Late Friday Fast and Furious Document Drop

Here we go, again – It’s an Obama administration tradition  – the late Friday doc drop.

CNN Reports:

About 1,400 pages that had been demanded by Capitol Hill investigators were sent to three key congressional committees in advance of what is expected to be a contentious hearing next Thursday when Attorney General Eric Holder testifies on the subject.

The documents lift the veil on conflicting views among Justice executives, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, and the Arizona U.S. attorney’s office over whether and how to respond to allegations made in letters from Sen. Charles Grassley, R-Iowa.

Also today, the Justice Department  formally withdrew the February 4 letter  to Senator Grassley that denied that the ATF was walking guns:

Burke and ATF headquarters officials insisted the charge that agents “allowed the sale of weapons which were transported into Mexico is false.” He also insisted the “ATF makes every effort to interdict weapons that have been purchased illegally.”

When those claims, included in a February 4 letter to Grassley, later proved to be wrong, Assistant Attorney General Lanny Breuer and later Holder were forced to apologize to a Senate committee and to Grassley in particular.

Burke resigned at the end of August, just days after testifying before a congressional committee.

Friday, Deputy Attorney General James Cole said the Justice Department “now formally withdraws the February 4 letter.” He said facts have come to light that indicate that the letter contains “inaccuracies.”

Yeah, no kidding.

Meanwhile AWR Hawkins at Big Government breaks some news:

To date Barack Obama, the dispenser of hope and change and the presiding officer over the least transparent presidency in history, has claimed he only learned about Fast and Furious earlier this year. However, with each new document dump Obama’s timeframe seems to be as inaccurate (or as purposely misleading) as Attorney General Eric Holder’s.

For example, just months after he took office it was evident he was focused on a Fast and Furious-like operation, ostensibly aimed at cutting down on gun trafficking on the southern border.  Thus, on March 24, 2009, Deputy Attorney General David Ogden made the following announcement:

The President has directed us to take action to fight [Mexican] cartels…and Attorney General Holder and I are taking several new and aggressive steps as part of the administration’s comprehensive plan.

And the following month, April 2009, he stood beside Mexican President Felipe Calderón and uttered words we now recognize as hypocritical and duplicitous at best:

I continue to believe that we can respect and honor the Second Amendment right in our Constitution — the rights of sportsmen and hunters and homeowners that want to keep their families safe — to lawfully bear arms, while dealing with assault weapons that, as we know here in Mexico, are used to fuel violence.

Fast forward one year, and White House logs show that then-Deputy Attorney General Gary Grindler met personally with Obama four times between May 7 and May 19, 2010.

Just in case Grindler’s name doesn’t set off sirens in your mind, he had received an in depth briefing on Fast and Furious on March 12, 2010. (This briefing came via an ATF slideshow which I covered in a post for Big Government earlier this year.) During this same briefing, Grindler was provided with details concerning the number of times that a straw purchaser named Uriel Patino had purchased guns during Fast and Furious. (Patino’s total weapon acquisition numbered approx. 720 guns.)

By the way, Grindler is no longer a Deputy Attorney General. Rather, he is Holder’s Chief of Staff.

 ALSO:

Does this make sense?

The Note: Issa Backs Off GOP’s Call for Holder to Resign Over Gun Sales:

Despite the sometimes fierce accusations of misconduct that he has levied at Attorney General Eric Holder, Rep. Darrell Issa, chairman of the House Oversight Committee, said today he will not call on Holder to resign over the controversial Fast and Furious operation, at least for now.

“The fact is, it’s not about any one person. It’s not about Eric Holder,” Issa, a California Republican, told reporters at a Christian Science Monitor breakfast in Washington, D.C. “Eric Holder didn’t order, as far as we know or even suspect, he didn’t order this operation. He didn’t demand that they somehow do something this stupid.”

His aides said later that Issa’s no-resignation stance could change depending on what else his probe into the operation finds.

SEE ALSO:

Countdown To Holder’s Demise…

Pay attention.  In a week or so.  The hearing.  That – we are reaching the-the moment of truth on Holder.  What do we got now…almost 60 members – members of Congress calling for his resignation?  And that’s just publicly.  There are Democrats voicing the same uh…the same suggestion.  I’ll say it to you again – you keep asking me about it, every time we talk so one more time for you…Eric Holder will no longer be Attorney General of the United States.  That-that is – you’ll see that happen soon now.  Very soon.

Sipsey Street Irregulars: Traditional Friday Night DOJ Docu-Dump a whopping 1400 pages. Blaming Arizona. Don’t look at us, DOJ sez. “Willing stooges for the Gun Lobby.”

David Codrea: ATF memo describes operation designed to get guns to Mexico

Linked by Doug Ross in Larwyn’s Links, thanks!

Video: Obama, The Anti-Israel President

Via The Right Scoop, this powerful video from David Horowitz’s Freedom Center, makes the case pretty convincingly:

Much of what’s in this documentary you probably know if you’ve been paying attention, but it’s the big picture that becomes evident as they connect the dots that is absolutely frightening:

The top YouTube comment says: “Not just Anti-Israel, obama is an Anti-American president too!”

Good point.

God Help The USA and Israel:

Hat tip: Brian B.

Video: Professor Teaches “Everyone Wins A Trophy Generation” Econ 101

Would that there were more economics professors like Jack Chambliss of Valencia College. The good professor starts off his class each semester by making students write an essay about the American Dream. As part of the assignment students are asked to answer  the following question: What do you want the federal government to do to help you achieve that dream?

As he surveys the results, Neal Boortz calls them “The Gimme Generation”:

The results may, sadly, not be all that surprising.

About 10% of students said that they wanted the federal government to leave them alone and not tax them too much. These must be the minority of students who went to private schools or were home schooled. The vast majority, 80%, of the students said that the federal government should provide them with some form of free college tuition, free healthcare, a job, money for a house, money for retirement or money to spend. How did they plan to acquire that money? Easy – tax the rich.

The professor blamed the students’ ignorance on the educational system, but also on the class warfare rhetoric espoused by the President which some say has been ‘sowing class envy and social unrest’ and ‘cleaving a widening gulf… that is at once counterproductive and freighted with dangerous historical precedents. And it is an approach to governing that owes more to desperate demagoguery than your Administration should feel comfortable with.

But that is how hard leftists like Obama and his former “Green Czar”, Van Jones push their version of “The American Dream”.  Back in February, Jones wrote in The Huffington Post  his vision for America:

‘American Dream’ Movement Rooted in a Deeper Patriotism

That is an important moment and concept. But the notion of “negative liberty” (“don’t tread on me!”) is only one principle among many that make our country great. Other equally vital American values and ideals (like justice, opportunity, fairness and democracy) have gone largely undefended and unheralded, in this recent crisis. That ends — now. Our rising movement should stand for the full suite of American values and principles.

Number one on his agenda: “Increase revenue for America’s government sensibly by making Wall Street and the super-rich pay their fair share.”

Lefties like Van Jones, and Obama hate the Constitution because they view it as a charter of “negative liberties.” Although Jones glosses over the truth with platitudes he knows everyone agrees with, “justice, opportunity, fairness and democracy”, what the Communist left really wants is a guarantee of  “positive liberties”, or the “redistributive change” which  Obama once famously said the federal government or the state government must do on our behalves. To make their ideas more palatable, they paint them in patriotic language, as if being a totally dependent government funded leech is somehow an “American value”.

That’s the logical end result of Obama and Van Jones’ “positive liberties”:  “Somebody needs to pay for all of my children. Somebody needs to be held accountable…and they need to pay.”

How different is Angel Adams from the pathetic skull full of mush in Professor Chambliss’s sophomore Econ class who said: “As human beings we are really not responsible for our own acts, and so we need government to control those who don’t care about others.”

The “Everyone Wins a Trophy Generation” thinks “fairness” is all about  knocking people down who have more than they do.   Adam Corolla called the occupy movement,  the first wave of participation trophy “a$$holes” –  a bunch of self entitled monsters who think the world owes them a living. They leave the  little snow-globe lives in which they grew up,  find themselves not succeeding, and  instead of looking in the mirror and asking why they’re not doing better, they say, “hey man…what do you need all that sh*t for?”

At Big Government, John Nolte put it this way:

Occupy is all about greed, self-actualization, and narcissism. The fastest and easiest way to feel superior is to assume the role of a victim … because a victim is always superior to his or her oppressors.

Occupy is also an army the left and Alinksy-style community organizers like Barack Obama have been breeding for decades. The formula is simple: feed enough self-esteem to those who don’t deserve it and you create an entire generation of entitled crybabies desperate to direct the frustration of their unfulfilled lives at whomever.

Not only is this mindset of entitlement unhealthy for the country as a whole, it’s unhealthy for the individual, as psychoanalyst, Karen Ruskin PSY.D noted on The O’Reilly Factor not too long ago. She made the case that because the Occupy Wall Street protesters felt “a lack of  self empowerment”, they were mentally unstable and “on the road to depression.” Occupiers want the government to take care of them, or as O’Reilly said, “they want your stuff”. According to Ruskin,  that mindset is “awful for one’s mental health, wellness and well-being.”

There needs to be major change in the K-12 curriculum that has been breeding this toxic, destructive, self-entitled mentality. And by God, (this has been one of my pet peeves for at least 20 years) stop giving trophies to kids who haven’t earned them!

House Committee On Oversight and Reform Investigates HHS For Discriminating Against Catholic Church (Video)

The House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform held a hearing, Thursday, Dec 1,  to examine the Department of Health and Human Services’ recent activities related to the 2011 National Human Trafficking Victim Assistance Program.

LifeNews reported:

A House committee held a hearing today on the decision by the Obama administration to deny to the nation’s Catholic bishops a grant for a program helping sex trafficking victims because it would not refer for abortions.

The House Oversight and Government Reform Committee held the hearing on the administration’s decision not to renew funding for United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) program to assist human trafficking victims.

The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops had previously received a five-year $19 million grant to help victims of sex trafficking during the administration of pro-life President George W. Bush. Sensitive to how women are exploited in the sex industry, the Catholic bishops prohibit any subcontractors from using the funds to pay for or promote abortions. Instead, the Catholic bishops provide comprehensive case management services to survivors including medical and mental health services.

While the Obama administration extended the contract briefly in March, the bishops were recently notified that it would not be renewed. Instead, Obama officials awarded the grant to three other groups (Tapestri of Atlanta, Heartland Human Care Services of Chicago and the U.S. Committee for Refugees and Immigrants of Washington) — even though the bishops have helped more than 2,700 victims with the funding.

During the hearing, committee chairman Rep. Darrell Issa, a California Republican, said the decision violated the Obama administration’s “pledge to be the most transparent in history.”

Issa said at the beginning of the hearing, “As we attempt to understand the decision making process used to award these grants -  a process that from the outside observer’s perspective appears to be inexcusably politically altered…”

…”the most experienced and top rated national applicant (the Bishops)  was  not selected for the award. Other organizations including ones that submitted much lower rated proposals were somehow funded. The process was delayed for months while the agency struggled to find ways, in our opinion, to inject a new criteria to alter the funding process. That funding process was not as it was reported by HHS a stipulation or requirement – just the opposite.”

He noted, “a political appointee – unconfirmed  — effectively a tzar — interjected himself and made a decision that changed the outcome of this grant that otherwise would have been made by career civil service employees.”

Here is the entire 3-plus hour hearing:

Hat tip: Gateway Pundit