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Post by Pharcellus on Jun 22, 2012 16:26:41 GMT
Well, let's see here...
Let's say you're an incumbent president seeking re-election, with a bunch of cockmongers doing everything they can to get you out of office because they are a bunch of bigots, rather than acting responsibly doing the will of the people. They have latched onto a really disastrously bad situation (for your campaign, too) that your administration (though not you personally) oversaw, which wasn't even started by your administration; it was a legacy operation amongst thousands leftover from the previous administration. You haven't had time to figure out how to respond to it yet, so you decide to use a tactic which every goddamn president (and most especially W) has used or could use to stall the nonsense.
Personally, in a rational world, I'd say that Obama would have been smarter to give the idiots more than enough rope to hang themselves in the public eye; the problem is that we don't live in such a world, so the stupid conspiracy theory bullshit will grow legs and run around splattering everyone, including him, with mud, unless he does something to cover his ass. It doesn't matter if he had any hand in it or not, the repubs and the right-wing media will spin it hardcore that it was totally his fault, his idea, his plan, from the beginning to the bitter end.
In short, I don't fault him for using a tool available to him to deflect stupidity, even though I think it is stupid for him to have to do it in the first place. However, our country is going to hell in a handbasket, as the ignorant masses won't stop being hoodwinked by the fascist nutjobs to get elected into office.
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Post by tantalyr on Jun 22, 2012 16:30:05 GMT
Yup wooooo, Operation Wide Receiver in the Bush administration was a wholly different operation from Fast and Furious, an operation conceived and "executed" solely by the Obama Justice Department. And Wide Receiver was conducted in close cooperation with the Mexican government. In the case of Fast and Furious, the Mexican government wasn't even informed of the operation.
As for the 11th hour assertion of executive privilege . . . well, I think it's a terribly risky political move in this election year. Whether the privilege actually applies or not--a matter not nearly as clear as bloggers on both ends of the political spectrum would have you believe--the assertion of the privilege will undoubtedly energize politicians, talking heads and bloggers to trumpet the speculation that Obama has something serious he's trying to hide. And the American electorate doesn't like its presidents hiding stuff. Remember Richard Nixon?
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Post by sheral on Jun 22, 2012 17:51:42 GMT
The Clinton administration invoked executive privilege on fourteen occasions. The Bush administration invoked executive privilege on six occasions.
And Obama has done it once.
Perspective, anyone?
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Post by Pharcellus on Jun 22, 2012 18:03:20 GMT
It was only a different operation in official title; it was the same operation in execution. Also, the Mexican government was NOT informed about either operation at the time, so that is complete and utter bullshit. Mexican law enforcement was notified AT THE TIME that armed fugitives were crossing the border, but because they did not have ANY forewarning, they were completely unable to track them down (this was during operation Wide Receiver, btw). In classic form, the ATF gave Detty empty assurances to get him to proceed with the sales. By the time the guns were already in Mexico, the ATF, late into the operation, 'fessed up with the Mexican government. It was NOT done with foreknowledge and cooperation of the Mexican government. Period. ------------ quoted from: Talking Points Memo“The difference in the previous administration is there was coordination with the Mexican government,” Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA) said at a hearing in December. “They made a real effort under Wide Receiver to pass off a small amount of weapons and track them.” But new documents DOJ disclosed to congressional investigators on Thursday appear to indicate that ATF officials didn’t even consider looping Mexican authorities in on their operation until several months after the investigation began and ATF had already lost track of weapons that likely ended up in Mexico. The selection of emails indicate that officials discussed the possibility of working with Mexican officials but only talk about it only in theory. DOJ Assistant Attorney General Ron Weich wrote in a letter to Rep. Darrell Issa that the documents paint a “mixed picture” of how Operation Wide Receiver unfolded. ATF agents had already allowed suspected “straw purchasers” to buy weapons well before they began discussing making the effort to involve Mexican authorities. The documents indicate that former U.S. Attorney Paul Charlton participated in a discussion about the tactics used in the investigation, but don’t explicitly indicate he signed off on the strategy. Ten months later, however, an email from an assistant U.S. attorney indicated that agents were still not arresting straw purchasers. The federal prosecutor indicated in May 2007 that it was their understanding that ATF “will probably take them down on the next purchase.”
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Post by Pharcellus on Jun 22, 2012 18:13:24 GMT
Obama knows that the truth is going to come out; his use of executive privilege is a stalling tactic in a (probably futile) attempt at getting control of the political narrative surrounding it.
If the politicians investigating it weren't a bunch of hysterical hypocrites, then I might give more credence to the notion that Obama is hiding some wrongdoing on his part. However, considering that Grassley going on the public record saying that the entire goal of the Obama administration in orchestrating F&F is to attack the 2nd amendment COMPLETELY disqualifies him as a rational voice in the matter, as far as I am concerned.
If he played some part in the scandal, then Obama deserves to be chastised (or worse) over it. However, until there is some kind of sane non-politically-motivated investigation of it and his role in it, I don't have a problem with him stalling the idiots until they grow the fuck up and start acting like mature, responsible, RATIONAL adults, and stop pandering to the low-grade social morons who are driving their idiotic political narrative.
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Post by Pharcellus on Jun 28, 2012 19:14:11 GMT
Well, guess what? The TRUTH finally came out. The ENTIRE issue about the ATF letting the guns walk turns out to be COMPLETE AND UTTER BULLSHIT! It wasn't the ATF, but weak gun laws and lack of prosecutorial support that allowed them to walk across the border. Read the Fortune piece: features.blogs.fortune.cnn.com/2012/06/27/fast-and-furious-truth/?iid=SF_F_RiverThis totally blows the whole original story out of the water. and, of course, the Obama administration completely fucked up politically.
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xaeris
Apprentice of Rant
Posts: 462
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Post by xaeris on Jun 28, 2012 20:38:56 GMT
*reads the linked article*
Seriously?
THAT is our tax dollars hard-at-work?
Petty bullshit and whining over weekend hours?
I think out of the whole article, I found myself feeling sorry for Mr. Voth -- he didn't deserve that. Hopefully, Dodson and his little buddies burn in Hell for that kinda bullshit. Hopefully now that the Truth is out, those guys end up behind bars, or maybe they should have people breaking into their properties and leaving them death threats so they can know what that feels like.
Screw Obama, I want to go after the people involved in that shit. Actually, I think the guy who advocates insurrection has it right, that's about the only way we're going to fix anything in this nation. Too bad it'll never happen; there's just not enough people living in the US with the balls and teamwork skills to actually make it happen.
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Post by Pharcellus on Jun 28, 2012 21:34:27 GMT
Yeah, well, the government will just label you and your little band of insurrectionists as Domestic Terrorists and kill you with drones.
Militias are pretty much already out there; the problem is that they are all run by right-wing racist, fascist nutjobs, the kind which generated and swallowed the bullshit to begin with.
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Deleted
Deleted Member
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Post by Deleted on Jun 29, 2012 21:23:39 GMT
Wow, big shock that the Justice Department won't prosecute Holder for Contempt of Congress. Hah
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