John McCain Discusses Middle East, Libya Crisis With CNNs Candy Crowley | Harry Reid

(Photo: CNN's 'State of the Union')

Former presidential candidate John McCain (R-AZ) appeared on CNN’s “State of the Union” with Candy Crowley Sunday to discuss how the Obama administration has handled the crisis unfolding across the Middle East.

Specifically, the two discussed the drastically different narratives presented to the American people as the violence began on September 11th– that a YouTube clip was to blame– and the current acknowledgement that it got started with pre-planned acts of terror in Libya, where American Ambassador Stevens and three others were murdered by a mob.

“Friday we got the administration’s sort of definitive statement that this now looks as though it was a pre-planned attack by a terrorist group, at least some of whom were sympathetic to al-Qaeda,” Crowley began.  “Why do you think, and are you bothered that it has taken them this long from September 11th to now to get to this conclusion?”

McCain responded that there are certainly “political overtones” that would indicate the administration is concealing information for political gain.

“It was either willful ignorance or abysmal intelligence to think that people come to spontaneous demonstrations with heavy weapons, mortars, and the attack goes on for hours,” McCain said scathingly.  “And there were warnings…Look, things are going south all over the world.”

Here is video of the interview, via CNN:

“The chickens are coming home to roost, and the president won’t even talk about it,” McCain summarized.

When Crowley related Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid’s (D-Nev.) statement that Republicans are trying to score “political points” from the catastrophe, McCain retorted: “Maybe Senator Reid doesn’t care about Christopher Stevens. Maybe he doesn’t care about those three other brave Americans.”

“You know he does, though, right?” Crowley cautioned.

“We do,” McCain responded, adding that “every American, no matter whether Democrat or Republican” should be determined to discover what caused the deaths of the Americans in Libya.

“So he is the one that’s taking the cheap political shot,” McCain concluded.

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