Obama Invokes Executive Privilege on Fast and Furious Documents

[fskimospy]

No one can understand you when you claim to want more oversight and yet rabidly defend allowing NO oversight. It's simply a nonsensical position. If you'd simply admit your true position - that we need more oversight of Republican administrations but no oversight of Democrat administrations - then your posts would at least have some internal consistency, if not logic.

You are once again displaying a severely delusional view of reality. I have repeatedly condemned this sort of use of executive privilege in this thread while also condemning the rabid, ultra partisan hysteria of the right about this issue. Just because Obama is abusing executive privilege doesn't make you guys any less batshit insane for your reaction to it.

How is this a hard concept to understand? I dislike Obama's action here. I also think the Republicans on this board and in Congress are behaving like lunatics and are embarrassing themselves. If you'd simply admit your true position - that you have a rabid and irrational hatred of liberals and progressives, you could just stick to your other posts that are generally quite good.

 

[werepossum]

You are once again displaying a severely delusional view of reality. I have repeatedly condemned this sort of use of executive privilege in this thread while also condemning the rabid, ultra partisan hysteria of the right about this issue. Just because Obama is abusing executive privilege doesn't make you guys any less batshit insane for your reaction to it.

How is this a hard concept to understand? I dislike Obama's action here. I also think the Republicans on this board and in Congress are behaving like lunatics and are embarrassing themselves. If you'd simply admit your true position - that you have a rabid and irrational hatred of liberals and progressives, you could just stick to your other posts that are generally quite good.

Remember, I defended Obama and Holder right up until Obama took possession of the scandal, even though I always thought this is one of the worst abuses of government I've seen in my lifetime.

 

[piasabird]

The president is guilty of obstruction of justice by claiming executive privlidge. He should be impeached.

 

[Jhhnn]

Actually I assumed and speculated here that the whole thing was NOT initiated at the highest level, or probably even KNOWN at the highest level, right up until Obama took possession of it. You on the other hand immediately took your only position - that Obama and the Democrats were 100% right and the Republicans were 100% wrong. Even government intentionally arming drug cartels and facilitating murder doesn't shake your "reasoning". Which is why no one takes seriously such "reasoning".

I never claimed that Obama & Holder were 100% right, so you're off on another round of false attribution. Issa is pretty close to 100% wrong, however, given that he hasn't even attempted to investigate the operation from the ground up.

 

[BladeVenom]

Mexico is awash in a sea of guns, the idea that these guys would somehow not have been armed if those two guns had been interdicted is pretty hilariously naive. I mean I can't believe even the craziest people on here would genuinely believe that.

So you agree that gun control is stupid, and idiots like Eric Holder who believe in gun control are crazy?

Still you probably shouldn't sell guns to known criminals.

 

[Jhhnn]

The president is guilty of obstruction of justice by claiming executive privlidge. He should be impeached.

Issa's witch hunt committee is not a court of law & have no authority to dispense justice, nor any intent to accomplish that.

Obstruction of Justice has a specific meaning in the context of American Law. Obama isn't doing it. Ask Scooter Libby what it means.

 

[Jhhnn]

Remember, I defended Obama and Holder right up until Obama took possession of the scandal, even though I always thought this is one of the worst abuses of government I've seen in my lifetime.

Worse than invading another country on false premises? Worse than outing a CIA operative? Worse than financing weapons to drug running thugs in central America with money from Iran? Worse than massive illegal surveillance? Worse than selectively hiring DOJ lawyers from a third rate fundie law school over more qualified applicants? Worse than firing your own appointed US attorneys because they showed some of their traditional independence, then claiming executive privilege over it? Worse than invoking an 1863 statute to stymie state bank regulators in the runup to the housing bust?

Define "one of the worst abuses" in context, will ya?

 

[BladeVenom]

http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/t...-privilege-from-the-previous-administration-s

 

[blankslate]

Hmmmm....

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/25/us/issa-says-no-evidence-of-white-house-cover-up-in-guns-case.html

The statements from Mr. Issa, the chairman of the House oversight committee, came after Mr. Boehner said last week that President Obama’s decision to assert executive privilege to shield Justice Department documents related to the operation was “an admission that the White House officials were involved in decisions that misled the Congress and covered up the truth.”

On “Fox News Sunday,” a clip of Mr. Boehner’s statement was played and Mr. Issa was asked in an interview whether his committee had evidence that White House officials had knowingly misled Congress about the case.

“No, we don’t,” Mr. Issa said. “And I hope they don’t get involved. I hope this stays at Justice. And I hope that Justice cooperates, because ultimately, Justice lied to the American people.”

It has since come to light that the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives had used similar tactics three times during the Bush administration.

They did something that the Bush administration has done before.... their main mistake regarding this issue 😛

 

[trenchfoot]

Worse than invading another country on false premises? Worse than outing a CIA operative? Worse than financing weapons to drug running thugs in central America with money from Iran? Worse than massive illegal surveillance? Worse than selectively hiring DOJ lawyers from a third rate fundie law school over more qualified applicants? Worse than firing your own appointed US attorneys because they showed some of their traditional independence, then claiming executive privilege over it? Worse than invoking an 1863 statute to stymie state bank regulators in the runup to the housing bust?

Define "one of the worst abuses" in context, will ya?

And we mustn't forget the record breaking use of signing statements that Bush/Cheney used to get around the laws of the land.

 

[Doc Savage Fan]

You are once again displaying a severely delusional view of reality. I have repeatedly condemned this sort of use of executive privilege in this thread while also condemning the rabid, ultra partisan hysteria of the right about this issue. Just because Obama is abusing executive privilege doesn't make you guys any less batshit insane for your reaction to it.

How is this a hard concept to understand? I dislike Obama's action here. I also think the Republicans on this board and in Congress are behaving like lunatics and are embarrassing themselves. If you'd simply admit your true position - that you have a rabid and irrational hatred of liberals and progressives, you could just stick to your other posts that are generally quite good.

Hyperbole much?

Holder has lied multiple times...is it a hard concept to understand that some want to get to the truth of the matter?

 

[werepossum]

Worse than invading another country on false premises? Worse than outing a CIA operative? Worse than financing weapons to drug running thugs in central America with money from Iran? Worse than massive illegal surveillance? Worse than selectively hiring DOJ lawyers from a third rate fundie law school over more qualified applicants? Worse than firing your own appointed US attorneys because they showed some of their traditional independence, then claiming executive privilege over it? Worse than invoking an 1863 statute to stymie state bank regulators in the runup to the housing bust?

Define "one of the worst abuses" in context, will ya?

Let's see.
Didn't happen.

WTF? CIA Operative? Really? And the serial liar pretender was "outed" by Richard Armitage, the anti-war State Departmen careerist, NOT by the Bushies.

Maybe not - that one was pretty bad.

Isn't that Obama NOW?

Yes.

Hell, yes. That one doesn't even measure up to Clinton firing EVERY US Attorney on Day One (something never before done) and thereby stopping every ongoing investigation - many of whom were on him and/or his illegal donators - much less to this one.

WTF again.

Hmmmm....

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/25/us/issa-says-no-evidence-of-white-house-cover-up-in-guns-case.html


They did something that the Bush administration has done before.... their main mistake regarding this issue 😛

False. The Obama administration did something that in part was done TO the Bush administration - intentionally walking guns into Mexico or allowing them to enter Mexico unaltered through incompetence, I'm not sure which. Wide Receiver was set up completely different from Fast and Furious. Besides, as I've pointed out, the concept that Bush knew, that Wide Receiver was the same as Fast and Furious, is the old lie; Holder and Obama have now dropped that, claiming it was "inadvertent".

Note that Bush DID NOT claim executive privilege and DID produce the documents under subpoena by Congress, although he had the exact same theoretical interest in preserving his own power as does Obama. The difference is obviously either than Obama was behind this all along, or that he finds it such a useful tool that he must spend political capital to make sure the offenders are protected.

 

[thraashman]

Hyperbole much?

Holder has lied multiple times...is it a hard concept to understand that some want to get to the truth of the matter?

Yes, some do want to get to the truth of the matter, but that's not Issa or the House Republicans. Truth has been the enemy of Boehner, Issa and the bunch since they got control of the House. They want to witch hunt and destroy America as much as they can to make Obama look bad, it's not even a secret they've admitted as much.

 

[fskimospy]

Note that Bush DID NOT claim executive privilege and DID produce the documents under subpoena by Congress, although he had the exact same theoretical interest in preserving his own power as does Obama. The difference is obviously either than Obama was behind this all along, or that he finds it such a useful tool that he must spend political capital to make sure the offenders are protected.

Bush provided documents under subpoena about internal executive branch deliberations on how to respond to Congressional investigations? I'm very interested to learn about this, can you provide evidence?

 

[fskimospy]

Hyperbole much?

Holder has lied multiple times...is it a hard concept to understand that some want to get to the truth of the matter?

Nope, sure isn't hard to understand, and I want the truth also. It's also not hyperbole. The reaction from Republicans and conservatives on here as been totally unhinged and insane. Calling for Holder to be charged as an accessory to murder, calling for Obama's impeachment, declaring Obama behind the whole thing to begin with, etc, etc. All entirely fact free lunatic raving.

The biggest problem here is that even if an investigation turns up serious wrongdoing at this point it's going to be very hard to convince anyone that this isn't just witch hunting simply due to the bad reputation of Issa himself along with the crazed response of Republicans in general.

 

[Doc Savage Fan]

Nope, sure isn't hard to understand, and I want the truth also. It's also not hyperbole. The reaction from Republicans and conservatives on here as been totally unhinged and insane. Calling for Holder to be charged as an accessory to murder, calling for Obama's impeachment, declaring Obama behind the whole thing to begin with, etc, etc. All entirely fact free lunatic raving.

The biggest problem here is that even if an investigation turns up serious wrongdoing at this point it's going to be very hard to convince anyone that this isn't just witch hunting simply due to the bad reputation of Issa himself along with the crazed response of Republicans in general.

Do you think Holder should be held in contempt?

 

[blankslate]

Let's see.
Didn't happen.

WTF? CIA Operative? Really? And the serial liar pretender was "outed" by Richard Armitage, the anti-war State Departmen careerist, NOT by the Bushies.

Maybe not - that one was pretty bad.

Isn't that Obama NOW?

Yes.

Hell, yes. That one doesn't even measure up to Clinton firing EVERY US Attorney on Day One (something never before done) and thereby stopping every ongoing investigation - many of whom were on him and/or his illegal donators - much less to this one.

WTF again.


False. The Obama administration did something that in part was done TO the Bush administration - intentionally walking guns into Mexico or allowing them to enter Mexico unaltered through incompetence, I'm not sure which. Wide Receiver was set up completely different from Fast and Furious. Besides, as I've pointed out, the concept that Bush knew, that Wide Receiver was the same as Fast and Furious, is the old lie; Holder and Obama have now dropped that, claiming it was "inadvertent".

Note that Bush DID NOT claim executive privilege and DID produce the documents under subpoena by Congress, although he had the exact same theoretical interest in preserving his own power as does Obama. The difference is obviously either than Obama was behind this all along, or that he finds it such a useful tool that he must spend political capital to make sure the offenders are protected.

The general idea of tracking guns in this matter was done before that is not false. That is the idea that I think that President Obama's administration should have not followed.

If they canceled the program asap this hullaballoo over executive privilege around it wouldn't even be an issue.

The Democratic party shows its weakness in this case. One of their members should've gone after Karl Rove with the same zeal during the Valerie Plame investigation.

 

[fskimospy]

Do you think Holder should be held in contempt?

I don't really care. Contempt is a political move to compel more disclosure, which I like, but it's largely irrelevant here. This case is too weak to actually move forward and decrease the scope of executive privilege through either real congressional threats or the courts so in the end it probably won't mean much.

 

[werepossum]

The general idea of tracking guns in this matter was done before that is not false. That is the idea that I think that President Obama's administration should have not followed.

If they canceled the program asap this hullaballoo over executive privilege around it wouldn't even be an issue.

The Democratic party shows its weakness in this case. One of their members should've gone after Karl Rove with the same zeal during the Valerie Plame investigation.

Again, Wide Receiver was set up as fundamentally different from Fast and Furious. Wide Receiver was undertaken with the complete knowledge and cooperation of the Mexican government. Our BATFE has no law enforcement resources within Mexico, any more than Mexico has law enforcement resources within the USA. The guns were modified to include hidden tracking devices so that they could be tracked within Mexico (by the Mexican government) and the recipients arrested with their illegal guns. To the extent that guns were allowed into Mexico without such tracking devices it was either through BATFE perfidy or incompetence, NOT as the intention of the program. Guns walked in via Wide Receiver were to be intercepted BEFORE any crimes were committed with them.

Fast and Furious by contrast was undertaken without any knowledge and/or cooperation of the Mexican government. Fast and Furious used no GPS trackers. The Mexican government had no way to track these weapons - they weren't even informed the weapons had entered the country. For all they knew, the BATFE was hard at work preventing weapons from entering Mexico - what we pay them to do. Instead, Mexico has hundreds of dead citizens from weapons we intentionally walked in.

Fast and Furious is not a botched sting operation because it never had any enforcement mechanism. There is literally no comparison between Fast and Furious and Wide Receiver in design or intention. The only useful purpose Fast and Furious could ever serve is to provide dead Mexicans and statistics to back up the claim - oft repeated by Barack Obama - that drug cartel violence is due to American guns. And I was entirely content to accept that President Obama was above such a heinous action right up until he took possession of it.

 

[blankslate]

Again, President Obama's administration shouldn't even have tried any version of this. Given the source of the idea.

 

[wetech]

March 22 to May 3 is 6 weeks, which qualifies as " a few", not as "a couple" which your source distorts it into...

Not that your source is biased or anything...

http://xkcd.com/1070/

 

[Hayabusa Rider]

The general idea of tracking guns in this matter was done before that is not false.

Yeah is it.

Sting operation 1:
Drugs are provided to criminals. They are tracked and where and who they are distributed to are noted.

Sting operation 2: Drugs are provided to criminals. Maybe someone will catch somebody with them later. In the meantime, go home.

"In this manner" isn't equivalent, unless you say that they are the same because drugs were provided. Afterwards? Not a chance, and that's the important difference.

 

[blankslate]

See post 295

 

[BladeVenom]

Wide Receiver was about trying to catch and stop gun traffickers. They informed Mexican law enforcement.

Fast and Furious was about increasing illegal gun trafficking as an excuse for more gun control. This has been proven by ATF's own documents. http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-31727_1...furious-to-make-the-case-for-gun-regulations/

Eric Holder is trying to brainwash people against the guns. Here's the video of him saying it, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0nM0asnCXD0 Anyone believing the Obama administration in this matter has been successfully brainwashed.

 

[blankslate]

Eric Holder is trying to brainwash people against the guns. Here's the video of him saying it, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0nM0asnCXD0 Anyone believing the Obama administration in this matter has been successfully brainwashed.

Advertising brainwashes people by that videos standard. His use of the term "brainwash" was a gaffe on the level of "Our enemies are thinking of new ways to harm the U.S.... and so are we." though.



The Democratic party has given up on gun control laws since 1995 btw.

Unless it's a state specific law that prohibits it you can buy AR-15 rifles that have better features than the M-15A3 most people in the military are assigned. Except for the 3 round burst thing. Something that non-combat MOS personnel rarely get to use at the range anyway.

Congress let federal assault rifle laws expire without much of a whimper.

http://hunting.about.com/od/guns/a/awbexpired.htm

On September 13, 2004, the so-called Clinton Assault Weapons Ban of 1994 expired.