton. For days, media were swamped with Clinton people telling us that this was proof the committee was not running a legitimate investigation; just a witch hunt (don’t look at me sexism-seekers, that term was used by them) to bring down the innocent Ms. Clinton.
Well, guess what: I just learned, via
Rachel Bade’s article at politico.com, that Podliska quietly removed all accusations that his firing had anything to do with what he was asked to do regarding Hillary Clinton (it must have been quietly removed, since the article indicates those accusations were removed late last month).
Excerpted from Ms. Bade’s article:
Attorneys for the Air Force Reserve major filed an amendment to his original claim in late February, striking the legal clauses that included his accusation that the panel’s investigation was increasingly focused on Clinton – and that he was dismissed for refusing to go along.
Those claims had come at the worst possible time for the panel: just days before Clinton was set to testify before the committee and in the midst of a drumbeat of attacks on their credibility by Clinton allies. Democrats and pro-Clinton groups like Correct the Record trumpeted Podliska’s accusations for weeks, arguing he corroborated their theories that the panel was only intended to hurt the 2016 Democratic front-runner.
The House Benghazi panel also declined to comment for this story. But while the change may give GOP committee members a sense of vindication, it likely won’t undo the reputational damage the panel suffered during the monsoon of criticism last October, when the whole country was tuned in to the high-stakes hearing with Clinton.
Translation: the accusations were made, Clinton & Co. made maximum political hay out of them, and now, as the time grows hear when Major Podliska has to actually offer evidence that he was canned for not going after Ms. Clinton, he drops the charges…
…which, of course, means that the committee was maximally tarred, Hillary Clinton maximally benefited, and….now it doesn’t exist at all.
I’ll just bet media will give this every bit as much publicity as they gave the original, now non-existent, charges. Put me in for a share of one plug nickel.
This phony-baloney sequence has the stench of Hillary Clinton’s “ethics” all over it.
