VP Debate Live Streaming Online (VIDEO)

Tonight's debate opened with a charged back-and-forth between GOP nominee Paul Ryan and Vice President Joe Biden over the Obama administration's handling of the violent attack in Benghazi, Libya, that killed four Americans, including the U.S. ambassador.

The Romney-Ryan ticket has reason to see an opening here: The attacks, and the fumbling management of its aftermath by the White House, has outraged many Americans, who have yet to hear clear answers about why, nearly a week after the assault, a top official was still describing it as potentially linked to an obscure anti-Islam video.

"That's exactly what we were told by the intelligence community," Biden said. "The intelligence community told us that, and as they learned more facts about that, they changed their assessment."

It's the same answer the administration has offered for weeks, and while so far it has held up under scrutiny, it hasn't quieted vociferous critics.

But Biden appeared to trip up on the facts when Ryan accused the administration of failing to approve a series of additional security assets for diplomats in Libya.

On Wednesday, the House government oversight committee heard from two security officials based in Benghazi over the summer who described numerous attempts to seek more security, and produced specific memos sent to the State Department to back it up.

Biden said the administration was not aware of the requests -- something that may be true at the White House -- but is not accurate for State Department officials who denied the requests.

But Ryan misstepped, too, when he suggested that had there been more troops -- specifically a Marines division -- guarding the ambassador, the situation could have been avoided.

Marines don't guard ambassadors or embassies, for one thing -- they are there for classified materials. Moreover, none of the requested units described in Wednesday's hearing would have made a difference -- all but one or two of them would have been based in Tripoli, hundreds of miles away.

As one of the security officials acknowledged on Wednesday, "Having an extra foot of wall or an extra half-dozen guards or agents would not have enabled us to respond to that kind of assault."

-- Joshua Hersh

Source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/10/11/vp-debate-live-streaming-_n_1959823.html

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