Here, you are urged and encouraged to run your mouths about something important.

Friday, January 18, 2013

Holder fighting off FOIA request for Fast & Furious documents by refusing to respond to it

After Attorney General Eric Holder was found in both criminal and civil contempt of Congress for not releasing documents required by a lawfully issued subpoena by Congress, the U.S. Attorney responsible for prosecuting his boss on criminal grounds predictably decided not to do so for obvious reasons. That left the civil contempt charge, which served as the impetus for a lawsuit filed by the House Oversight Committee against Holder that is still pending.

These subpoenaed documents are the same ones over which Barack Obama asserted Executive Privilege to prevent from being released.

Concurrent with the civil lawsuit is an effort by a very effective Watchdog group to have the same documents released through a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request and it's causing Holder to react on a second front.

Via Judicial Watch:
Judicial Watch announced today that it filed a brief on January 15, 2013, in response to an Obama Department of Justice (DOJ) motion to indefinitely delay consideration of Judicial Watch’s Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit seeking access to Operation Fast and Furious records withheld from Congress by President Obama under executive privilege on June 20, 2012 (Judicial Watch, Inc. v. U.S. Department of Justice (No. 1:12-cv-01510)).

Rather than respond substantively to Judicial Watch’s FOIA lawsuit, the DOJ argued in court that the lawsuit should be subject to a stay of proceedings because it is “ancillary” to a separate lawsuit filed by the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee against the DOJ. The Court “should let the process of negotiation and accommodation [between the House Committee and the DOJ] run its course, and then decide with the input of the parties whether and how this action may appropriately proceed at that time,” the DOJ argued, effectively abrogating the FOIA. The Obama DOJ even suggested that the Judicial Watch litigation might encourage the Congress to fight harder to get the same documents in separate litigation.
To Judicial Watch's argument, consider an exchange between Issa - in his role as a member of the House Judiciary Committee and Holder on December 8, 2011. In the exchange (audio only), Issa was pressing Holder to admit that if the documents relative to Fast & Furious after March of 2011 are not released, the Attorney General will be found in contempt.

There are two very key points (the second is particularly important) expressed by Issa relative to these documents.
  1. Issa explains that Holder must cite a Constitutional exemption for refusing to produce the documents.
  2. Even if Holder magically cites an exemption, he is still required to produce a log of the documents.
To this point, Holder has done neither, which leaves Obama's assertion of Executive Privilege the lone justification for the American people not knowing the truth about Fast and Furious.

Of all the exchanges between Issa and Holder, this one may just be the best.



h/t Breitbart

Chris Christie's hypocrisy is bigger than he is

Does anyone remember the refreshingly bombastic Chris Christie who took on teachers unions and seemed to be a conservative hero during the height of the Tea Party? Yeah, it's not taxing on your short-term memory, is it? Those days almost can't be seen in the rearview mirror anymore.

The new Christie may be just as bombastic but he's become quite the Barack Obama sycophant. First, it was Hurricane Sandy and now it's the gun control debate in the wake of Sandy Hook. In the first video below, Christie responds to a question about an NRA ad. The ad highlights the fact that Obama's children are protected with armed security at their school while your children are left defenseless in theirs.

If the hypocrisy the New Jersey Governor demonstrated could be transformed into a tangible mass, it would dwarf him.

At the essence of each one of his points is an undercurrent view that the children of public officials are more important than the children of everyday Americans. In trying to rip the NRA, Christie ends up even further proving the point made in the ad.

First, he says the children of public officials don't have a "choice" when it comes to what their parents decided to do for a living. Uh, hey Governor, the parents of American children don't have a "choice" when it comes to sending their children to 'gun-free zones', which are inherently more dangerous because such things are as enticing to criminals as picnic baskets are to bears. The truth is that Obama's children are safer at school than any child in any school that is a 'gun-free zone'.

Christie then says, "the effects on their (children of public officals) lives is significant" while diminishing the "effects" on his own children's lives compared to Obama's children. By extension, we are to conclude that the "effects" on the children of parents who are not public officials is much less significant than the effects on Christie's children. Uh, hey Governor, do you have any idea what the effects of high unemployment are? At least you don't have to worry about that personally, nor do the children of most public officials.

Then, Christie says:
"The President doesn't have a choice and his children don't have a choice of whether they're going to be protected or not. The reality of our lives in American society don't lead to that... it's awful to bring public figures' children into the political debate. They don't deserve to be there."
Again, the Governor actually makes the point of the ad by missing it. PARENTS WHOSE CHILDREN ARE LEFT DEFENSELESS DON'T HAVE A CHOICE EITHER, MR. CHRISTIE.

Perhaps the cherry icing on top of Christie's hypocrisy cake is this quote:
"They've got real issues to debate on this topic. Get to the real issues. Don't be dragging people's children into this. It's wrong."
Either Governor hypocrite missed the egregiously bald-faced political theater when Barack Obama signed 23 Executive Orders with young children standing behind him OR Christie believes that it's ok to exploit children in the gun control debate as long as their parents are not public officials.

Over. The. Top.

Via MediaIte:



Here is the ad that Christie finds 'reprehensible':

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