Most Corrupt Man Ever Resigns as Attorney General

[Duke Leto]

2.) The notional plan was to use a system where they tracked people whom they had probable cause to believe legal purchases would then be illegally resold.

Which is a notional claim that any rational person would have to reject on it's face. The only way they could have more than a suspicion is if someone checks the box on their 4473 form that they are purchasing the gun for someone else, which no straw buyer would actually do, or if the gun ends up in the hands of the criminal.

Well, now we're splitting hairs on a point I don't think we have any reason to disagree on. The reality is that probable cause is whatever the investigating officer can convince the case and appeals judges it is. A judge in one jurisdiction might see multiple gun purchases as reason for a search warrant, another might not.

I'm inclined to prefer a more rigorous system of licensing and standards for resale than the gun lobby currently allows. You might disagree.

My point was simply that it was a political Catch-22 and the Right would appeal to mutually exclusive prejudices in declaiming the program no matter what happened.

 

[laruan]

for the benefit of those OPs who do not reside in the USA , could someone kindly spell out what corrupt and terrible practices occurred under this guys tutelage

 

[Ford]

for the benefit of those OPs who do not reside in the USA , could someone kindly spell out what corrupt and terrible practices occurred under this guys tutelage

He spent a significant portion of his time arguing that the policies of the administration which hired him were not, in fact, illegal in any way. Just like most other attorneys general.


This of course makes him the most corrupt person ever.

 

[SimpleDon]

According to Wikipedia, the ATF "purposely allowed licensed firearms dealers to sell weapons to illegal straw buyers, hoping to track the guns to Mexican drug cartel leaders and arrest them." I don't know much about the case, but the claim that said buyers were illegal is fairly significant.

It was an idea that worked better in theory than practice. But it was also an idea that started in 2006. You'd think by the reaction that the second Holder got into the AG seat, he picked up a phone and said, "Let's give lots of guns to drug dealers!"

So, what you are saying is that Eric Holder started Fast 'n Furious© two years before he was appointed AG? Wow, who would have thought it.

That must have been about the time that Obama was plotting the Great Financial Crisis and the Great Recession. And the bank bailout, which he singlehandedly pushed through Congress against fierce Republican opposition. Or so I have been told here.

 

[Ford]

That must have been about the time that Obama was plotting the Great Financial Crisis and the Great Recession. And the bank bailout, which he singlehandedly pushed through Congress against fierce Republican opposition. Or so I have been told here.

Um, hello? Obama was part of the Democrat Senate that took over in 2007 along with the Democrats in the House like Nancy Pelosi and Barney Frank who caused the financial crisis! I mean, the economy was humming along just fine until they assumed control in January 2007 and what happened next? Disaster!

Barack Hussein Obama was a Senator back then. A SENATOR. Then next thing you know he was a candidate for President. Coincidence? I think not!

Obviously the Democrat Senate and House engineered the recession so that Barack Hussein....OMG his middle name is Hussein!!! ... would be elected dictator, er...President.

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

It was an idea that worked better in theory than practice. But it was also an idea that started in 2006. You'd think by the reaction that the second Holder got into the AG seat, he picked up a phone and said, "Let's give lots of guns to drug dealers!"

So, what you are saying is that Eric Holder started Fast 'n Furious© two years before he was appointed AG? Wow, who would have thought it.

He is just that corrupt!

That must have been about the time that Obama was plotting the Great Financial Crisis and the Great Recession. And the bank bailout, which he singlehandedly pushed through Congress against fierce Republican opposition. Or so I have been told here.

Exactly!

 

[funinspace]

More pudding on the Govt. protection Axis (not that I expect any serious repercussions, but it should be an interesting to hear it when I have time):
http://www.bloombergview.com/articles/2014-09-26/the-secret-goldman-sachs-tapes

The reporter, Jake Bernstein, has obtained 46 hours of tape recordings, made secretly by a Federal Reserve employee, of conversations within the Fed, and between the Fed and Goldman Sachs. The Ray Rice video for the financial sector has arrived.
<snip>
In meetings, Fed employees would defer to the Goldman people; if one of the Goldman people said something revealing or even alarming, the other Fed employees in the meeting would either ignore or downplay it. For instance, in one meeting a Goldman employee expressed the view that "once clients are wealthy enough certain consumer laws don't apply to them." After that meeting, Segarra turned to a fellow Fed regulator and said how surprised she was by that statement -- to which the regulator replied, "You didn't hear that."

This sort of thing occurred often enough -- Fed regulators denying what had been said in meetings, Fed managers asking her to alter minutes of meetings after the fact -- that Segarra decided she needed to record what actually had been said. So she went to the Spy Store and bought a tiny tape recorder, then began to record her meetings at Goldman Sachs, until she was fired.

I don't want to spoil the revelations of "This American Life": It's far better to hear the actual sounds on the radio, as so much of the meaning of the piece is in the tones of the voices -- and, especially, in the breathtaking wussiness of the people at the Fed charged with regulating Goldman Sachs. But once you have listened to it -- as when you were faced with the newly unignorable truth of what actually happened to that NFL running back's fiancee in that elevator -- consider the following:

1. You sort of knew that the regulators were more or less controlled by the banks. Now you know.

2. The only reason you know is that one woman, Carmen Segarra, has been brave enough to fight the system. She has paid a great price to inform us all of the obvious. She has lost her job, undermined her career, and will no doubt also endure a lifetime of lawsuits and slander.

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

One thing to keep in mind is that this issue regarding the investigations of those who helped push the global economy to and past the line of collapsed is not one of the things brought up by the right-wing in their criticism of the evilness that is Eric Holder.

 

[funinspace]

One thing to keep in mind is that this issue regarding the investigations of those who helped push the global economy to and past the line of collapsed is not one of the things brought up by the right-wing in their criticism of the evilness that is Eric Holder.

Oh, absolutely (as I have said before). More pathetic than this Administrations (and the FR-SEC) protection axis of the Banksters, is the quiet approval of said protection by the Greedy Old Perverts.

The only complaints one hears about this is generally from a very few Progressive Democrats in Congress, though done with a fairly quiet voice. Other than that, the complaints come from an odd assortment of libertarian leaning and progressive minor websites. Bloomberg to its credit, is one of the few large sites (that I am aware of) that tends to speak out about the issue regularly.

 

[Deepak]

Which is a notional claim that any rational person would have to reject on it's face. The only way they could have more than a suspicion is if someone checks the box on their 4473 form that they are purchasing the gun for someone else, which no straw buyer would actually do, or if the gun ends up in the hands of the criminal.

Well, now we're splitting hairs on a point I don't think we have any reason to disagree on. The reality is that probable cause is whatever the investigating officer can convince the case and appeals judges it is. A judge in one jurisdiction might see multiple gun purchases as reason for a search warrant, another might not.

I'm inclined to prefer a more rigorous system of licensing and standards for resale than the gun lobby currently allows. You might disagree.

My point was simply that it was a political Catch-22 and the Right would appeal to mutually exclusive prejudices in declaiming the program no matter what happened.

I think we agree on the Catch-22 part, but while a police officer could try to submit a PC affidavit based on multiple gun purchases - the ATF or FBI trying to do so is unlikely and a judge accepting it is unlikely. It's well established that exercising constitutionally protected rights cannot be used as the basis for PC, which is why cops who want to search you say they smelled drugs rather than say you refused a search (or invoked your 5th amendment rights). Any ATF agent or FBI agent conducting such an investigation would know this.

Regarding the resale standards, I think it's a discussion which deserves a dedicated thread, but even if we required a blood oath witnessed by the Sultan of Brunei there would be no way to know that an illegal transfer happened until the gun actually ends up in the hands of a criminal or found at the scene of the crime. It's that discovery itself that makes the transfer an illegal one, and which is what is at the heart of this 'scandal'.

So the dilemma actually has three prongs, and what I'd like to know from the right-wingers who have their hackles raised on the issue is what pretense they would expect the authorities to step in with. The conundrum here is that the people who are concerned about the issue also seem to be the people who want nearly unrestricted access to firearms, and minimal to no oversight over transfers.

 

[Duke Leto]

So the dilemma actually has three prongs...

Meaningless pedantry: In that case we should call it a trilemma.

 

[maxparrish]

According to Wikipedia, the ATF "purposely allowed licensed firearms dealers to sell weapons to illegal straw buyers, hoping to track the guns to Mexican drug cartel leaders and arrest them." I don't know much about the case, but the claim that said buyers were illegal is fairly significant.

For this sort of thing, I'm more inclined to trust RationalWiki.

http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Operation_Fast_and_Furious

Here's their citation:

http://fortune.com/2012/06/27/the-truth-about-the-fast-and-furious-scandal/

Note that Fortune magazine is hardly "Liberal Media".

Here are the problems with the Right of Center narrative on "Fast and Furious"

1.) It was a program started by the ATF years before Holder even started as AG, and was always a regional initiative rather than a national one.
2.) The notional plan was to use a system where they tracked people whom they had probable cause to believe legal purchases would then be illegally resold.
3.) Although the ATF had probable cause to believe everyone on their list was reselling to criminals, another department in DoJ, the US Attorney's Office (ie., the guys who file charges and prosecute as opposed to the people who investigate the crimes (dun dun)) refused to indict some of them.
4.) One of the guns bought by one of the indicted suspects was used to kill a US Border Patrol agent.
5.) One of agents of the ATF team alleges that the reason 4.) happened was not 3.), but a deliberate decision by ATF investigators to wait until crimes were committed with the guns before purchasing, which GOP congressmen have chosen to believe in the face of evidence to the contrary.

Assuming it is truth you wish to honor, I suggest you look for another source "to rely on", and actual read the right-wing narrative before fog-horning Fast and Furious as 'another fake scandal'. Among the facts ignored or you were unaware of:

First, while Fortune is typically not liberal, some of its contributors are. Were you aware that Ms. Eban, who wrote the article, is a former Clinton political staffer? One might take her article more seriously if her claims were based on citable public sources, but as most of it is based on spoon fed regurgitations and sentimental characterizations by agency shills, is their any reason to believe her or them?

Second, note that the tone and plot-line of Eban's article is that of a rather crude hit piece - an attempt to mud gun the character of "renegades", meaning any long-trusted agency staffers who have shaken off the protective "blue wall" mentality endemic in law enforcement agencies. She ignores that the transformation to 'renegades' starts with long-time respected drone(s) who eventually develop doubts and growing disillusionment's. While most drones continue to cynically (or fearfully) toe the blue wall party line, there are always few doubters who won't "get on board" - these 'renegades' are then targeted for vilification and whispered accusations, which Eban happily passes on as "journalism".

Third, Eban published her article BEFORE the Inspector General finished his report. He impeached her source(s). http://www.cnn.com/2012/09/19/us/us-fast-furious-report/

Washington (CNN) -- More than a dozen Justice Department and Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives officials faced punishment Wednesday after a long-awaited report on the botched gun probe known as "Operation Fast and Furious."

Within minutes of the report's release, Justice announced that former acting ATF chief Kenneth Melson was retiring and another official, Deputy Assistant Attorney General Jason Weinstein, had resigned....

Weinstein and Melson were among 14 people who "bore a share of responsibility for ATF's knowing failure in both these operations to interdict firearms illegally destined for Mexico, and for doing so without adequately taking into account the danger to public safety that flowed from this risky strategy," the report states. Weinstein failed to pass along key information about the flawed tactics being used in Fast and Furious, while Melson and other ATF officials didn't properly supervise the probe, the report states....

http://hotair.com/archives/2013/05/...ore-fox-news-reporters-were-monitored-by-doj/

http://www.cbsnews.com/news/heads-roll-after-fast-and-furious-investigation/2/

A "fake scandal"? EVEN without Holder's involvement or his coverup there is nothing "fake" about it.