Holder wasn’t willing to hold anyone at Justice accountable at the Judicial hearing on Capitol Hill, today, even though it has been proven that they provided false – *excuse me!* inaccurate information to House investigators. “The people supplying the information were acting in good faith”, he maintains. Sounds to me like the Inspector General report is a foregone conclusion.
Senator Cornyn asked him, almost as an after thought, by the way, do you know the factual differences between Wide Receiver and Fast and Furious?
After fumbling around a bit, Holder finally admitted that he knew the difference between the two operations, and claimed he was not trying to equate the two. This, after watching several Dem Senators try to equate the two, and not opening his mouth to correct them. What weasels they are:
Wide Receiver sought to track and interdict guns being smuggled south using a combination of RFID-tracking devices embedded in the shipments and overheard surveillance aircraft. Wide Receiver failed because of the limitations of the technology used, compounded by the ineptness of its installation and the unexpected resourcefulness of the cartel’s gun smugglers.
As a result of the mistakes made in Wide Receiver, guns were lost: approximately 450 made it into Mexico. As a result, the botched operation launched in 2006 — and in this instance, actually botched — was shut down in 2007.
Compare the mistakes of Wide Receiver to the operations launched under Eric Holder’s Department of Justice, which had the advantages of learning from the postmortem failures of Wide Receiver two years before.
Fast and Furious used neither tracking devices nor aircraft, ran interference for smugglers with local law enforcement on multiple occasions, and federal agents were not allowed to interdict weapons.
Wide Receiver shut down within a year after 450 weapons went missing in a botched law enforcement operation. Fast and Furious purposefully ran at least 2,020 weapons to the Sinaloa cartel without any intention of arresting the straw purchasers and smugglers. Other operations in other states — CBS News’ Attkisson cites allegations of “at least 10 cities in five states” — allow the possibility that (if the other operations were as prolific as Fast and Furious) Holder’s Department of Justice may have intentionally sent more than 12,000 guns into criminal hands in the U.S and Mexico, enough to arm three U.S. Army brigades.
Law enforcement operations sometimes go horribly wrong, and every indication is that Operation Wide Receiver executed by the ATF during the Bush administration while Alberto Gonzales was the attorney general was a “keystone cops” operation of the first magnitude. It was a horrible failure.
But Fast and Furious was no accident.
Nor was it within spitting distance of being a law enforcement operation. Fast and Furious and the alleged gunwalking operations based in Houston, Dallas, Charlotte, Indiana, Tampa, and elsewhere were specifically designed to assure that straw purchasers and cartel weapons smugglers would be under the de facto protection of the Obama adminstration, with no attempts at interdiction and with interference on behalf of the criminals being traced to the ATF, FBI, and DOJ.
Seton Motley reported on the upcoming vote at Big Government:
From most appearances, the Senate will this week vote on Senate Joint Resolution (S.J.Res) 6 – the Congressional Review Act Resolution of Disapproval of the Obama Administration Federal Communications Commission (FCC)’s illegal Internet Net Neutrality power grab.
Only 51 votes are required for passage – which means only 4 Democrats are needed. There are 23 Democrat Senate seats up for reelection next year. A few of these folks aren’t running. The rest are – many in center or center-right states. Additionally, there are a few other Senators that should also be subject to Constitutional reason, and thusly contacted.
Watch Motley and AFP’s Phil Kerpen discuss the Senate Net Neutrality vote:
See Big Government for a list of Senators to contact and tell “vote Yes on S.J.Res 6.”
Herman Cain categorically denied all the sexual harassment charges made against him, including the latest allegations of sexual misconduct and is having a press conference this afternoon in Phoenixto specifically address Bialek’s charges. (UPDATE:Live stream, here.)
One person – either Cain or Bialek is clearly lying, so now it unfortunately becomes necessary to look into the character of the person making the charges because she has the potential of derailing the campaign of the frontrunner in the Republican Presidential primary. If these allegations against Cain are false, a monumental injustice has been done not only to an innocent man, but to the entire country denied the opportunity to vote for him. If they are true, well – I don’t want to see a serial lecher and liar become the Republican standard bearer.
Who is Sharon Bialek? How credible is this woman? How credible is her story? What little we know of her is not terribly flattering.
According to this Daily Mail report, she’s a “gold digger” who’s filed for bankruptcy twice, has not held a job for more than two years, always lived above her station, and will do anything to never have to work again. She has accused an ex-boyfriend of harassment, and her own father only heard her shocking story about Cain for the first time, yesterday. Her live-in fiance heard about it for the first time, last Friday.
Does it seem a little odd to you that she wouldn’t have told her fiance about such a noteworthy thing? The frontrunner in the Republican party had once made a pass at her? Not worthy of comment? Seems weird.
Meanwhile, a friend of Ms Bialek, from Chicago, told the New York Post: ‘She has a very infectious personality. It’s easy to see how she won [Cain] over. But the reality of her situation is — she’s a complete gold digger. It’s all about the money.’
Adding that she was from a middle-income family but lives in a posh house while running from bill collectors, the source said: ‘Most of her jobs ended in termination. It’s always the employer’s fault, not hers.
‘This is a lady who lives off the system. She is hellbent on finding a way of never having to work and living the lifestyle she wants to live, a very affluent lifestyle.’
That’s some “friend”.
Details of a number of legal and financial difficulties belonging to Ms Bialek also emerged today, with the Chicago Tribune listing a long history with tax evasion and late or missed credit card payments.
The paper reported that Ms Bialek has filed for personal bankruptcy twice, first in 1991 and then again in 2001.
In 2001, she claimed $5,700 in assets and more than $36,000 in liabilities. Among the creditors seeking payment was a management firm demanding back rent of $4,500, four credit card companies and a lawyer asking for his legal fees.
She is also said to have accused a former boyfriend of harassing her for money he had loaned her after she borrowed $4,500 from him.
The IRS filed a tax lien against her in 2009 for nearly $5,200. In August, the Illinois Department of Revenue claimed Ms Bialek owed the state more than $4,300, including penalties and interest, relating to income taxes from 2004, according to county records.
Court records also show creditors took legal action against her during the past decade, including at least one lawsuit filed in Cook County.
***
Gloria Allred described her client as a ‘registered Republican’, but the 50-year-old does not have an active voter card in Illinois, election officials said. The state does not allow voters to register by party, but records show she pulled a GOP ballot in the 2008 primary.
There’s also this:
A Fox News reporter confronted Ms Bialek during an interview today about living in the same building as Obama top aid David Axelrod.
She was asked: ‘One of the things is that you lived at a 505 North Lake Shore Drive apartment, right? This is the same building, it happens to be the same building David Axelrod lives in. Do you know David Axelrod? Ever have any interaction with him at all?’
***
The 50-year-old replied: ‘I saw him in the gym. I mean — everybody nods to each other. It is friendly building but I never had any interaction with him.’
Hmmmm.
RCP video of that interview with Fox’s Martha MacCallum, here.
Here’s Cain’s appearance on Jimmy Kimmel Live, last night:
The Accuser is an attractive woman and we may assume that she has been the object of many “unwanted advances” over the years, all but one of which she considered unworthy of a Manhattan press conference.
A New York Times headline characterizes the accusation against Cain as “lewd behavior,” but such behavior goes on all the time — yea, verily, even in New York! — without meriting a headline in the Times.
Gloria Allred described her client as a ‘registered Republican’, but the 50-year-old does not have an active voter card in Illinois, election officials said. The state does not allow voters to register by party, but records show she pulled a GOP ballot in the 2008 primary.
Ace of Spades HQ still thinking where there’s smoke, there’s fire, links to Bill Bennet in his Great Big Cain Roundup:
Four women are not an insignificant number. One or two anonymous charges, perhaps. Three anonymous charges (where, as I understand the story, Cain knows of at least two of the women) plus one woman who went very public and opened herself up to all manner of investigation are a lot. It is no longer insignificant. Neither is it insignificant that the Cain campaign discounted the charges in the initial stories, saying they were based on anonymous sources, only to make a mockery by blaming other campaigns with less substantiation than the original stories.If Herman Cain wants to be taken seriously as a public advocate for anything, never mind running for the chief executive and commander in chief of the most powerful and important and blessed country in the world, he needs to give a full press conference dedicated exclusively to this issue and these allegations.
I have watched long enough and held my tongue long enough to give him the benefit of the doubt, but can no longer say this is a witch hunt, “a lynching” to use his word, or any other euphemism. There are allegations out there that matter and they have stacked up. For we who led the charge against Bill Clinton on a number of related issues to continue to blame the media or other campaigns or say it simply doesn’t matter makes us the hypocrites as well.
I received a press statement from Ms. O’Grady’s office last week after a blog post of mine on the water cooler regarding a source close to the Cain camp believed Mayor Rahm Emanuel had something to do with the exchange of information regarding sexual harassment charges against Mr. Cain. Mayor Emanuel has denied any involvement.
Below is Ms. O’Grady’s statement:
The Illinois Restaurant Association is an entity independently managed and operated apart from the National Restaurant Association. Sheila O’Grady was appointed President of the Illinois Restaurant Association in 2007. She does not have a prior connection to Mr. Cain (whose time at the National Restaurant Association pre-dated her appointment by more than a decade), nor does she have any knowledge of the current allegations stemming from his tenure at the organization. Any reports suggesting otherwise are baseless.
O’Grady served as Mayor Daley’s chief of staff for a number of years until 2007. Daley, no stranger to controversy himself, was recently slapped with a lawsuit last spring by John Brooks, Chicago’s former fire Commissioner. Brooks claimed that Daley threatened to smear him over what Brooks said were false sexual harassment allegations if Brooks did not retire on his own.
I made no mention of O’Grady in any previous blog post. One Chicago radio host, however, did mention her name following my post on Emanuel. Other than that, why is O’Grady speaking up now?
Attorney General, Eric Holder is testifying before the Senate Judiciary Committee in a standard oversight hearing, this morning. We can expect tough questions from Republican senators who have been critical about the ATF’s handling of Operation Fast and Furious.
Matthew Boyle of The Daily Caller reports that Iowa Republican Sen. Chuck Grassley, the committee’s ranking minority member, is set to lead the charge against Holder, whose prepared testimony The Daily Caller obtained Monday.
That prepared statement makes no mention of Holder’s May 3 House Judiciary Committee testimony, when he told Congress under oath that he had only known about Operation Fast and Furious for a few weeks.
Many members of Congress believe that May 3 answer Holder gave is either a lie or the product of incompetence. At least 36 have called for Holder’s immediate resignation.
Doubts about Holder’s truthfulness have arisen in part because Grassley previously told TheDC he personally handed Holder a letter about Fast and Furious months earlier. Senior aides also sent Holder numerous briefing memos on the subject, including the name and specific details of the failed operation, as early as July 2010. Holder now claims he didn’t read the memos.
Senator Diane Feinstein discussed the need for new gun regulations with Holder, (who, amazingly enough is using this hearing as a forum to push gun control), then complimented the FBI on the excellent job they’ve done on stopping terrorist plots, and thanked Holder for the great job he’s doing.
Senator Lindsey Graham didn’t discuss Fast and Furious, at all. He focused on questions pertaining to the handling of captured combatants in the war on terror, and GITMO.
Senator Chuck Schumer is running interference for the administration by focusing on the fact that Operation Wide Receiver (implemented much differently than F&F) was started under the Bush administration, to make the point that the gun-walking program was a Bush era idea. “It’s important to look at both sides”. (Schumer doesn’t seem to know the difference between Lanny Davis and Lanny Breuer.) Holder doesn’t know the answer to any of his questions.
Cornyn asks Holder, “Have you apologized to Brian Terry’s family? Have you talked to them?” Holder answers no.
Michelle Malkin is live blogging and live tweeting the hearing. I missed Grassley’s grilling:
Grassley grills Holder on Lanny Breuer’s admission of failures. Holder on false Breuer letter: “I regret that.” But Holder refuses to admit that DOJ knew the letter was false.
Holder whines about conversation becoming public, though Grassley said he asked him if it would be okay. Holder then says the leaks are “under investigation” — though those investigating are the ones suspected of leaking.
Foxes guarding the henhouse.
Katie Pavlich points out clear distinction between Bush-era Operation Wide Receiver and Obama-era Fast and Furious:
Under Wide Receiver, the Mexican government knew about it & 300 guns were traced. Under #fastandfurious, Mexico was left in dark, and 2,000 guns were lost.
Senator Mike Lee (R-UT) asking about letters sent to the Justice Dept. relating to Justice Kagan and Obamacare that have been ignored. Holder claims to know nothing about the letters.
Moving on to some softball questions on Fast and Furious. What can be done to ensure inappropriate tactics aren’t used again? How about we focus on the inappropriate, criminal tactics that still need to be answered for?
Holder appears confident and upbeat, like someone who realizes he’s beaten the rap.
Asked about Fast and Furious wiretaps, Holder said Lanny Breuer would not have approved these wiretap requests – it would be one of his deputies. Only roving wiretaps would have to be approved by Breuer. There were no roving wiretaps associated with Fast and Furious.
***
Finally! Cornyn asked Holder if he knew the difference between Wide Receiver and Fast and Furious, causing Holder to stutter a rambling answer. Cornyn actually asked him, “Are you winging it?”
Holder claimed he wasn’t equating Wide Receiver with Fast and Furious after watching Senate Dems make the equation for the entire hearing.
He also asked Holder if he could name one person who has been held accountable for the disastrous operation. Holder indicated that he was waiting for the (sham) IG report.
UPDATE:
Video of Holder answering whether he had apologized to Brian Terry’s family:
According to a Monday report in the French website “Arret sur Images,” after facing reporters for a G20 press conference on Thursday, the two presidents retired to a private room, to further discuss the matters of the day.…
The conversation then drifted to Netanyahu, at which time Sarkozy declared: “I cannot stand him. He is a liar.” According to the report, Obama replied: “You’re fed up with him, but I have to deal with him every day!”
What a vile embarrassment our stooge in the White House is. We expect this from the French — they partied with the Nazis after they marched into France. But this? It’s official: Obama is a scumbag.
He is lethal to liberty and to our allies in freedom. Could America sink any lower under this president? Don’t answer that.
Allahpundit reminds of us of some past clashes Obama’s had with Bibi:
Remember when he allegedly humiliated Netanyahu at the White House at a meeting in 2010, and then when Netanyahu humiliated O right back with that lecture in the Oval Office back in May about Israel’s borders? There’s no love lost here, although electoral concerns (if nothing else) will keep Obama a very willing partner with Israel for the next year. Philip Klein asks a good question, though:
All the reporters at G20 ignored it except for obscure French website? Hot mic and no one recorded?
Now you may be asking yourself, “Self, why would this just be coming out now if it happened on Thursday?” An excellent question, with an answer that is at the same time incredible and completely expected. The press swore to keep it super-secret.
The surprising lack of coverage may be explained by a report alleging that reporters present at the event were requested to sign an agreement to keep mum on the subject of the embarrassing comments.
A member of the media confirmed Monday that “there were discussions between journalists and they agreed not to publish the comments due to the sensitivity of the issue.”
So basically the G20 became a high school dance where the two popular guys were overheard talking mad smack about the Jewish kid.
So there you go. As Howe concludes, “the world is in great hands”.
Nice Deb 