MURDERGATE
Posted on 06/23/2012 1:29:08 PM PDT by kristinn
In the classic Washington investigation at the highest levels of power, it is never the original offense that leads to trouble. It is who knew what and who said what that powers the probe and brings forth the cry of cover-up.
That script is being followed almost to the letter in the drama that continues this week as the Republican-controlled House of Representatives prepares for a possible vote on contempt of Congress charges against the highest law enforcement official in the country, Attorney General Eric Holder.
It began as a congressional probe of Operation "Fast and Furious," a botched effort by the Justice Department's Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms to trace illegal gun trafficking to Mexican drug cartels.
But now it is about a letter from the Justice Department to members of Congress dated February 4, 2011 denying the operation's existence.
The denial was vehement but, it turned out, inaccurate, as the department conceded when it formally withdrew the letter on December 11, 2011.
The Justice Department "obstructed the investigation" for nearly a year, said Darrell Issa, chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee. What the committee now wants to know is how and when officials knew the February 4 letter was wrong and why it took so long for them to retract it.
The subpoena the committee issued last week was largely for post-February 4 documents that might shed light on those questions. The claim of executive privilege invoked by President Barack Obama at the request of his attorney general covers those very same papers.
(Excerpt) Read more at chicagotribune.com ...
And I jokingly thought to myself how they could possibly blame this one on Bush!
Gotta' hand it to the usurper in chief and his cabinet, they sure are consistent when it comes to "da bush".
“In the classic Washington investigation at the highest levels of power, it is never the original offense that leads to trouble.”
Except that there’s a dead guy at the start of this one... other than that YEP same ol’ same ol’!
How does this article fit with the other articles? More information /details? Or are they just regurgitating the same ol/same ol?
I think the original offense is the bad thing in this case.
The “original offense” in the Nixon case was a break-in by over-zealous campaign people in an attempt to steal political information on the opposition. Nixon didn’t know about it, and indeed what he was impeached for was trying to cover it up when it was revealed.
That was nothing at all like the highly secret operation that violated the sovereignty of another nation and resulted in deaths of that nation’s citizens, along with the deaths of US law enforcement personnel, which was coordinated by Holder and almost certainly approved by Obama.
Obama knew about it in advance and approved it, and has very good reason for trying to cover it up.
...a botched effort...
All of the state controlled media is using this canard. I hear it everywhere, and all the time.
Clue to the state controlled media: It wasn't botched! This administration, to the highest levels (read Holder and 0bama) orchestrated this operation on PURPOSE!
The only thing that was "botched," was the administration got CAUGHT!
I so wanted to type this whole post in caps...
5.56mm
[R]anking department officials are by law supposed to review any wiretap requests. If they did not, they can be portrayed as careless stewards of the law, or worse. If they did, and if the requests included details of the operation, they have even more serious explaining ahead of them.
The article states,
“But Issa is aggressive and partisan.”
How about,
“But Issa is fearless and wants to uphold
the rule of law in the US.”
Just to be fair and accurate...
Nixon WAS NOT impeached.
He resigned when the House Republicans came to him with the news that they could not stop an impeachment vote in the House.
“...a botched effort...”
“Botched raid” was the standard media line referring to the assault on the Branch Davidian compound at Waco.
I guess “botched” is newspeak for the US government’s involvement in killing it’s own innocent citizens and LEOs.
roto rooters trying to play catchup and confusing the issue even more. They are attempting to oversimplify a very complex series of events. Anyone who hasn’t followed this all the way along remains clueless.
The last paragraph, however, shows the continued
Reuters leftist bias:
“Democrats counter that any high-level Justice
Department officials who may have approved those
wiretaps used the same accepted procedures that
other administrations have long employed. At that
high level, they say, the details of a law enforcement
operation are not being reviewed. That is the
responsibility of officials on the scene.”
So review is required by law, but the piece leaves the
impression that it is never done in practice. If a
Repyoobican were in office, there would be a need
at least to tighten things up at the Justice Department.
Someone would be required to lose his job. The last
paragraph says review is not done in practice and leaves
the article there. It is, again, another “Bush did the
same thing” argument by Reuters.
Ecellent!
No, you’re right. Nixon wasn’t actually impeached, but it would have happened. And you know he would have done the right thing and resigned (in addition, because the Senate most certainly would have upheld it).
Of course, the really, truly Impeached One, being let off the hook by the Senate, never had to do anything except raise the fees for his speaking tours...
LOL!
You are absolutely correct in post #6. The reason they said “it’s not the crime, it’s the coverup” in Watergate is because the crime wasn’t much at all.
Fast and Furious is multiple murder verging on mass murder.
Desking is probably reviewing to make sure that even in all this bad news, Obama and Holder don’t look so bad and Issa and the Republicans look like rabidly partisan whiners.
Interesting. When ?I went to the link it showed 9 comments. I wanted to read them, but,,,, when I clicked on “Comments,” there were no comments! Guess they might have been getting reamed?
This is not a pleasant topic but “Fast and Furious” is growing legs and this is bigger than Watergate.
This is the best commentary I have seen on the topic. It draws the conclusion that the MSM has no shame and goes over a lot of facts that one might not be familiar. This is very provocative and is not for the ostriches out there:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UFIpoL3jrfo
I believe that this needs to be vigorously investigated. If President Obama is involved in the decision, Obama needs to be impeached. Holder needs to go to jail until he delivers the documents to congress. If Holder is guilty of being involved in this, he needs to be put on trial and convicted of murder.
That's funny. Here are the testimonies, under oath, of four ATF field agents who say they did exactly that. They are not the only ones.
The Department of Justice ’ s Operation Fast and Furious: Accounts of ATF AgentsAgent Casa recounted a similar situation. He had also never heard of, nor seen, guns being allowed to walk until he got to Phoenix:
. . . . But from the time I started as an ATF special agent . . . up until the time I got to Phoenix, that was my understanding, that we do not let guns walk, absolutely, positively not. And if we –if ever a case [where]we would do that, there better be a really good explanation why we did not grab that gun when we could.
Q. But that changed when you came to Phoenix, I mean the practice at least changed, correct?
A. Yes.
(snip)
As Agent Dodson testified:
Q. Based on our training and experience, what did you think about [walking guns]?
A. It was something I had never done before, sir. And quite frankly, I took great issue with it and concern.I felt like I understand the importance of going after the bigger target, but there is a way to do that. We did it successfully in the dope world all the time. And those skills and practices that we used there, a lot of them transfer over, and more than applicable in gun trafficking investigations, but we weren’t allowed to use any of them.
Q. And did you ever have a recollection of sharing your frustration with Special Agent Casa?
A. Oh, yes, sir.
Q. And any other special agents that you can –
A. Yes, sir.
Q. And maybe you could just tell us what other agents you –
A. Pretty much everyone, sir. It was, I shared my reservations and concerns with Special Agent [L], with Dave Voth, with Special Agent [D]Special Agent [H], Special Agent Alt, Special Agent [P], several of the special agents that came on the GRIT, G-R-I-T. The gunrunner initiative is what it stands for. I shared them with or I voiced my concerns to other agents inside the Phoenix field division that was on other groups.
(snip)
Despite this e-mail, agents continued to experience dismay and frustration as Operation Fast and Furious continued along its perilous path. As Agent Casa testified:
Q. And is it fair to say that. . .the folks on your side of the schism wanted to do everything they could to interdict these weapons so they wouldn’t get any farther down the street than they have to?
A. Yes, sir. We were all sick to death when we realized that –when we realized what was going on or when we saw what was going on by the trends. We were all just, yes, we were all distraught.
The rift widened when the Assistant Special Agent in Charge (ASAC) authoritatively and unambiguously told Group VII that guns were not being walked, that the special agents were incorrect in their terminology, and that there would be no more discussion or dissension about this topic. Agent Dodson testified:
A. Then we get an e-mail that . . . there is going to be a meeting. [the ASAC] is coming down, [the ASAC] comes into the Group 7 office and tells us essentially we better stand down with our complaints, that we didn’t know what the definition of walking guns was, we weren’t familiar with the Phoenix way of doing things, that all of this was sanctioned and we just needed to essentially shut up and get in line. That’s not a quote, but that’s the feel of the meeting, so . . .
THANK YOU!!!! WORTH REPEATING.
If it starts with a lie, I don't waste my time on it.
Desking=propagandist. Gotcha.
See you in the morning.
You’re spot on...
“I think the original offense is the bad thing in this case.”
Exactly.
They are trying their best to say it’s the coverup, when this is about allowing guns to be sold to murderers to kill Mexican citizens so they could continue their campaign against guns in this country. Removing guns from the population in the first step in government control of the masses. They just didn’t expect that the guns would be traced back to the murder of border patrol agent,Brian Terry, and possibly the murder of ICE agent, James Zapata.
Murdergate is an appropriate name. We don’t know how many innocent Mexicans were killed.
Thank you for posting this. I heard that some of the agents were even trying to do surveillance on their own time.
From this testimony alone, someone should be going to jail.
At any rate he did it on his own because it was incomprehensible to him that they should let guns walk. As it would be to anyone with half a brain and a conscience.
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