A Study In Contrasts: Atty Gen. Eric Holder vs Lt Col. Allen West On Radical Islam

…Or obfuscation vs clarity… or  weasel words vs hard truths.

Who looks like he has command of the issue, and who looks like an evasive tool?

This is a video that had to be made:

Lt Col Allen West is currently running for the US Congress in FL. You can donate to his campaign, here.

A  cry for Holder to step down or be fired is reverberating throughout the right wing blogosphere:

Wizbang: What does it take to fire an Attorney General?

Gateway Pundit:Eric Holder Is Irresponsible & Dangerous – Eric Holder Must Step Down

Rhymes With Right: Fire Eric Holder

US Backlash: Remove The Weak & Useless Hack Eric Holder

Bluegrass Bulletin: Eric Holder Must Go

Steven’s World: Holder Must Go

IBD: Holder’s Got To Go

You can add me to the chorus. But I thought he was a worthless stooge from the get-go.

An impassioned plea to the contrary:

The Hayride: Please Don’t Get Rid Of Eric Holder, Mr. President (Updated)…

…I don’t want Holder gone.

How can I say that? Very simple. Nothing Holder does and says is at odds with the thoughts and directions of his boss. Barack Obama chose Eric Holder, and he didn’t do so out of ignorance or carelessness. Holder is an Obama Mini-Me. If Obama was Attorney General he’d be doing exactly what Holder is doing. And if and when Holder is finally made to resign in disgrace – a resignation I hope not to see any time soon – someone equally at odds with the rest of the country and equally unfit to serve will take his place. Because it takes such a person to do what Obama wants done.

So let’s leave Holder where he is. Let him be an albatross around the President’s neck. The Democrats were sorry to see Michael “Brownie” Brown go as head of FEMA; now that their Michael Brown (or at least one of their Michael Browns; Janet Napolitano, Carol Browner, Tim Geithner, Kathleen Sebelius, Ken Salazar and even Joe Biden are also just as incompetent and ridiculous as Brownie was) has shown his stripes in the AG’s chair, I want him as a symbol of the weakness, inanity and fecklessness of this administration as a whole.

Removing Holder won’t change the performance of the Justice Department. All that would do is put someone just like Holder, but who doesn’t have his disgraceful reputation and record in the job YET, in charge. And that fresh face will go on doing the terrible work Obama wants done without the public’s recognition of same.

Sounds  a lot like the argument I made some months ago when a hue and cry erupted for Janet Napolitano to step down:

Janet Napolitano Echoes Obama

We’re kidding ourselves if we think that these ludicrously incompetent stooges would be replaced with anyone better.

UPDATE:

Congressman Peter King (R-NY): Holder ‘doesn’t deserve to be attorney general’

“An attorney general who eight and a half years after Sept. 11 does not realize our enemy is radical Islam is either so politically correct or so out of touch that he doesn’t deserve to be attorney general,” King said on Fox News.

“I mean, this is why he wants to have the terror trials of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed in Lower Manhattan — he just doesn’t get it.”

LOL!

Media Mutters really stuck it to the wingnuts, this time:

Right-wing media falsely claim Holder “refuse[d] to say ‘radical Islam’ is a cause of terrorism”

Right-wing media have falsely claimed that Attorney General Eric Holder “refus[ed] to say ‘radical Islam’ is a cause of terrorism.” In fact, Holder specifically mentioned “a radical version of Islam” as a possible motivation for Faisal Shahzad, a suspect in the attempted Times Square bombing.

Well, my goodness! Why, yes…If you watch the video, you can clearly hear Holder saying (after much evasiveness and dissimulation): “I certainly think it is possible that people who espouse a radical version of Islam have had an ability to impact people like Mr. Shahzad…” while looking like it was making him ill to say it.

After being hectored for 2 minutes he did finally sort of, in a round-about way, almost  say  —-well no, he really never actually did say that  radical Islam is the cause of terrorism. He was willing to entertain the idea that it may be a contributing factor, and it pained him to say it.

(I’m now picturing Media Matters hacks breathlessly fact-checking the point where Holder finally admits radical Islam may possibly have had an ability to impact terrorism…“2 minutes in” – ORLY??? How about 2 and a HALF minutes?!)

UPDATE II:

Carol from No Sheeples Here had the same idea, and  made her own video, which can be seen, here.

Linked by Hyscience, Pundit and Pundette, and Obi’s Sister, and Just A Conservative Girl,thanks!