NYT calls for the head of the Attorney General

Wow…who would have thought that the leftist rag would demand the resignation/firing of the Attorney General of the United States?  I guess the offense was just that horrible!  Excerpt:

It (the administration) has offered up implausible excuses, hidden the most damaging evidence and feigned memory lapses, while hoping that the public’s attention moves on. But this scandal is too important for the public or Congress to move on. This story should not end until Attorney General [redacted – CL] is gone, and the serious damage that has been done to the Justice Department is repaired.

Kudos to the NYT for demanding that the integrity of the office of the AG and the Department of Justice be preserved!  I guess Operation Fast & Furious, a botched federal government operation which resulted in our government arming Mexican drug lords who, in turn, killed Border Patrol agent Brian Terry PLUS 300+ Mexicans, was just so egregious that even the liberal apologists at the Old Gray Hag couldn’t defend USAG Eric Holder over it.

Hmm?  What’s that?  The NYT column isn’t talking about Holder or Fast & Furious?

Oh, wait.  That’s right!  My bad.  The column was demanding the head of Bush’s AG Alberto Gonzales on a silver platter for the far more disgusting crime of…firing U.S. Attorneys who serve at the pleasure of the administration.

No, as it turns out, the NYT is allowing Holder and the administration to get their talking points out about Fast & Furious.  Naturally and predictably, Holder whips out the race card, and the NYT is more than happy to accommodate Holder.

But Mr. Holder contended that many of his other critics — not only elected Republicans but also a broader universe of conservative commentators and bloggers — were instead playing “Washington gotcha” games, portraying them as frequently “conflating things, conveniently leaving some stuff out, construing things to make it seem not quite what it was” to paint him and other department figures in the worst possible light.

Of that group of critics, Mr. Holder said he believed that a few — the “more extreme segment” — were motivated by animus against Mr. Obama and that he served as a stand-in for him. “This is a way to get at the president because of the way I can be identified with him,” he said, “both due to the nature of our relationship and, you know, the fact that we’re both African-American.”

From Big Journalism:

Conflating things? How do we “conflate things” when we provide the documents PROVING our points? Plus if we are leaving out things it’s because Mr. Holder and the Department of Justice aren’t providing us with all the details.
…
How about members of the Congressional Black Caucus Mr. Holder and Mr. Savage? As Mr. Boyle and Michelle Fields report the feeling in the caucus is that the congressional investigation is warranted. So do they feel this way because Mr. Holder is an African American? Are they racists against their own race?

To recap:  Republican A.G. fires US Attorneys (within his job duty), and the NYT demands he lose his job.  But Democrat A.G. arms a Mexican drug cartel and gets over 300 people killed, including federal border patrol agent Brian Terry (whose name the NYT can’t bother themselves to mention), and the NYT yawns disinterestedly and allows unfounded accusations of racism and sensationalism to go unchecked.  Because proof is racist, or something.

Nope…no liberal media bias!

Holder goes after TX voter ID law, turns blind eye to ID rules in other arenas

There’s this…

The Obama administration on Tuesday will wade into the increasingly divisive national debate over new voting laws in several states that could depress turnout among minorities and others who helped elect the president in 2008. …

With the presidential campaign heating up, Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. will deliver a speech Tuesday expressing concerns about the voter-identification laws, along with a Texas redistricting plan before the Supreme Court that fails to take into account the state’s burgeoning Hispanic population, he said in an interview Monday.

Holder will speak at the Lyndon Baines Johnson Presidential Libary and Museum in Austin, Tex., which honors the president who shepherded the 1965 Voting Rights Act into law. …

When it comes to voting fraud, some conservatives have long argued that it is a serious problem, although others say the number of such cases is relatively low. Studies of the issue have reached different conclusions on the extent of the problem.

“You constantly hear about voter fraud . . . but you don’t see huge amounts of vote fraud out there,’’ Holder said.

…as opposed to this:

You’re not seeing things.

The International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers (IAM) has  given 99% of its campaign money to Democrats (according to ElectionLawCenter.com,  citing OpenSecrets.org). Democrats, including Obama administration Attorney  General Eric Holder, who will be in Austin, Texas tomorrow supporting the  rejection of voter-ID laws and, according  to the Texas GOP, “NAACP plans to involve the United Nations on (sic) US  elections,” abhor the idea of making voters bring some form of photo  identification to the polls.

Yet the IAM in the instance photographed required a photo ID of all who  wished to vote in a contract ratification election. From the looks of the  professionally made sign, the photo-ID requirement in the union’s elections  would appear to be far from an isolated instance. Gosh, I wonder why?

Doug  Ross’s reaction: “Needle on Hypocrisy-Meter Breaks Off.”

At some point during all these years of covering the voter-ID issue, you  would think that someone in the press, much of which is unionized (specifically  the Associated Press, which has the credit for the photo above), would have  noted that unions at least occasionally and likely far more than occasionally  require that members present a photo ID to be able to cast their ballots. Nope.  How typically irresponsible.

Translation: Requiring picture ID in order to receive Social Security, Medicare, welfare, a library card, a driver’s license. are totally cool, and requiring picture ID to vote in certain (i.e. union) elections is only sensible.  But requiring picture ID for the most sacred act of our republic is racist.  Or something.

ATF wanted Fast & Furious fiasco to push for more gun control

Remember last month when Eric Holder said that the botched Operation Fast & Furious, which resulted in the deaths of people including a border patrol agent (of which Holder is not remorseful), was proof that we needed more gun control laws in the U.S.?  As if more gun control laws would have stopped our own government from arming Mexican drug cartels, right?  Anywho, new e-mails are surfacing that showed ATF officials were indeed using the power of their office, coupled with the fiasco that was OF&F, to push more gun control legislation.  Details:

ATF officials didn’t intend to publicly disclose their own role in letting Mexican cartels obtain the weapons, but emails show they discussed using the sales, including sales encouraged by ATF, to justify a new gun regulation called “Demand Letter 3″. That would require some U.S. gun shops to report the sale of multiple rifles or “long guns.” Demand Letter 3 was so named because it would be the third ATF program demanding gun dealers report tracing information.

On July 14, 2010 after ATF headquarters in Washington D.C. received an update on Fast and Furious, ATF Field Ops Assistant Director Mark Chait emailed Bill Newell, ATF’s Phoenix Special Agent in Charge of Fast and Furious:

“Bill – can you see if these guns were all purchased from the same (licensed gun dealer) and at one time. We are looking at anecdotal cases to support a demand letter on long gun multiple sales. Thanks.”

On Jan. 4, 2011, as ATF prepared a press conference to announce arrests in Fast and Furious, Newell saw it as “(A)nother time to address Multiple Sale on Long Guns issue.” And a day after the press conference, Chait emailed Newell: “Bill–well done yesterday… (I)n light of our request for Demand letter 3, this case could be a strong supporting factor if we can determine how many multiple sales of long guns occurred during the course of this case.”

There’s much more at the link.  Here’s guessing that House Oversight Chair Darrell Issa is going to grill the hopelessly corrupt Eric Holder on this at today’s hearing.

Holder: We need to tighten gun control laws so we at the federal government don’t give any more guns to murderous Mexican drug cartels

What a #*&@% moron!  This guy must possess another chromosome or two, because this is just idiotic on so many levels.  Details:

In his testimony, Holder also advocates for new gun-control laws that he says would have halted, or at least prevented, Operation Fast and Furious. Holder echoes California Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein’s comments from last week, when she argued that stricter gun laws would have stopped law enforcement agents from facilitating the sale of guns to Mexican drug cartels.

Just to make sure I understand this properly…

The feds force reluctant gun dealers to sell guns to Mexican drug lords, who then turn around and use those guns (unexpectedly, of course) to commit crimes, especially murder.  When the resulting (and predictable) operation blows up, Holder and his minions scramble into CYA mode to deal with the humilation and possible criminal charges.

Their response?  We need stricter gun control laws.  Of course.  I mean, stricter gun control laws that applied only to American citizens would have prevented the federal government from this insanely stupid government operation (forcing gun dealers to sell arms to Mexican drug lords), right?  Hmmm?  They won’t?

You know, if I were cynical, I would think that the feds are using this debacle as a cover for  implementing more gun control laws against the populace.  If I were cynical, that is.

S&P to U.S.: Your credit rating is downgraded because the outlook isn’t so good. U.S. to S&P: Consider yourself investigated!

Slaying the messenger:

The Justice Department is investigating whether the nation’s largest credit ratings agency, Standard & Poor’s, improperly rated dozens of mortgage securities in the years leading up to the financial crisis, according to two people interviewed by the government and another briefed on such interviews.

The investigation began before Standard & Poor’s cut the United States’ AAA credit rating this month, but it is likely to add fuel to the political firestorm that has surrounded that action. Lawmakers and some administration officials have since questioned the agency’s secretive process, its credibility and the competence of its analysts, claiming to have found an error in its debt calculations.

I’m sure this is a big ol’ coinkidink, and in no way whatsoever related to the credit agency telling the world what we already know (but it damning to the administration): this government is way too friggin’ big to repay all of the debt it has racked up.

Holder: The most effective counter-terror method the U.S. has is its fearsome…court system

Ho. Ly. Shiite.  Who needs SEALs, right?

Holder’s declaration came in a Thursday speech to hundreds of progressive lawyers, advocates, judges and students gathered at the American Constitution Society’s annual gala. “I know that – in distant countries, and within our own borders – there are people intent on, and actively plotting to, kill Americans,” he told his legal peers in the enthusiastic audience. “Victory and security will not come easily, and they won’t come at all if we adhere to a rigid ideology, adopt a narrow methodology, or abandon our most effective terror-fighting weapon – our Article III [civil] court system,” he declared to much applause.

I can see it now:

Muhammed:  Hey, Ibrahim, let’s go blow up some infidels in America!  Where to this time: NYC, LA, Miami, San Franistan?

Ibrahim:  What, are you crazy?  Have you SEEN what the Americans are doing?  Dude, they’re mobilizing lawyers and judges and stuff!

Muhammed:  Holy falafel!  I mean, that sternly-worded U.N. Resolution was scary enough…but this?  May Allah help us!

Ibrahim:  Don’t fret yet, brother.  I’ve got a call in to the ACLU on this.  If anyone can stand up for our “rights”, it’s those guys.  But dude, if the ACLU can’t shield us from those fearsome black-robed giants and intimidating Armani-clad attorneys, I don’t know who can!

Exit question: Quick show of hands here, but am I the only one who’s impressed that Eric Holder actually knew part of the Constitution?  Someone check the forecast for Hell to see if it’s a little chilly.

Obama to 9/11 victim’s sister: The criminal probe of CIA agents who used interrogation techniques that got us bin Laden will go on

Obama:  Hey, guys, thanks for helping procure critical information that nabbed OBL for us.  Now where were we?  Oh, yeah, now I remember: trying to send your butts to prison for using harsh interrogation techniques!  Details:

The sister of a Sept. 11 victim said President Obama on Thursday turned down her request to advise Attorney General Eric Holder to drop his probe of CIA agents whose interrogation methods may have provided information leading to the raid on Al Qaeda leader Usama bin Laden.

Debra Burlingame, whose brother was the pilot of American Airlines Flight 77, which was hijacked and forced into the Pentagon on Sept. 11, 2001, told Fox News on Thursday that she made the request during Obama’s meeting with families of victims of the Al Qaeda attack.

When the president approached her table, Burlingame said she told him that as a former attorney she knows he can’t tell the attorney general what to do – an assessment the president agreed with, she said.

“And I said, but that shouldn’t stop you from offering your opinion. After all, we wouldn’t be here celebrating today if they hadn’t done their job,” she said. “And they have the hammer of a possible indictment over their heads. Can’t you at least give him your opinion?”

The president replied that he wouldn’t, she said. She added, “And he turned around and walked away.”

An@l orifice.

Obama’s DOJ shuts down prosecution of U.S.S. Cole bomber

Remember when President Kick#ss promised the U.S.S. Cole and 9/11 families justice?  Well, as is the case with his other promises, that one also had an expiration date.  “Words.  Just words.”

From the Washington comPost:

The Obama administration has shelved the planned prosecution of Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri, the alleged coordinator of the Oct. 2000 suicide attack on the USS Cole in Yemen, according to a court filing.

The decision at least temporarily scuttles what was supposed to be the signature trial of a major al-Qaeda figure under a reformed system of military commissions. And it comes practically on the eve of the 10th anniversary of the attack, which killed 17 sailors and wounded dozens when a boat packed with explosives ripped a hole in the side of the warship in the port of Aden.

In a filing this week in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia, the Justice Department said that “no charges are either pending or contemplated with respect to al-Nashiri in the near future.”

Apparently, B.O. didn’t think his personal and his party’s approval ratings were nearly low enough, so he’s going for broke.

Exit question:  With examples like this (to add to the already long list of examples), why does the left seem puzzled that there is a growing suspicion that B.O. is more Muslim than any other faith?

You MUST be kidding me! DOJ to hire “Ebonics expert”?

And the left wants us to keep them in charge for this?

The Department of Justice is seeking to hire linguists fluent in Ebonics to help monitor, translate, and transcribe the secretly recorded conversations of subjects of narcotics investigations, according to federal records.

A maximum of nine Ebonics experts will work with the Drug Enforcement Administration’s Atlanta field division, where the linguists, after obtaining a “DEA Sensitive” security clearance, will help investigators decipher the results of “telephonic monitoring of court ordered nonconsensual intercepts, consensual listening devices, and other media”

The DEA’s need for full-time linguists specializing in Ebonics is detailed in bid documents related to the agency’s mid-May issuance of a request for proposal (RFP) covering the provision of as many as 2100 linguists for the drug agency’s various field offices. Answers to the proposal were due from contractors on July 29.

Sometimes, the absurdity is just so glaring that there isn’t much else to say.

Exit question: Are there really linguists who specialize in Ebonics?

AZ law working already, future Democrat voters hardest hit

AZ to Eric Holder: Bite me.  Heh.

Nicaraguan mother Lorena Aguilar hawks a television set and a few clothes on the baking sidewalk outside her west Phoenix apartment block.

A few paces up the street, her undocumented Mexican neighbor WendiVillasenor touts a kitchen table, some chairs and a few dishes as her family scrambles to get out of Arizona ahead of a looming crackdown on illegal immigrants.

“Everyone is selling up the little they have and leaving,” said Villasenor, 31, who is headed for Pennsylvania. (Here they come, PA! – CL)  “We have no alternative. They have us cornered.”

The two women are among scores of illegal immigrant families across Phoenix hauling the contents of their homes into the yard this weekend as they rush to sell up and get out before the state law takes effect on Thursday.

Awesome.  See what happens when you simply enforce existing laws?

Now if only we can get my state (and the rest) to implement the AZ law, then…well, then I guess we can look forward to a Holder lawsuit, too.

Political cartoon of the day

The Eric Holder approach:

Crush Liberalism Radio on Sunday, May 16, at 10:00 pm

Phones open this week.  Feel free to call in.  This week’s main discussion will be the weenie who masquerades as our nation’s Attorney General, maybe Gov. Chris Christie of NJ, and more…Sunday night on Crush Liberalism radio!

See you there!

Eric Holder: No, I haven’t read the AZ immigration law, but I’m POSITIVE it’s unconstitutional!

When you’ve already got your mind made up about something, you don’t let trivial things like facts and the Constitution get in the way, do you?  Details:

Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr., who has been critical of Arizona’s new immigration law, said Thursday he hasn’t yet read the law and is going by what he’s read in newspapers or seen on television.

Now that is an awesome prosecutorial approach!  “Your honor, I have no bleeping idea what’s in this law, but Keith Olbermann says it sucks, so here we are.”  Continuing:

“I’ve just expressed concerns on the basis of what I’ve heard about the law. But I’m not in a position to say at this point, not having read the law, not having had the chance to interact with people are doing the review, exactly what my position is,” Mr. Holder told the House Judiciary Committee.

This weekend Mr. Holder told NBC’s “Meet the Press” program that the Arizona law “has the possibility of leading to racial profiling.” He had earlier called the law’s passage “unfortunate,” and questioned whether the law was unconstitutional because it tried to assume powers that may be reserved for the federal government.

Rep. Ted Poe, who had questioned Mr. Holder about the law, wondered how he could have those opinions if he hadn’t yet read the legislation.

“It’s hard for me to understand how you would have concerns about something being unconstitutional if you haven’t even read the law,” the Texas Republican told the attorney general.

Holder’s response to “what part of the AZ law violates the Constitution?” seems to be “Who cares?  I don’t like it!”  The chief law enforcement officer, friends.  We’re in great hands.

Apparently, the administration didn’t learn diddly after the Cambridge police – Professor Gates incident, whereby Barry O made a fool of himself by criticizing the police (“They acted stupidly”) before getting all of the information.  Open mouth, insert foot, repeat as necessary.

Quote of the day, “Holder thinks bin Laden deserves same trial as Manson” edition

Good grief!  To think this leftist tool is our A.G.!  From Breitbart.tv (video at the link):

Fox News: [Attorney General Eric Holder] said the “apt” comparison is to mass murderers like Charles Manson, who is currently serving a life sentence for orchestrating a killing spree in the 1960s. Trying to explain the analogy, Holder said mass murderers like Manson still reserve the right to go before a jury and have the charges against them proved beyond a reasonable doubt.

Wow.  Just “wow”.  😦

Administration frees terrorist who attacked Americans, will prosecute OUR interrogators instead

Eric Holder, a man of priorities.

First, he fought to secure the pardon of FALN terrorists in 2000.  Then, after the administration decides to free a Gitmo terrorist who attacked our soldiers in Afghanistan, Holder thought it would be a fine idea to prosecute not the terrorist, but the CIA interrogators who might have spoken harshly with a 9/11 mastermind in order to obtain life-saving intel.

Remember when Uhhhh-bama said he didn’t want to look backward?  As with all of his other statements, that one had an expiration date.  It’s like dude’s a serial liar or something.

You know, if I didn’t know any better, I’d swear that B.O. and his cronies don’t really have American interests at heart.

Obama’s new AG “forgets” ties to Blago

I’m sure it’s just a big ol’ coinkidink.  From Chicagoland:

Before Eric Holder was President-elect Barack Obama’s choice to be attorney general, he was Gov. Blagojevich’s pick to sort out a mess involving Illinois’ long-dormant casino license.

Blagojevich and Holder appeared together at a March 24, 2004, news conference to announce Holder’s role as “special investigator to the Illinois Gaming Board” — a post that was to pay Holder and his Washington, D.C. law firm up to $300,000.

Holder, however, omitted that event from his 47-page response to a Senate Judiciary Committee questionnaire made public this week — an oversight he plans to correct after a Chicago Sun-Times inquiry, Obama’s transition team indicated late Tuesday.
…
Holder signed the questionnaire on Sunday — five days after Blagojevich’s arrest for allegedly putting Obama’s U.S. Senate seat up for sale. The Judiciary Committee asked him to provide lists and “copies of transcripts or tape recordings of all speeches or talks delivered by you” and “all interviews you have given to newspapers, magazines or other publications.”

OK, just to make sure I’m understanding this right:

Holder was to get paid $300k for some work for Blagodonuts.  Holder turned in a questionnaire to the Senate Judiciary Committee after Blago’s arrest last week, but miracle of all miracles and mother of all coincidences, he just so happened to forget his presser with Blago to include on his SJC questionnaire that he was required to disclose.  I mean, with all this publicity surrounding Blago, we are to believe that Holder did not recall his public speech (you know, that thing the SJC requested a report of?) with the man?

I’m not buying it.  And for good reason:

The March 2004 Chicago news conference where Holder and Blagojevich spoke was widely covered because of a controversial 4-1 Gaming Board vote earlier that month to allow a casino to be built in Rosemont. That vote defied the recommendation of the board’s staff, which had raised concerns about alleged organized-crime links to the Rosemont casino’s developer.

Besides that, the Gaming Board’s staff had been concerned that the governor had named his close friend and fund-raiser, Christopher G. Kelly, as a “special government agent” to be involved in official state negotiations about the casino. Kelly, the Sun-Times later learned, was a business partner of Tony Rezko, another Blagojevich fund-raiser who had held an option to lease a hotel site next to the proposed casino site in Rosemont.
…
In an interview Tuesday, the Gaming Board’s chief investigator in 2004 said the timing of Blagojevich’s appointment of Holder raised the staff’s suspicions.

“The concern was Holder had a bias to do whatever Blagojevich wanted, which was to give the casino to Rosemont,” said Jim Wagner, who was a top Chicago FBI agent before he joined the Gaming Board, from which he retired in December 2005. “We all believed the only reason Holder was coming in was to fashion an investigation that would manipulate the casino into Rosemont.”

Wagner also said the matter should be explored by the Senate Judiciary Committee. “It ought be brought up and vetted totally as to what motivated him to leave it off” the questionnaire, Wagner said. …

Hope, and change.  Or something.