Posted on 06/21/2012 6:37:56 AM PDT by marktwain
As noted by Jonathan Adler, below, President Obama today asserted Executive Privilege for Attorney General Eric Holder’s refusal to comply with a document subpoena from the U.S. House Oversight Committee. The letter is here. The Committee will vote later today on a resolution to hold Holder in contempt of Congress. The Committee Report in support of the contempt resolution is here. A fact sheet on the contempt resolution is here.
Fast & Furious was a program implemented by the Arizona office of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms & Explosives, in Sept. 2009 through January 2011. In F&F, BATFE lied to and coerced Arizona gun stores into selling firearms to obvious “straw purchasers”–persons who were illegally buying firearms on behalf of someone who cannot legally buy firearms in the U.S. The “someone else” was Mexican gun traffickers, with most of the guns going to the Sinaloa cartel. Over 2,000 firearms were thus put into criminal hands. In this article for the NRA magazine America’s 1st Freedom, I provide a timeline of events through October 2011. F&F was a larger and even more destructive reprise of Operation Wide Receiver, which in 2007 put about 500 guns into criminal hands, before BATFE’s management in DC began asking questions that immediately led to Wide Receiver being shut down.
On Feb. 4, 2011, the Department of Justice sent a letter to the House Oversight Committee which falsely claimed that no “gunwalking” (allowing guns to pass into criminal hands, without the guns being kept under constant surveillance) ever took place in Fast & Furious. In December 2011, the Department of Justice admitted that the letter was false, and formally withdrew it. The author of the letter, Ronald Weich, has left DOJ to become Dean of the University of Baltimore Law School.
Whistleblowers from BATFE started coming forward in December 2010, after F&F guns were used in the murder of Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry. There has been extensive retaliation against the whistleblowers.
The particular issues in the contempt vote, and therefore in President Obama’s assertion of Executive Privilege involve:
1. Retaliation against the whistleblowers.
2. Post-Feb. 4 DOJ documents about the false Feb. 4 letter, communications with the White House about F&F after Feb. 4, and other DOJ documents involving the (alleged) continuing cover-up after Feb. 4.
While Fast & Furious was going on, personnel at the National Security Council in the White House received information about it, although the full extent of what they were told is not yet clear. The contempt resolution is based on a document subpoena which was issued in October 2011.
According to Attorney General Holder, the DOJ has 140,000 documents related to Fast & Furious. Fewer than 8,000 have been provided to Congress pursuant to subpoenas. The contempt vote has been narrowed to 1,300 documents. In refusing to comply with the House subpoenas, the DOJ has refused to create a privilege log–which would identify withheld documents, and the legal reason for their being withheld.
So here are my questions for the commenters: Is President’s assertion of executive privilege legally persuasive? Do the citations provided in the executive privilege letter provide an accurate description of current law on executive privilege? Todd Gaziano, of the Heritage Foundation, argues that Executive Privilege is not properly invoked here.
UPDATE: I will be discussing today’s developments on WDTK radio, Detroit, at 4 p.m. Mountain Time. You can listen live here.
Maybe we should ask if they want to investigate themselves so they can just say no as they did with the classified leaks.
MARK LEVIN: "Executive Privilege" And How the House Should Move Forward Legally
Is President Obama’s assertion of executive privilege valid?
Does it matter? Who is going to challenge it? Aside from the usual pissing and moaning from the limp-wristed pu$$ies that call themselves Republicans, there will be no action taken for the empty suit’s illegal actions.
Levin makes an excellent point in that to claim executive privilege, Obama has to list specific documents that the privilege applies to. It can’t just be a blanket declaration that covers all of the documents.
Can Obama make an executive-privilege claim stick? (How will it work legally and politically?)
I think that leaves this case out.
So, from your point of view, there is absolutely no hope for this nation.
I pity you.
“When has this administration ever been concerned with the rule of law? “
Exactly—and who is there to stop him? He knows that this government was meant to be honored by honorable men and if a dishonorable, unscrupulous, criminal bastard ever got his hands on the presidency along with a dishonorable, treasonous, criminal AG, NOTHING could stop them from doing anything they wanted.
Time for a rope and a step off the stool, nothing is being done, woe is me, it has been 24 hours, why isn’t Holder in jail. A republican ‘Thistle’.
1. Feel free to share an example, ANY EXAMPLE, of an honest, demonstrable and meaningful effort to counter the constant barrage of unconstitutional power grabs by this pencil-necked pansy tyrant wannabe.
2. Who exactly, from the laundry list of ineffectual limp-wristed pu$$ies that call themselves Republicans, do you see righting the path from the destruction of the past three years?
3. Pity yourself.
Governor Scott Walker. He took the RATS and Unions on and inspired a state and a nation.
But, of course, success is not what you are looking for. That would screw-up the personal pity-party you are trying to inflict on the rest of us.
Really not getting the whole pity party thingy in relation to my assertion that the RePukelicans are a gaggle of useless, gutless pansies when it come to defending the Constitution, but whatever... It is generally stated that “success has a thousand fathers”; given that edict, why isn’t the RNC establishment out in force touting Walker’s efforts as a means of reversing course for these past 3 1/2 years of the little socialist?
Walker inspired a nation? Hardly. He inspired conservatives; conservatives who are now forced to vote for RINO’s who have no intention of emulating Walker’s conviction or principles. Ridding the country of these lifelong gutless politicans will take DECADES... it’s called reality, check into it.
Run off and suck your thumb in the corner. I really don't have time for you and your ilk. I have a Republic to help save.
Right back at ya there slick...
You exhibit all of the traits of the average self-aggrandizing a$$ clown, without the communication skills.
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