House Republicans Request Special Counsel to Probe Holder on 'Fast and Furious'

[I AM NOT THAT GUY 5,715]

House Republicans are calling for a special counsel to determine whether Attorney General Eric Holder misled Congress during his testimony to the House Judiciary Committee on Operation Fast and Furious

House Judiciary Committee Chairman Lamar Smith, R-Texas, was sending a letter to President Obama on Tuesday arguing that Holder cannot investigate himself, and requesting the president instruct the Department of Justice to appoint a special counsel.

...one memo dated July 2010 shows Michael Walther, director of the National Drug Intelligence Center, told Holder that straw buyers in the Fast and Furious operation "are responsible for the purchase of 1,500 firearms that were then supplied to the Mexican drug trafficking cartels."

Other documents also indicate that Holder began receiving weekly briefings on the program from the National Drug Intelligence Center "beginning, at the latest, on July 5, 2010," Smith wrote.

"These updates mentioned, not only the name of the operation, but also specific details about guns being trafficked to Mexico," Smith wrote in the letter to Obama.

"Allegations that senior Justice Department officials may have intentionally misled members of Congress are extremely troubling and must be addressed by an independent and objective special counsel. I urge you to appoint a special counsel who will investigate these allegations as soon as possible," Smith wrote.

Smith said he was not suggesting that Holder committed perjury, per se.

"I am suggesting there is a conflict between what the attorney general told us and what these documents that were just released show us. ... We need to find out what's behind that ... and give the attorney general the opportunity to tell the truth," Smith told Fox News.

House Judiciary Committee Ranking Member John Conyers, D-Mich., said he had not been informed of the reqeest before it was sent to the president.

This is the third time in two years the Judiciary Committee chairman has called for a special counsel. In October 2009, Smith asks for a special counsel to investigate the now defunct community organizing group ACORN. In July 2010, Smith asked the Obama administration for a special counsel to investigate voter intimidation charges against the New Black Panther Party.

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2011/10/04/house-republicans-to-request-special-counsel-to-probe-holder-on-fast-and/#ixzz1ZrtD4HIz

[Danno 1,228]

You could expect Holder to "forget" some detail of a routine matter but clearly no one forgets communications about a operation of shipping thousands of guns into the hands of foreign gangs.

The nations top law enforcer, has no regard for the law.

[lostinblue 1,989]

You could expect Holder to "forget" some detail of a routine matter but clearly no one forgets communications about a operation of shipping thousands of guns into the hands of foreign gangs.

The nations top law enforcer, has no regard for the law.

Among the e-mails was a photograph of a powerful Barrett .50-caliber rifle that had been illegally purchased in Tucson and recovered in Sonora, Mexico, raising the possibility of a second “gunwalking” program, this one called “Wide Receiver.”

Like Fast and Furious, the ATF-supervised scheme that saw thousands of weapons “walk” across the Mexican border for reasons no one in the Justice Department has yet satisfactorily explained, Wide Receiver was apparently a joint operation that also included the Drug Enforcement Administration, the FBI, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, the IRS and the US Attorney’s office.

It’s likely there have been others, in such states as Florida and Indiana.

While the back-channel e-mails don’t explicitly discuss Fast and Furious, they do show the White House’s intense interest in the ATF’s and other federal agencies’ activities in Arizona. In one message, O’Reilly asks Newell whether he can share some information with other officials. “Sure, just don’t want ATF HQ to find out, especially since this is what they should be doing (briefing you)!” comes the reply.

Despite whistle-blower testimony, Newell denies that his agents deliberately facilitated weapons transfers to Mexican drug lords, although he recently admitted in a supplemental statement to Rep. Darrell Issa’s House Committee on Government Reform and Oversight that his July testimony “lacked clarity.”

We’ve also just learned from documents that guns linked to Fast and Furious turned up in El Paso last year -- the first time such weapons have surfaced outside Arizona, where the guns were “released.” A convicted drug felon was allowed to buy 40 AK-47-type rifles, which eventually wound up in Texas.

It’s time for politicians on both sides of the aisle to demand answers from Justice and the White House. Issa and his colleague in the Senate, Chuck Grassley, have been doing yeoman’s work, but there’s only so much they can do without the wind at their backs.

A White House under investigation can delay, slow-walk documents, redact them in the name of national or operational security, and simply refuse to make witnesses available to investigators -- all of which the administration has done. Issa and Grassley had asked to interview O’Reilly before the end September, but the White House says he’s on assignment in the Mideast and thus unavailable.

Short of a special prosecutor -- a move floated by Issa but one that the Justice Department, which is leading its own probe, would likely block -- the only hope we have that the truth will come out is public pressure.

So where are the GOP candidates? Where is a critical mass of journalists and commentators, who should be asking sharp, tough, pertinent questions in the national interest?

By now, it’s clear that the US government is in Fast and Furious up to its ears -- with two, possibly three dead agents and more than 200 dead Mexicans to show for an operation that never had the slightest chance of success.

The only real question is: Why?

Read more: http://www.nypost.com/p/news/opinion/opedcolumnists/furiously_unraveling_f6fpYY4OXSJg62rFIrFiUI#ixzz1ZsY45EBv

[Gary and Alla 3,694]

The only real question is: Why?

Read more: http://www.nypost.com/p/news/opinion/opedcolumnists/furiously_unraveling_f6fpYY4OXSJg62rFIrFiUI#ixzz1ZsY45EBv

Seriously? The reason why is the Heller and McDonald decisions by the Supreme Court. Obama is attemoting to provide fuel for the UN proposed international regulations on firearms. They do not care if people are killed as long as the blame gets directed at gun owners and makers.

They found out in 1994 that if you implement a federal gun law, the party implementing it will be un-@ssed from congress! They have been in a quandry ever since! Enter the UN.