Bruce, thank you for your apology. I was referring to the end of your first post where you made descriptions of President Obama and AG Holder.

I’m glad to know you were critical of the Bush Admin for their unfortunate treatment of the people involved in the warrantless wiretapping, not to mention the attacks on the Wilsons. Good to know you stood up for them.

I did read your citations. That’s how I knew what they were. And that some were literally reprinting, word for word, what was in a Fox News article. As you did with the list of guys Fox News says were retaliated against. Since you did not answer this, I’ll accept that you understand you’ve conceded that point, as you did the truth about the killing of Agent Brian Terry.

The LA times article re Trevino notes his allegation of 150 deaths is unfounded, and has a critical comment from an ATF agent on the other side which says Trevino, the former AG now working as a lower level politician, Just has “a good political thing to say”.

I was trying to spare you any indignity of refuting all of your statements. You unfortunately left me no other option. I have read your opinions and the unfounded basis on which you made them. I don’t know how to help if you don’t want to hear the appropriate response.

Just realized I mistakenly entered the word “fled” twice in my quotation from the FBI’s release. The sentence should read “His co-conspirators, including the gunman suspected of firing the fatal shot, fled and are being sought in connection to the murder.”. This is directly from the FBI’s posting of the May 6, 2011 release from Dennis Burke. While I don’t think Burke’s behavior with the Dodson memo was appropriate, that doesn’t mean the facts about the Brian Terry killing are somehow different. If you discount this release solely based on the name of the US attorney, then we’re in a world where, to quote a past president, “Facts are stupid things.”

Bruce, I see you neglected to mention any apology for the horrifying slurs you uttered, so I’m hoping you’ll do the right thing about those in another post.

Let’s address your response.

Your citation of Michelle Malkin’s right wing blog about Darrell Issa saying that 200 people in Mexico died as a result of F&F does not constitute you finding a real journalist to corroborate Issa’s self-serving claims. You then link to a CNN Mexico post that says that Issa is claiming this. You provide no proof that 200 people were killed other than Darrell Issa’s opinion about it. He isn’t just a US Congresssman. He’s the guy who’s been on a witch hunt against this administration and this AG since the GOP got the majority in the House. This is the most significant political position he’s ever or will ever hold, given that his attempt to get himself the CA governorship by orchestrating the recall of Gray Davis failed when Arnold Schwarzenegger stole his thunder. So Issa is really trying to maximize his moment in the sun, whether he has any basis or not. He is not, by himself, a reliable source, particularly given his history.

As for your citations and notes on whistleblowers, almost all of your material, including your list of the guys starting with “Agent Larry Alt…” comes verbatim from a Fox News article. In searching for impartial sources for material on these guys, we find that there’s nobody else saying that the agents were specifically attacked because of their testimony. There are mentions of their integrity being questioned, but nothing saying that all or any of them were ruined for testifying.

The exception is John Dodson. In his case, the Jusice Dept IG compelled Dennis Burke to resign for leaking a memo about Dodson to a reporter. (the memo, by the way, didn’t endanger or harm anyone. It simply shows that Dodson was being hypocritical in his loud comments re F&F when he was doing the same thing re AKs.). So I’d say you’re right that Dodson was retaliated against by Dennis Burke. And what do you know? The system at Justice worked. The IG made Burke resign. Not Darrell Issa, who simply tried to exploit the situation for his own benefit. As for the rest of what has happened with Dodson, we’re back in the land of “Fox says…”. I have no idea how Dodson conducted himself, but the only info about his supposed hardships comes from Fox or right wing bloggers who despise this AG. By the way, were you concerned about the Bush Admin whistleblowers re the NSA scandal, or is it only when someone alleges retaliation by a Dem admin that you feel it matters?

And I’m not sure why you’re belaboring the Brian Terry matter, when you’re already admitting that no link has been established between the two F&F AKs at that crime scene, and the bullet that killed Terry. You cite the indictment of Manuel Osoro-Arellanes for his involvement in the Terry shootout, but you neglect to mention some key information. According to the FBI, “His co-conspirators fled, including the gunman suspected of firing the fatal shot, fled and are being sought in connection to the murder.”. You also forgot to mention that there was a third AK in the shootout, and not necessarily a F&F weapon. It disappeared with the gunman who the FBI believes killed Terry when he fled the scene. so once again, we’re back where we started – with a F&F gun that did not kill Brian Terry and is irrelevant to your case.

So I do hope you’ll find the time to retract those unfortunate statements and try to walk some of this back.

B, that’s, well, a spectacular amount of vitriol for such a short post. Congratulations. Hate much?

The executive privilege, being used for the first time by this president, is meant to finally stop all the fishing expeditions after over a year of badgering by Darrell Issa. They’re not hiding anything. They’re trying to allow the Justice Department do their job without having to spend half their time continually responding to overreaching document demands from a congressman who’s trying to make himself sound important during an election year. Enough is enough. This isn’t a criminal matter – it’s a settled issue that Issa wants to puff up.

Please specify what you mean by blatant disregard for the law and constitutional restraints. Do you mean the way that Eric Holder has repeatedly gone before a hostile GOP house panel to be berated and attacked? Or the way Obama hasn’t used this measure a single time until now?

Maybe you’re thinking about when they deliberately exposed an intelligence agent to get political payback on a whistleblower. Or maybe you’re thinking about when they circumvented Congress by selling weapons to Iran and funneled the proceeds to Contra forces. Oh, wait. Those were real criminal situations and you don’t want to talk about real criminality.

“Anti-white racist scumbag”? “Amoral anti-constitutionist jerk”? Where do you get that much hatred and why do you think it’s appropriate to say offensive things like that anywhere?

Hold on guys- I’m still laughing too hard at Bruce to reply to him…

The US wanted gun violence in Mexico to censor guns in the US snicker

They ran joint with Mexican authorities to recover the weapons so they could build a case for US gun censorship pfft

The Wide Receiver guns never killed anyone… hahaha hahahaha hahahaha (holds sides)

The whole thing about differences between F&F and Wide Receiver- snort HAHAHAHAHAHHAHAAAAA!

Jesus Christ, that was funny.

The names William Newell and William Hoover ring a bell there, boy? Let’s start with them, not the least of which being how they just sat there with his thumb up his ass watching the trade-offs that took place still on US soil and made absolutely no effort to intercept the weapons- or arrange to have them intercepted.

We can start with that they were the two dipshits in charge of that particular clusterfuck, and that no one in Hard Right Arizona felt the least bit of need to have them removed from their respective offices, so both of the botched runs have them in common.

Then we can move on to the part where the Mexican Government didn’t do shit to find the buyers after they crossed, and did the same “We weren’t told” line they gave for Fast & Furious in 2009.

After that, how about we move on to that the Republicans:

A) Didn’t give two jack shits about rectifying the situation

B) Made no effort to investigate it

C) Halted what investigations were made

D) Forbade efforts to retrieve the weapons, and

D) Started bitching like a Catholic schoolgirl on her period about the 2009-2010 investigations.

E) Bitched even worse than that when it turned up that people like Newell and Hoover barely got a slap on the wrist under Bush.

Hey, didn’t this F&F bullshit start around the time the Wide Receiver probe started putting people in prison? Man, that’s soooo interesting.

Putting aside that you clearly got your “facts” from Planet Fox, Bruce… nobody’s claiming Fast & Furious would have been a perfect operation even if it did go as planned. But let’s look at the difference:

The right didn’t give a shit about accountability when they did it- they only gave a shit when it was the left in that position. Oh, and guess we could count that the left tried to minimize the damage while the right just said “Oh, well- spilled milk and all” on theirs… but the concept of people accounting for their mistakes might make your head explode.

Monica Crowley is an evil little viper, supassed in her churlishness only by Malkin. I’d like to see both of them dancing in a courtroom on slander & libel charges.

Bruce, thanks for acknowledging the truth about Brian Terry’s death. We can now remove that from this discussion since it doesn’t apply to the matter at hand. Just having a mangled bullet doesn’t mean that it came from one of the f&f guns. I don’t recall hearing that there were only two semis involved in that shootout. Meaning that the guns were there but didn’t kill Agent Terry. Which makes them irrelevant other than as a footnote and points out how shameful it is that GOP congress people and pundits are hiding behind Terry and his parents just to try to sound moral while attacking Holder.

Re the Zapata killing, you’re citing a right wing blog that displays an offensive graphic about Holder. How am I to take that as serious? Do you have ballistics evidence to show any connection to F&F? Other than right wingers trying to add more bodies to the pile, I haven’t seen anyone making a serious case that Zapata’s death is relevant to this matter. As for Issa fishing in this area, I’m sure he is. But if Justice is investigating, and you can be sure they are, then Issa is once again meddling into an unrelated area just to fish for more reasons to demand docs from Holder.

As for those 200 supposed deaths in Mexico, you’re not seriously referring me to a blog created by Michelle Malkin, are you? How about a real news source? The right wingers at Hot Air were citing, wait for it…Darrell Issa! Please provide something more substantial. Thanks.

Pleases also cite specific examples of the “whistleblowers” who were “punished” for coming forward about this. Are you sure these were not people who were grinding political axes or were let go for other reasons. You’re throwing around some pretty serious accusations, so it would help to back them up.

I’m sorry you’re not understanding this, but it’s evident that this entire matter has been a witch hunt for some time. Darrell Issa isn’t trying to do oversight work when he subpoenas thousands upon thousands of documents without knowing what he’s looking for, and then changes up his requests and demands instant responses from Justice. Maybe we could have a few Justice staffers working solely for Darrell Issa who could spend their days finding and copying documents. And if a few ongoing investigations are compromised, that’ll just be collateral damage, right?

The real purpose of Issa’s work is to get revenge for Alberto Gonzales and Scooter Libby, and to hide it behind a veneer of moral outrage. Personally, I’d prefer if he just came out and did it directly rather than playing all these games.

This isn’t Gonzales, where serious imprprieties happened and the AG was forced to resign. This isn’t the Wilson/Plame matter where criminal acts were committed and the investigation was criminally obstructed. This isn’t Iran/Contra, where criminal acts were committed and then covered up and pardoned. This isn’t the Clinton witch hunt which covered every ground imaginable looking for a scandal and resulted in an impeachment over a really petty matter. This is Darrell Issa, still in search of power and attention since he failed in his attempt to get himself the California governorship when he orchestrated the recall of Gray Davis. Darrell Issa, who knows this is the highest office he will ever hold and wants to puff himself up as much as he can. And he knows that even if there’s a floor vote on this, it will go down party lines and not accomplish anything else.

Keep in mind that Holder actually has been cooperating. And no, he did not commit perjury. He has repeatedly and patiently appeared in Congress before hostile GOP politicians who regularly attack him and demand that he resign, as they have practically since he took office.

As for bloodshed, cover-ups and perjury, I’d point you to real instances of criminal activity like the Wilson/Plame matter and Iran/Contra. This is a matter of a bad bipartisan Justice policy that went through two presidents, didn’t work, and was stopped. And it’s a matter of a determined and angry GOP congressman who is doing something pretty shameful here.

Finally, I do take issue with your other statements, particularly the ridiculous right wing talking point about the 2nd Amendment. But I was trying to be brief. In a target rich environment, I thought I would just go for the easiest stuff for you to correct first.

And I don’t know that you’re a plant, potted or otherwise. But you’re citing right wing talking points as though they were facts. So if you’re left wing, this is a heck of a way to demonstrate it…

Bruce, do you have any ballistics evidence to back up your claims re the use of these weapons? You know, like finding bullets from the guns in the bodies of the people you’re stepping on to make your attempt at the moral high ground? Because what we know re Brian Terry is that the guns were recovered after that shootout, not that they were directly used on him. As for Zapata, you are aware that the gun used to kill him was not from Fast and Furious and that the connection has been dismissed, right?

And you do know that all of this is really a political discussion over the GOP trying to throw more potshots at Eric Holder while hiding behind the bodies of US law enforcement, right?

Maybe you might want to walk a bit of that back and get your own “facts” straight.

Rick, where did you get the idea that Monica Crowley is a journalist? She’s a pundit who usually just repeats the talking points, albeit with a happier face than Michelle Malkin.

Ooh, am I waiting for Aria’s smackdown of the latest right-wing plant’s absurdity.

Ok, let’s go over this theory: In order to ban guns in the US, the government sold them to people in Mexico.

Now let’s explain why I can still say this is the stupidest goddamn thing I ever heard in my life with a straight face, even after I just got done reading heirsinhopes posts on the other F&F thread:

First of all, if someone wants to create a problem to politicize, they create in the area where they want it politicized. If the mayor of LA wants to create an arson epidemic, he doesn’t send the fucking arsonist to Tiajuana, he hands him a gas can and a zippo with a card that says “have fun.” Maybe not that exact scenario, but we are talking about LA here.

Second of all, in what universe other than the one Fox News lives in is it a good idea to create a shit storm of gun violence, then tell everyone caught in it to hand over their means of defense during an election year? If anything, people who deliberately create outbreaks of gun violence are doing it to sell MORE guns, because guess where everyone’s going?! For that matter, what kind of deal did they have with the drug lords to supposedly let them shoot up the southwest, and how’d they plan to make them stop once they politicized it to disarm the whole damn country?

Third, regarding the whole “Maybe not American bodies” thing… just how stupid are you, Crowley? It’s a cartel, read: They’re in every freakin’ country the competition hasn’t killed the shit out of them in yet. If they were walking guns to the cartel in Arizona,the cartel’s in America, sweetheart. So, if anything, the fact that the US death count doesn’t read like the 12 Days of O Holy Hell shows that what stayed in America is/was pretty subdued.

Yeah, I’m in a bad mood- with right wing stupidity over this topic. Seriously, and I say this to the apologists from the bottom of my heart: Come up with something better than conspiracy theories and lies about how the operations done under Bush (such as Wide Receiver) had no complications/legal hang-ups or shut your damn mouths.

Ahhhh, the alliterative asshole appears again!

Fux Nuze sez

Next Up: How Obama controlled the planes on 9/11.

Monica Crowley is a superb, highly educated journalist who is motivated by idealism and old-school adherence to the principles of good reportage. Of course she is correct about liberal zealots who constantly gnaw at the foundations of our Second Amendment, indeed, of our entire Bill of Rights.

Isn’t this the same Monica Crowley who thought that the Dems intend to commit fraud as their only way to win an election? The same Monica Crowley who said that Obama was directing the Occupy protests? The same Monica Crowley who made a particularly vicious comment about Sandra Fluke and was never asked about it on Fox? Is that the unimpeachable source of information we’re discussing?

Bleach-blond bimbo Monica banters her belligerent bile to brain-dead buffoons.