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I know nothink! NOTHINK! That’s Sgt. Schultz catchphrase from the Hogan’s Heroes, as the WWII prison guard dodged responsibility for doing his job. The White House might as well have loaded the catchphrase into President Obama’s TelePrompTer during today’s press conference, as the Commander-in-Chief eschewed any prior knowledge of the Solyndra and Fast n’ Furious SNAFUs. What else could he say? Whatever it was, he didn’t say it. And no matter what he said, well, any way you look at this the President loses . . .
If Obama wasn’t aware of a federal program that enabled firearms smuggling to Mexico— as part of his publicly declared crackdown on gun smuggling to Mexico—why not? Operation Fast and Furious was a major ATF effort, funded with extra money allocated to the Bureau at President Obama’s request. And this was it: what the ATF was doing to stop gun smuggling (allegedly). Why didn’t the President know the game plan?
If President Obama was aware of Operation Fast and Furious, and there’s documentation or credible testimony to prove it, stick a fork in him. He’s done. Never mind that the U.S. has been funneling guns into Mexico for decades, thousands of which “seeped” to the bad guys. The idea of arming Mexican narco-terrorists is beyond the pale.
Obama: it wazzunt me. Holder: missed that. And yet U.S. Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry is dead. Pinning the blame for the program that armed the men who killed Terry (and ICE Agent Jaime Zapata) on incompetence further down the Obama administration food chain is an excuse that will not win the President any friends or admirers.
Nor will his Administration’s sloth and timidity in dealing with the scandal. If people were authorizing gun running to Mexico “behind his back,” shouldn’t the President have fired the people who kept him in the dark? Gunwalker has been drip, drip, dripping for months. From Real Clear Politics, here’s a choice quote from the press conference:
“He’s assigned an Inspector General to look into how exactly this happened and I have complete confidence in him and I have complete confidence in the process to figure out who in fact was responsible for that decision and how it got made,” Obama added.
As TTAG reported previously, the Inspector General’s (IG) office has been sharing information about their “investigation” with the Arizona U.S. Attorney’s office—which is under suspicion in both Gunwalker and Grenadewalker. The “independent” IG investigation is pre-D.O.A.
In terms of speed and rigor, it seems that the DOJ’s internal investigations are based on the dynamic sleuthing done by O.J. Simpson after his acquittal.
So the Chief Executive is shocked—shocked, I tell you!—about a half-billion dollar loan his peeps ram-rodded through the DOE to fund a green energy company that went bankrupt AFTER getting the loan, and completely at a loss on the whole Fast n’ Furious Guns for Gangstaz thing.
So is he clueless, a terrible executive or lying through his teeth? There is but one obvious answer: yes.
So is he a. clueless, b. a terrible executive, or c. lying through his teeth?
d. All of the above.
Operations Gunrunner and Fast & Furious…the hallmarks of the Obama Administration.
BRING ON DR. RON PAUL 2012!!!!
Why would he have had prior knowledge of one operation (out of many) run by one cabinet position (out of many)? There were many other things to keep him busy in the past 2-3 years than look at this. Health-care, stimulus, education, foreign affairs, terrorism etc. Whether you agree or disagree with nay of those policy areas is irrelevant to the point i am making. Dr Ron Paul himself has said the President (speaking of the position, not this individual) is only one branch of Government and is not all-powerful. That is how the founders intended.
Brad – the article subject matter is valid for TTAG but the wording seems more like redstate.com or other sites like that. Shouldn`t this site be more balanced and present the “facts”?
Also are you suggesting the Inspector General is not independent? They have typically been in the past, even under this administration. Lets not allow the conspiracy thoughts to totally take over.
Mike,
I’m an “equal opportunity abhorer” when it comes to corruption. My dad was born and raised in Chicago. He then moved to Louisiana. He used to tell me that Chicago was as corrupt as all of Louisiana put together. Which is saying something. I’m fed up with BOTH PARTIES. Obama is the one currently at the helm. When Bush ran things, I bitched just as much – if not more – about his guys. Why? Because as a Conservative, I frequently felt betrayed. Corruption knows no party affiliation, sex, race, or creed. It’s the only thing I can think of that NObody’s cornered the market on, outside of common sense.
As a Chief Executive, the buck is supposed to stop at his desk. If he’s not aware of something this big, he’s unfit for office. If his staff betrays him and keeps him in the dark and he doesn’t immediately do something significant (like firing Holder) then he’s a bad manager and unfit for office. If he participated in this, he’s criminally liable and unfit for office. I’m trying hard to find a scenario where he is FIT for office, and I’ve yet to come up with one. The way I see it, he’s either incompetent, clueless, or corrupt. None of those are qualities we need in a chief exec.
He would have knowledge because as president he is responsible. The legal term is “Unitary Executive”. The executive functions with the legal authority of Article 2, and everything done is done legally as if the president had ordered it or done it.
Of course if that is not true, then the people who did it acted without legal authority, and should be fired, prosecuted, convicted, and jailed. Yeah, that will happen with this crew in about 5, 4, 3, 2….. (crickets chirping….)
That people are not being fired and prosecuted tells us that the president wanted it to happen, perhaps with plausible deniability. Why hold off on prosecution? Because when people are prosecuted, they tend to rat out the big rat, and that is not what BHO wants.
President Obama seems to keep right up on the terrorist strikes (personally okaying targets), we just assumed he kept up on the dynamic and dangerous situation in Mexico, and his administration’s efforts at resolving the crisis. He also seems to be well informed on the immigration status of the border areas.
Mike, tell us about yourself.
What guns do you own? What is your go-to-gun(s) for home self-defense? Do you hunt? How long have you been a gun owner? Are you a member of the NRA or GOA? What are your thoughts about the anti-gun Brady Bunch and the ATF?
“What guns do you own? What is your go-to-gun(s)” bla bla bla.
Meaning what?
Mike’s post reminds me of the 80’s Iran Contra Scandal.
President Reagan, Vice President Bush skated on “plausible deinability.”.
It was good for the goose.
That is where some of these people are annoying me. Just because one president may or may not have done something illegal/corrupt does not make it right.
I don’t care what party they fly, what color they are or any other non-pertinent factoid. If a president acted illegally, he should be prosecuted. If he acted with gross incompetence, he should be removed from office in some fashion – either by impeachment or by making him a one term president depending on the severity of the incompetence/corruption.
Why is it so hard to understand? Why are people making excuses for BO based on people other than BO?
Call me naïve, but I want the president to function with the knowledge that he is the employee of the people. He is our servant leader not our 4 year term king.
POTUS is either President Pinocchio or President Schultz, and I’m not sure which is worse.
Even if Obama knew what was going on, it started before he got here with a series of other operations. If he kill switched it early he would need a reason for the beauracratic shit storm that would have caused. The reasons likely being criminal charges and releases from duty for a lot of the agents involved and a sizable chunk of the ATF as a whole in the area. While that could have somewhat cleaned up the mess that obviously had been building and billowed out of the can and onto the floor and his feet he did not want to put a big red bullseye on an entire federal agency in such a direct fashion.
Considering the near government shutdowns we have had as recently as this past August I doubt bringing charges on the entire management structure of the ATF would have made the general, non-informed populace feel anything more than panic at that time. Then, say he did smear the ATF and wash his hands. Now he would have undermined an entire federal agency and that would damage the day to day runnings of the organization. There’s a lot of innocent people who work for the ATF who aren’t Special Agents and they have to live too.
Given how fast this situation has been blowing up I am unwilling to guess how much Obama knew or was told at what time. Saying he knew isn’t going to help, saying he didn’t know is going to bring more light to the people who are or were in direct control of this crap. The details of this weren’t well-hidden and given that he was not voted into office to breathe down the neck of the ATF he’s done what he can without just starting an intelligence war between the members of his cabinet, the press and the ATF.
He has people who look into everything and brief him on a discretionary basis. This operation at first glance looked like the others like it that came previous and I doubt he gave it a second thought. If the Border Patrol agent had not died then it wouldn’t be as hot a topic. Obama and his advisors couldn’t have predicted it.
I don’t think he did the best he could have with this situation but I can’t say I see no logic in the actions of the President. I can see logic. I can also see he is cornered and very likely going to go down over this but I can understand why it happened in this way at least on some level.
Why isn’t anyone discussing the FBI’s involvement in this? The ATF had FELON’s clearing NICS checks while purchasing dozens of AK style rifles and NOTHING was said.
The FBI runs NICS, there’s no way that somebody didn’t pull strings in order for them to get the go ahead on those purchases.
Lying- body language and facial expression. He’s toast and he knows it.
His options are malevolence towards Mexico or incompetence. He’s chosen to say he’s incompetent.
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