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Mike Kelly (R-PA) questions IRS commissioner in hearing over targeting conservative groups.

Attorney General Eric Holder testifies on Capitol Hill in Washington, Wednesday, May 15, 2013, before the House Judiciary Committee. WASHINGTON –  Eric Holder lashed out at his chief antagonist Wednesday at a congressional hearing where the attorney general was questioned on recent administration scandals, telling Republican Rep. Darrell Issa at the end of a tense exchange that his conduct is "shameful."  Holder’s comments came after Issa accused him of purposely and repeatedly keeping information from Congress.  “No, that’s what you typically do,” Holder responded. Following crosstalk, Holder added, “That is inappropriate and is too consistent with the way in...

U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder is set to testify before the House Judiciary Committee about the Justice Department's gathering of Associated Press phone records. Committee chairman Bob Goodlatte says he expects committee members Wednesday to ask pointed questions about the Justice Department's secret seizure and examination of two months of telephone records of reporters and editors for The Associated (AP). Goodlatte says Congress and the American people expect answers and accountability. On Tuesday Holder defended the Justice Department's seizure as part of a probe into what he called a grave national security leak that put the American people at risk....

Why a humiliated "Lame duck" Obama can be as much of a threat to liberty and security as ever. (Video)

Deputy chief of mission for the U.S. in Libya Gregory Hicks testified Wednesday that he was told not to meet with a congressman sent to investigate the attack on the American consulate in Benghazi. Hicks said a State Department lawyer accompanied the delegation and attempted to be in every single meeting he was involved in.

"But what about the American people? Really? Think about that for a few moments. Now … you’re not telling me that the same people who put this colossal failure back into the White House for four more years is going to get worked up over Benghazi, are you?"

Live Stream Full Committee Hearing: "Benghazi: Exposing Failure and Recognizing Courage"

The noise in the hen house this morning is the flutter and cackle of the chickens from Benghazi, scuttling home to roost. The House committee opening hearings Wednesday on what happened there is likely to serve up chicken surprise. The four whistleblowing witnesses scheduled to testify to the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee are said to be eager to tell a story far different from the various accounts, all confused and all contradictory, peddled by the Obama administration. Someone at the White House should have remembered that old Washington chestnut, as true now as ever,

Omerta is the Italian word for "humility." It was also the code of silence in the Mafia the breaking of which was punished severely. Apparently the Obama Administration has a similar code of silence. According to Fox news at least four career employees of the State Department and the CIA have been threatened not to talk by their superiors. Victoria Toensing, a former Justice Department official and Republican counsel to the Senate Intelligence Committee, is now representing one of the State Department employees. She told Fox News her client and some of the others, who consider themselves whistle-blowers, have been...

Rep. Trey Gowdy says that more Benghazi hearings are ‘coming quickly’ and they will be ‘explosive’. When asked if it will include witnesses who were there but haven’t been allowed to come forward, he wouldn’t say directly because of confidentiality but told the Fox News host that she was ‘very warm’ and suggested it may include ‘direct testimony by eyewitnesses’:

Some 72 members of Congress have signed on to a letter demanding that the mainstream media provide coverage of the murder trial of abortion practitioner Kermit Gosnell. Reps. Marsha Blackburn (R-TN) and Steve Scalise (R-LA) were joined by 70 of their House colleagues late Wednesday demanding national broadcast news channels ABC, NBC, and CBS stop blacking out coverage on high-profile abortion controversies. Their letters specifically reference two instances where the media has covered up the story of Planned Parenthood lobbying in support of infanticide in the Florida State Legislature and in the ongoing murder trial of abortionist Kermit Gosnell in...

The House Science, Space and Technology Committee will hold a hearing on how to “better identify and address asteroids that pose a potential threat to Earth,” Chairman Lamar Smith (R-Texas) said in a statement on Friday. The announcement comes after a meteorite exploded in a massive blast above Siberia that damaged buildings, houses and cars and injured about 1,000 people on Friday. "The light was so intense that it completely illuminated the courtyard of our apartment block," said Sergei Zakharov, head of the Russian Geographical Society in Chelyabinsk, according to The Wall Street Journal. "The sound, the shock wave came...

Countering the Republican-led opposition to President Barack Obama’s nominee for defense secretary is a less flashy but powerful constituency: military veterans. Veterans’ organizations have praised Chuck Hagel, a twice-wounded combat veteran of Vietnam and deputy administrator in President Ronald Reagan’s Veterans Administration. The Veterans of Foreign Wars has called him uniquely qualified to become Pentagon chief. The Military Officers Association of America said his experience gives him “a range of perspectives.” The American Legion said he was a longtime advocate for veterans. … VoteVets, a left-leaning veterans group, has campaigned for Hagel through social media, old-fashioned letters to editors and...

BREAKING: Obama to hand over drone documents ahead of Hagel hearing Posted by CNN White House Producer Lesa Jansen Washington (CNN) - Amid new controversy over his administration's targeted killing of American citizens, President Barack Obama has yielded to demands from Congress to turn over to them classified Justice Department legal advice justifying the policy. The president's move comes on the eve of confirmation hearings Thursday for his CIA director-nominee John Brennan, and complaints from senators - including several Democrats - about secrecy surrounding the drone policy.

Surprised they didn't opt for the Inquisition analogy . . . On Chris Hayes's MSNBC show this morning, Ali Gharib, editor of the "Open Zion" blog at the Daily Beast, described the questioning of Chuck Hagel at his Senate confirmation hearing as "a Republican purge" and a "Maoist public shaming." Michael Hastings of the Rolling Stone begged to differ, finding it more reminiscent of "Stalin." View the video here.

Senate Judiciary Committee Full Committee DATE: January 30, 2013 TIME: 10:00 AM ROOM: Hart 216 OFFICIAL HEARING NOTICE / WITNESS LIST: January 23, 2013 NOTICE OF COMMITTEE HEARING The Senate Committee on the Judiciary has scheduled a hearing entitled “What Should America Do About Gun Violence?” for Wednesday, January 30, 2013 at 10:00 a.m., in Room 216 of the Hart Senate Office Building. By order of the Chairman. UPDATED Witness List Hearing before the Senate Committee on the Judiciary “What Should America Do About Gun Violence?” Wednesday, January 30, 2013 Hart Senate Office Building, Room 216 10:00 a.m. Captain Mark...

On his Wednesday radio program, conservative talker Rush Limbaugh said that Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s Wednesday testimony about last year’s terrorist attacks in Benghazi were designed to help her politically. “What was happening here was the cleansing of Mrs. Clinton’s record in advance of her presidential run in 2016,” Limbaugh said. “Folks, this was banana republic kind of stuff. It was the kind of — you talk about two different worlds and isolation — the ruling class, the political class existing within its own borders, and its own world, and its own set of rules and taking care of...

2pm (ET) LIVE: Investigation of Benghazi Attack

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton won't testify to Congress next week on Benghazi, after fainting and suffering a concussion Saturday and due to her ongoing stomach ailment. "While suffering from a stomach virus, Secretary Clinton became dehydrated and fainted, sustaining a concussion," Deputy Assistant Secretary of State Philippe Reines said in a statement. "She has been recovering at home and will continue to be monitored regularly by her doctors. At their recommendation, she will continue to work from home next week, staying in regular contact with Department and other officials. She is looking forward to being back in the office...

HOUSE COMMITTEE HEARING ON BENGHAZI ATTACK

Breaking on Fox.

Flashback to 1973...

Syndicated columnist Charles Krauthammer on Tuesday said the White House used David Petraeus’s affair to get the CIA director to give testimony about the attacks on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi, Libya, that was in line with the administration’s position on the matter. Appearing on Fox News's Special Report, Krauthammer said, "The sword was lowered on Election Day" (video follows with transcript and commentary):

By MANU RAJU 11/13/12 11:23 AM EST It is "absolutely imperative" that Gen. David Petraeus testify about what went wrong in Libya, even as he reels from his sex scandal roiling the intelligence community, the top Republican on the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee said Tuesday. "I will say that I think it's absolutely imperative that Gen. Petraeus come and testify," Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine), the committee's ranking member, told reporters. "He was CIA director at the time of attack. He visited Libya at the time of attack. He has a great deal of information that we need...

One piece of information that got lost the last few days of sex scandals is the news that David Petraeus personally traveled to Libya after the Benghazi attack — and apparently filed a “trip report” covering his own findings. Senator Dianne Feinstein, who heads the Senate Intelligence Committee probing the Benghazi terrorist attack, wants either the report or Petraeus to testify to its contents. So far, though, the CIA and the White House have refused to provide it — and yesterday, Feinstein threatened that subpoenas may be forthcoming if the stonewalling continues... ...This lack of openness, coming on the heels...

The ranking Republican on the Senate Intelligence Committee said he’s spoken to former CIA Director David Petraeus about still testifying on the Benghazi attack — and the answer is not now. Sen. Saxby Chambliss (R-Ga.) said on ABC’s This Week this morning that his committee wasn’t told about the Petraeus investigation — reportedly centering around his mistress and emails — until Friday, when the general’s resignation was announced. “He and I have already had a conversation. You know, he’s trying to put his life back together right now and that’s what he needs to focus on,” Chambliss said in regard...

NEW YORK — The families of people killed in the Sept. 11 attacks have been invited to military installations in four states to watch pretrial hearings in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, for five men charged with planning or assisting the terrorist strike. The hearings, which begin Monday, are closed to the public, but relatives who register in advance can watch on closed-circuit television at forts in New Jersey, Massachusetts, Maryland and New York City. The suspects on trial before the military commission include Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the self-professed mastermind of the Sept. 11 attacks.

Trey Gowdy, an outspoken Republican congressman from South Carolina, blasted Obama administration officials during Wednesday's House Oversight and Government Reform Committee hearing on the Libya U.S. Consulate terrorist attack, raising his voice to levels rarely heard on the House floor.

C-Span will carry the hearings on Security Failures of Benghazi live at 12pm.

Congress should hold hearings into the attack on the U.S. consulate in Libya that killed four Americans to prevent a cover-up by the Obama White House, U.N. expert Richard Grenell tells Newsmax.TV. “We should do it immediately, because we’ve already seen the State Department scrubbing some of its information from its website,” Grenell, a partner with Media Capital Partners, tells Newsmax in an exclusive interview. He referenced a recent Fox News report on the development. “The State Department gave a warning that said, ‘We don’t have any intelligence that anything is going to be wrong on 9/11.’ And then they...

The Environmental Protection Agency held 12 hours of stacked hearings in Washington, D.C. and Chicago on Thursday in favor of a regulation that analysts have concluded would kill the building of new conventional coal plants in the U.S. Among the participants scheduled to testify in consecutive five minute blocks throughout the day were multiple representatives from the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People and environmental activists from the Sierra Club, the Environmental Defense Fund, the Natural Resources Defense Council and Greenpeace. The proposed rule, reported by The Washington Post in March, limits the amount of greenhouse gases emitted...

A visibly frustrated Attorney General Eric Holder slammed the table when responding to a question about Operation Fast and Furious during a Tuesday budget hearing before the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Commerce, Justice, Science and Related Agencies. “That was a fundamentally flawed program, fundamentally flawed,” Holder said of Fast and Furious. “And, I think that I can agree with some of my harshest critics that there are legitimate issues that need to be explored with regard in which the way Fast and Furious was carried out.” “But, I think one thing that also has to be understood is that once...

Two video interviews here: http://www.birthersummit.org/news/in-the-news/81-atlanta-georgia-interviews.html

If you would like to read the article with the embedded links, please visit http://www.birthersummit.org/news/80-georgia-hearings-two-out-of-three-aint-bad.html Author's Request: If you are not going to read the conclusion of this article, please do not read any of it. Those whose critical thinking skills are limited, either genetically, or willfully, are required to read the conclusion at least three times before sending me your zombie hate mail. Once again, in the days following the hearings that were conducted in Georgia on January 26, there has been a lot of spin and misinformation coming from our side; while much of it comes from simply...

Late yesterday, House Oversight Committee Chairman Darrell Issa’s office sent me an email with a copy of a letter the Congressman had sent to Attorney General Eric Holder on December 15 — a letter to which the A.G. has yet to respond. In it, Issa informs Holder that the Committee would like him to appear for more testimony on January 24, 2012. In other words, Fast and Furious isn’t going away any time soon. Issa wrote: The hearing will examine flaws in the management structure of the Justice Department as demonstrated in the genesis and implementation of ATF’s Operation Fast...

When it came time for Attorney General Eric Holder to make his opening comments, Congressman Darrell Issa (R-CA) requested that the A.G. be sworn under oath. Issa had already noted that Congress had been lied to and that in previous hearings, Holder & Co. displayed the “unheard of” habit of redacting their letters and testimony to the Congress. Congressman Lamar Smith (R-TX) said that it wasn’t necessary for Holder to be sworn under oath because it was understood that he was already under oath by virtue of the purpose for which he was appearing. Issa then asked Smith if he...

epublican lawmakers told Attorney General Eric Holder on Thursday to fire some Justice Department subordinates over the flawed arms-trafficking investigation called Operation Fast and Furious. At a House Judiciary Committee hearing, Rep. Jim Sensenbrenner of Wisconsin said impeachment is an option if Holder does not "clean up this mess" quickly. Sensenbrenner and other Republicans hold the attorney general responsible for the operation, in which federal agents failed to track hundreds of illicitly obtained weapons that were later recovered in Mexico and the U.S., many of them at crime scenes. "If you don't get to the bottom of this," there is...

Once Lamar Smith (R-TX) opened the hearings with comments on Fast and Furious and then passed the baton to Congressman John Conyers (D-MI), it seemed the hearings would be a wash. That’s because it was evident from the start that Conyers was there to carry water for Holder. For example, Conyers used his opening comments to highlight the “life and contributions” of Holder, and to highlight the need for more gun control in the United States. He particularly supported the new requirement for border state gun stores to file special reports on customers who make multiple long gun purchases. (Conyers...

It's time for Congress to impeach Attorney General Eric Holder. Congress may remove from office "all civil officers of the United States" if they are convicted of "treason, bribery or other high crimes and misdemeanors," the Constitution says (Article II, Section 4). Only the House of Representatives can impeach, which is comparable to indictment. The official is then tried by the Senate, where a two-thirds vote is required for conviction. The Constitution doesn't say what constitutes "high crimes and misdemeanors," but perjury surely is among them. So is obstruction of justice.

King said: “In our first two hearings, the Committee has examined radicalization of Muslim-Americans generally and focused on the problem of radicalization in U.S. prisons. “At this hearing, the third in a series, we will examine Somalia-based terrorist organization al-Shabaab’s ongoing recruitment, radicalization, and training of young Muslim-Americans and al-Shabaab’s linking up with al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP). “In Minnesota, Ohio, and other states, dozens of young Muslim males have been recruited, radicalized, and then taken from their communities for overseas terrorist training by al-Shabaab. In a number of cases, the men – including both Somali-Americans and other converts...

Several top ATF officials will testify Tuesday before a House committee investigating the controversial “Fast and Furious” weapons program and likely will be asked whether they were ordered not to tell Mexican authorities that guns recovered at crime scenes in that country had been illegally purchased in the U.S. The House Oversight and Government Reform Committee hearing, called in the wake of acting ATF Director Kenneth E. Melson’s closed-door testimony that the Justice Department sought to shift blame for Fast and Furious away from its political appointees, also will get its first opportunity to question ATF supervisors who have defended...

According to a release from Rep. Darrell Issa, (R-Calif.) his House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform has scheduled new hearings into the on going Operation Fast and Furious scandal — this time they’ll be talking to ATF agents based in Mexico: “Operation Fast and Furious: The Other Side of the Border” will examine accounts of agents based in Mexico Washington DC– On Tuesday, July 26th, the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee will convene a hearing as part of the ongoing investigation into the Department of Justice’s Operation Fast and Furious, a tragically flawed effort that is connected to...

Congressional Hearings on Planned Parenthood Abortion Biz Possible Washington, DC -- The day after a national pro-life organization released a new comprehensive report showing the numerous abuses at Planned Parenthood abortion centers as reasons for a Congressional investigation, one top Republican says that's possible. http://www.lifenews.com/2011/07/08/congressional-hearings-on-planned-parenthood-abortion-biz-possible/

At a congressional hearing on Muslim radicalization in U.S. prisons, Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee (D-Texas) said that investigators needed to analyze Christian militants in America because they too might try to “bring down the country.” In an exchange with witness Patrick Dunleavy, the former deputy inspector of the criminal intelligence unit, New York Department of Correctional Services, Rep. Jackson Lee mentioned the case of a man who blew up an abortion clinic and proposed that this perhaps was an attempt to undermine U.S. law that allows a woman to procure an abortion. Rep. Lee then said, “As we look to...

WASHINGTON — Knowledge of Operation Fast and Furious, a controversial border security strategy that allowed guns to be shipped illegally into Mexico in an effort to track them to drug cartels, went to the top of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms, according to evidence released on Wednesday at a House Oversight Committee hearing. Witnesses at the House hearing included three relatives of a Border Patrol agent killed in Arizona and three A.T.F. agents, right. The operation, which began in 2009, came under fire after two guns linked to it were found at the scene of the killing of...

The chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee released copies of redacted emails on Wednesday that detail the involvement of the head of the ATF in a controversial gun-tracking program as early as March of 2010. The emails strike a stark contrast to letters the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF) have sent to lawmakers in which they denied selling assault weapons to known and suspected straw purchasers for drug cartels and claimed that they made every effort to prevent weapons from going to Mexico. In one of the emails, released by Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.),...

Mid-June could potentially bring the first of what may be several hearings on Capitol Hill over Project Gunrunner, but that is not confirmed nor is it presently on the Congressional calendar, a House source said today. "It might not happen," the source said via e-mail. Mike Vanderboegh, the Sipsey Street Irregulars blogger who broke the initial Gunrunner stories with National Gun Rights Examiner David Codrea almost six months ago, first reported the possibility of a hearing earlier today. That hearing would be before Congressman Darrell Issa’s Committee on Oversight and Government Reform. Issa did recently indicate that hearings into the...

An open letter to Senators Max Baucus and Jon Tester Senators Baucus and Tester: You’ve both led in actions in the past to merit gun owner support (see "On the Issues" links, below), notably your letter to Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) Acting Director Kenneth E. Melson opposing expansion of reporting requirements for long gun purchases, your leadership in ensuring that spent military cartridge cases remain available to the civilian market, and your warning to Attorney General Eric Holder that you “oppose reinstating the ban on the sale of assault weapons.” Good job on those. Unfortunately, you...

Five executives from America’s leading oil companies were marched in front of the Senate Finance Committee Thursday morning for a public scolding, and told to defend industry tax breaks while Americans are being charged $4 for a gallon of gas. In other words, Thursday was judgment day the CEO’s of the country’s five largest oil companies. And because most of the committee’s Republicans were attending a budget meeting at the White House, the executives were left to face a very partisan, very unhappy panel of Democrats. Representing the scorned oil industry was John Watson of Chevron, Marvin Odum of Shell...

RENO, Nev. (AP) -- President Barack Obama announced Thursday that the Justice Department is assembling a team to "root out any cases of fraud or manipulation" in oil markets that might be contributing to $4 a gallon-plus gasoline prices. "We are going to make sure that no one is taking advantage of the American people for their own short-term gain," Obama said at a town-hall style meeting at a renewable energy plant in Reno. The national average price for a gallon of regular gasoline was $3.84 on Thursday, about 30 cents higher than a month ago and almost a dollar...