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Just try to wrap your arms around the magnitude of defiance and chutzpah that  led to and accompanied President Obama’s appointment of the discredited Susan  Rice as national security adviser. But don’t let this outrage distract you from  his equally disturbing appointment of leftist Samantha Power to replace Rice as  U.N. ambassador.

Though Democrats and their supporting liberal media, with a few notable  exceptions, have aggressively downplayed the multifaceted Benghazi scandal, none  of them has laid a glove on the irrefutable claim that Rice delivered the  talking points that had been altered by the administration to distort the facts  in order to mitigate any damage to Obama’s re-election efforts.

In a piece for the Washington Post explaining her decision to withdraw, Rice  did anything but acknowledge her wrongdoing. She said, “I have never sought in  any way, shape or form to mislead the American people. … Even before I was  nominated for any new position, a steady drip of manufactured charges painted a  wholly false picture of me.”

Well, if she didn’t seek to mislead the American people, then someone higher  than her in the administration sought to and did mislead her and used her to  deceive the people by repeating a steady barrage of manufactured lies to paint a  wholly false picture of what precipitated the terrorist attack on our  mission.

We knew then and we know even more certainly now that this was a premeditated  terrorist attack and not a spontaneous occurrence spurred by angst over an  obscure anti-Muslim video. We know that the administration knew that, as well,  and deliberately said otherwise at least in part to protect Obama’s narrative  that he had al-Qaida and radical Islamists on the ropes prior to the November  election.

If Rice wasn’t lying, she owed it to the American people to help determine  who put her in the position of unwittingly defrauding the public about a matter  of vital importance.

But Obama, Rice and the rest of the administration have just thumbed their  noses at Congress and the American people and arrogantly refused to explain  themselves.

Now Obama is rewarding Rice for her fierce loyalty with an appointment to a  position arguably as influential as secretary of state and one for which she  will not need to be confirmed. He is also counting on her continued deference in  placing his personal interests above the nation’s.

With Obama’s brazen appointment of Rice to this position, he is saying either  that Rice didn’t lie (in which case someone else in the administration did,  including possibly himself), or that she did lie and he is perfectly fine with  it, maybe even grateful for it. Obama might as well say to us, “I don’t really  care what you think about our bogus story concerning the video. It got us  through the election. I won.”

If Obama insists on stubbornly clinging to the story that Rice did not know  she was broadcasting falsehoods, then he should tell us who did know. But he’s  Obama. That’s not going to happen.

Equally troubling is Obama’s selection of Samantha Power to replace Rice. In  announcing Power’s appointment, Obama praised her as “a relentless advocate for  American interests and values.” But is she?

In 2003, Power called for a “historical reckoning with crimes committed,  sponsored, permitted by the United States.” In a piece in The New Republic, she  advocated a “doctrine of the mea culpa,” which essentially involves the United  States owning up to its alleged past foreign-policy abuses to put itself in a  better light to the world.

Is this not exactly the attitude Obama has expressed in his ongoing apology  tour at home and abroad, always anxious to throw this nation under the bus and  distance himself from its pre-Obama history? Those who have pooh-poohed this  accurate characterization of Obama’s blame-America-first approach should take  note that Obama has now boldly reaffirmed this very worldview with his  appointment of Power.

The Power appointment also further validates Obama’s critics who have accused  him of being a poor friend of our ally Israel. Space limitations don’t permit  elaboration here, but Paul Mirengoff at the Powerline blog has described Power  as “virulently anti-Israel” and “Israel hating,” and supports his assertion in  these two posts: one and two.

Obama’s two appointments show that even as he is under heavy criticism for a  smorgasbord of scandals, he is utterly undaunted. He “won” the election, and he  is going to impose his agenda for transformational change no matter what and  militantly ignore all efforts to make him accountable.