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Friday will mark exactly three months since House Republicans, with great fanfare, voted to impanel the Select Committee on Benghazi – a tribunal charged with uncovering the truth behind the 2012 terrorist attack after five other congressional committees had apparently fallen short.

Since each party named its members to the panel, however, we've heard barely a peep.

After an initial photo-op, the 12-member committee led by Chairman Trey Gowdy (R-S.C.), has held no public hearings. It has issued no reports, and the only two public statements of any kind it has released have been to disclose that it received a pair of classified briefings.

The radio silence is by design, Republicans say.

Gowdy spent the first weeks after his appointment by Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) insisting that Democrats were wrong in their predictions that the committee would be nothing more than political theater, a show trial timed to fire up a conservative base full of conspiracy theorists right before the November elections.

By not rushing to hold hearings, Gowdy can demonstrate that he's taking his time and not creating a campaign spectacle.

"There's no frustration," said an aide to one Republican member of the panel. "It's good that it's a deliberate process and not a flash in the pan."