Yesterday’s press conference was pathetic. Here’s why.  

A sample:

Faced with the first chance, after more than two months, to grill Barack Obama about the tragedy in Benghazi, Libya, and related setbacks throughout North Africa and the Middle East, the assembled journalist wannabes barely scratched the surface of what should be treated as a major scandal….. [A]fter a vague assertion by Obama that he had generally ordered his “national security team [to] do whatever we need to do to make sure they’re safe,” nobody asked a word about specifics.Nada.

This “let him off easy” approach contrasts starkly with the repeated and specific questions the media asked President G.W. Bush, at every opportunity, about supposed “torture” of terrorist detainees.

Herewith, then, the basic and obvious questions that should have been asked, but weren’t:

• Mr. President, you said generically that you ordered your team to keep the Americans safe. But did you A) entertain any specific proposals to send in a rescue mission; B) remain in direct operational contact during the conflagration with your national security team in order to assess rescue possibilities; C) have any knowledge during those seven hours about any orders for American military or intelligence officers to “stand down”?……