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Forget Klownald Trump. This is your story of the day. Attorney General Eric Holder is on Capitol Hill day, facing another round of questions from relentless GOP watchdogs led by House Oversight and Govenrment Reform chair Darrell Issa.

You can watch the proceedings live on CSPAN online here.

The grilling comes as Border Patrol agent Brian Terry’s family files suit against the lying ATF:

The family of slain U.S. Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry charged Wednesday that the top federal prosecutor in Phoenix lied to them about the guns found at the crime scene in an attempt to hide the weapons’ connection to the ATF’s failed Fast and Furious gun-tracking operation.

Terry was killed in December 2010, allegedly by Mexican bandits carrying at least two AK-47 semiautomatic rifles that had been purchased in Arizona as part of Fast and Furious. The operation was intended to catch drug lords using illegal weapons, but the ATF immediately lost track of 1,700 firearms.

The Terry family alleged that then-U.S. Atty. Dennis K. Burke told them last March that the two weapons came from a store in Texas and were not part of Fast and Furious.

The family made their allegations in a “notice of claim” stating that they intend to sue the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives and the Justice Department for $25 million. They called the gun-tracking operation “abominable, reckless, nonsensical.”

Burke has resigned and has declined to discuss Fast and Furious. But the family’s claim notice strongly suggests that the federal government initially sought to keep Fast and Furious under wraps and hoped it would not be linked to the slaying.

House GOP leaders repeat what whistleblowers have been telling us from the start: Top White House/DOJ knew. They knew:

Top Department of Justice officials had extensive knowledge of and involvement in Operation Fast and Furious, claims a new report released Thursday, hours before Attorney General Eric Holder’s scheduled testimony to the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee.

The report released by Rep. Darrell Issa, R-Calif., and Sen. Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, top lawmakers investigating the botched gunrunning operation, claims Justice Department officials in Washington and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives were involved in the coordination in the early stages of the operation.
Related Interactive

Report released by Issa and Grassley on Fast and Furious

Republican lawmakers Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) and Sen. Charles Grassley (R-Iowa) released a new report suggesting top Department of Justice officials had extensive knowledge of and involvement in Operation Fast and Furious.

Justice headquarters “had much greater knowledge of, and involvement in, Fast and Furious than it has previously acknowledged,” the memo reads.

Rep. Issa’s preview statement in the advance of the hearing is here:

ate last year, after months of investigation, the Justice Department finally acknowledged the allegations were true. Fast and Furious was both reckless and flawed.

The Justice Department, however, has been less than forthcoming in cooperating with the efforts of Congressional investigators to determine exactly what happened and who was responsible:

• The Justice Department has delivered fewer than 8% of the 80,000 documents we know it has identified as being related to this flawed operation.

• It has refused to allow investigators access to numerous witnesses who participated in the operation – one witness, after being served with a subpoena, invoked his Fifth Amendment right to protection against self-incrimination rather than answer questions.

• Justice Department now asserts that many documents pertaining to internal discussions and decision making about its response to Operation Fast and Furious are off-limits to investigators.

The American people deserve better from our nation’s top law enforcement agency. Thursday’s hearing will feature the nation’s top law enforcement official, Attorney General Eric Holder, who will be asked to explain his decision to withhold this factual evidence from investigators. What he is concerned this information would reveal? Why is the Department trying to keep its internal discussions about Operation Fast and Furious from after February 4, 2011 secret? Why did it take nearly nine months for the Justice Department to acknowledge its earlier denials were false? Why did senior Justice Department officials who knew about and received briefings on the operation fail to stop it? Should Americans have confidence in their chief law enforcement agency even though these same officials remain in their posts?

There is now broad bipartisan agreement that the congressional investigation into Operation Fast and Furious has exposed a serious and deadly failure of government. We know that the life of a brave Border Patrol agent has been lost along with countless Mexican citizens who have been victimized by guns from Operation Fast and Furious. Attorney General Holder has acknowledged that the danger created by Fast and Furious will continue for years.

This hearing is not about controversial struggles between gun control advocates and supporters of the Second Amendment. It is about the unifying, and what should be bipartisan, expectation that the Justice Department be held to a high standard and that those who failed to meet this standard should be held accountable. I look forward to Attorney General Holder’s testimony.

After Issa threatened contempt charges against the Department of Justice Obstructionists, DOJ responded with…more obstruction:

The Justice Department response Wednesday rejected Issa’s February 9, 2012, deadline to produce all demanded documents. Cole called the deadline “impossible” to meet because of the broad scope of the request.

He did not directly refer to the threat of a contempt charge by Issa.

…The hearing Thursday will not be the end of the battle over Operation Fast and Furious. The Justice Department’s inspector general continues to work on a detailed account of the origins of the operation, and who was involved. The report is not expected to be complete for at least a couple more months.

Holder has promised when it is completed, he is prepared to make individuals accountable. But Holder says he has no plan to seek resignations or administer discipline until that report is complete.

The corruption keeps piling up. Matthew Boyle has a hard-hitting investigative piece in the Daily Caller exposing yet another DOJ scandal involving alleged bribery of top officials involved in a financial fraud probe:

A U.S. Justice Department source has told The Daily Caller that at least two DOJ prosecutors accepted cash bribes from allegedly corrupt finance executives who were indicted under court seal within the past 13 months, but never arrested or prosecuted.

The sitting governor of the U.S. Virgin Islands, his attorney general and an unspecified number of Virgin Islands legislators also accepted bribes, the source said, adding that U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder is aware prosecutors and elected officials were bribed and otherwise compromised, but has not held anyone accountable.

The bribed officials, an attorney with knowledge of the investigation told TheDC, remain on the taxpayers’ payroll at the Justice Department without any accountability. The DOJ source said Holder does not want to admit public officials accepted bribes while under his leadership.

That source said that until the summer of 2011, the two compromised prosecutors were part of a team of more than 25 federal prosecutors pursuing a financial crime ring, and at least five other prosecutors tasked to the case were also compromised by the criminal suspects they were investigating, without being bribed.

Washington knew what it was getting when it confirmed corruptocrat Eric Holder. Innocent people have paid with their lives. Ignoring this man and his boss’s utter, systematic contempt for the rule of law has yielded deadly consequences.

America, let’s not make that mistake again.

***

Update:Go to my Twitter account for live-tweeting of the hearing.

Most jaw-dropping moment so far: Indignant Holder demanding he get “credit” for his work at DOJ.

Running joke: Every time gun-control Democrats call for more “tools.” There are plenty enough of them in charge in Washington.

Side note: Donald Trump stepping on this important hearing tells you everything you need to know about his purported interest in advancing conservative/GOP interests. Circus, circus.

Video clips:

GOP Rep. Issa’s opening statement:

GOP Rep. Patrick Henry underscores that there’s been no accountability for 13 months:

GOP Rep. Anne Marie Buerkle confronts Holder with Terry family’s plea for action. At the five-minute mark, you can’t hear it, but Democrats advised Holder: “Don’t answer:”

THE WHITE HOUSE
Office of the Press Secretary
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
January 23, 2012

Air Force One Estimated Departure time: 6:35 p.m. MST

The visit comes just as the state of Arizona launches its own investigation of Barack Obama’s bloodiest scandal…

…and just as a top DOJ prosecutor invokes the 5th, while the water-carrying media spins.

GOP leaders Boehner and Cantor won’t demand Holder’s resignation.

Hopefully, there are citizen activists in Arizona who will make sure Obama doesn’t get away with whitewashing Fast and Furious on his visit.

The Year in Obama Scandals — and Scandal Deniers
by Michelle Malkin
Creators Syndicate
Copyright 2011

With 2011 drawing to a close, it is time to account. As an early-and-often chronicler of Chicago-on-the-Potomac, I am amazed at the stubborn and clingy persistence of President Barack Obama’s snowblowers in the media. See no scandal, hear no scandal, speak no scandal.

Dartmouth College professor Brendan Nyhan asserted in May — while Operation Fast and Furious subpoenas were flying on Capitol Hill — that “one of the least remarked upon aspects of the Obama presidency has been the lack of scandals.” Conveniently, he defines scandal as a “widespread elite perception of wrongdoing.”

So as long as left-wing Ivy League scribes refuse to perceive something to be a scandal — never mind the actual suffering endured by the family of murdered Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry, whose death came at the hands of a Mexican cartel thug wielding a Fast and Furious gun walked across the southern border under Attorney General Eric Holder’s watch — there is no scandal!

Self-serving much?

Mother Jones’ Kevin Drum likewise proclaimed: “Obama’s presidency has so far been almost completely free of scandal.”

This after the year kicked off in January with the departure of lying eco-radical czar Carol Browner. In backroom negotiations, she infamously bullied auto execs to “put nothing in writing, ever.” The previous fall, the White House’s own oil spill panel had singled out Browner for misleading the public about the scientific evidence for the administration’s Draconian drilling moratorium and “contributing to the perception that the government’s findings were more exact than they actually were.”

The Interior Department inspector general and federal judges likewise blasted drilling ban book-cooking by Browner and Interior Secretary Ken Salazar, who falsely rewrote the White House drilling ban report to doctor the Obama-appointed panel’s own overwhelming scientific objections to the job-killing edict.

In February, federal judge Martin Feldman in Louisiana excoriated the Obama Interior Department for defying his May 2010 order to lift its fraudulent ban on offshore oil and gas drilling in the Gulf. He called out the administration’s culture of contempt and “determined disregard” for the law.

This spring saw rising public anger over the preferential Obamacare waiver process (which I first reported on in September 2010). Some 2,000 lucky golden ticket winners were freed from the costly federal mandates — including a handful of fancy restaurants in Aloha Nancy Pelosi’s San Francisco district, the entire state of Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid’s Nevada, and scores of local, state and national Big Labor organizations, from the Service Employees International Union and Teamsters on down. Meanwhile, as The Hill newspaper reported last month, other not-so-lucky Republican-led states seeking waivers, such as Indiana and Louisiana, were rejected.

But it wasn’t just Republicans objecting to the president’s arbitrary Obamacare fiats. In July, congressional Democrats turned on the monstrous federal health bureaucracy known as the Independent Payment Advisory Board. The constitutionally suspect panel — freed from normal public notice, public comment and public review rules — would have unprecedented authority over health care spending and an expanding jurisdiction of private health care payment rates.

Obama’s health and human services secretary, Kathleen Sebelius, faced separate legal questions over her overseer role in a hair-raising document-shredding case when she served as governor of Kansas. In October, a district judge in the Sunflower State suspended court proceedings in a high-profile criminal case against the abortion racketeers of Planned Parenthood. Bombshell court filings showed that Kansas health officials “shredded documents related to felony charges the abortion giant faces” and failed to disclose it for six years.

That same month, Bloomberg News columnist Jonathan Alter gushed: “There is zero evidence … of corruption. Where is it?”

Alter’s declaration of the “Obama Miracle” came just weeks after the politically driven half-billion-dollar Solyndra stimulus “investment” went bankrupt, prompting an FBI raid and ongoing criminal and congressional probes of the solar company funded by top White House bundler and visitor George Kaiser.

As Solyndra and an avalanche of other ongoing green subsidy scams erupted, so did the LightSquared debacle — a federal broadband boondoggle involving billionaire hedge fund managers and Obama donors Philip Falcone and George Soros. In September, two high-ranking witnesses — William Shelton, the four-star general who heads the Air Force Space Command, and National Coordination Office for Space-Based Positioning, Navigation and Timing Director Anthony Russo — exposed how the White House had pressured them to alter their congressional testimony and play down concerns about LightSquared’s interference threat to military communications.

The White House continues to block efforts to gain information about the Federal Communications Commission’s approval of a special waiver for the company, even as new government tests this month showed that the company’s “signals caused harmful interference to the majority of … general purpose GPS receivers.”

The Obama White House closed out the year with Democratic Sen. Claire McCaskill of Missouri demanding a probe of the smelly $443 million no-bid smallpox antiviral pill contract with Siga Technologies — controlled by big lefty donor Ron Perelman. Then there was the small matter of massive voter fraud in Indiana, where a Democratic official resigned amid allegations that “dozens, if not hundreds,” of signatures were faked to get Obama on the state primary ballot in 2008. And while Americans busied themselves with the holidays, White House and Democratic campaign officials were dumping more than $70,000 in contributions from another deep-pocketed contributor — scandal-plagued pal and former New Jersey Gov. Jon Corzine, who oversaw the collapse of MF Global.

All this — and so much more — yet erstwhile “conservative” journalist Andrew Sullivan of Newsweek/The Daily Beast scoffed, “Where are all the scandals promised by Michelle Malkin?”

There’s none so blind as those who will not see.

Via GOP Rep. Darrell Issa:

ISSA STATEMENT ON PASSAGE OF BRIAN A. TERRY MEMORIAL ACT FROM HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

The Brian A. Terry Memorial Act of 2011 is awaiting action by the Senate.

The .pdf of the bill can be accessed right here.

NRA News host Cam Edwards interviewed a Terry family friend yesterday on the one-year anniversary of Agent Terry’s death. Listen here.

Yesterday: The murder of Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry: One year ago today

Since this blog was founded in 2005 and before that, since the publication of Invasion in 2002, I’ve covered the blood-boiling deaths of law enforcement and border security officials who put their lives on the front lines for us — only to lose them in part because of government negligence, malfeasance, and refusal to do what needs to be done to keep America safe.

We have mourned murdered National Park Service ranger Kris Eggle. And Denver detective Donnie Young. And Los Angeles sheriff’s deputy David March. And Houston police officer Rodney Johnson. And so many more.

All are etched in my consciousness permanently, but none have shaken me more than the death of Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry one year ago today. The systemic incompetence, callousness, and corruption that created the conditions for his murder are unfathomable. The cover-up that continues today in the White House is unconscionable.

Look back at how Agent Terry’s death was first reported 12 months ago:

A Border Patrol agent was shot and killed Tuesday night near Rio Rico after encountering several suspects, federal authorities said Wednesday.

Agent Brian Terry was killed just 10 miles north of the U.S.-Mexico border, north of Nogales. Four suspects are in custody and one is being pursued, according to a press release from Customs and Border Protection.

The Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Santa Cruz County Sheriff’s Office are investigating.

Now, reflect on the extent of the lies, leaks, deception, and obstruction in the investigations of Agent Terry’s murder.

Now, imagine the suffering of the Terry family a year later — still seeking answers and the truth about Operation Fast and Furious — as they endured the vile, cynical exploitation of the case by Attorney General Eric Holder, who released his Kabuki “apology” letter to the media before they had even received it.

Border security activists, Second Amendment activists, anti-corruption advocates, and all Americans who care about the security and sovereignty of this country owe this family their thoughts, prayers, and gratitude as they continue to fight for the truth.

***

Neil McCabe at Human Events has a moving tribute and retrospective.

Katie Pavlich at Townhall.com remembers.

Vigilant national security/second amendment blogger David Codrea at Sipsey Street Irregulars marks the anniversary:

A year. And still we wait for the FBI to figure out a way to prosecute the one wounded killer they were forced to retain without compromising their cover-up of the involvement of their one-armed paid snitch.

A year. And still we wait for the much ballyhooed Office of Inspector General Report. You know, the one that the administration always uses to justify not telling you anything about the Gunwalker Scandal.

A year. And still we wait for the “mainstream media” to actually engage on the story of the greatest scandal of federal misadventure to date.

Watch this video from the House GOP Oversight and Reform on Brian Terry’s service to our nation:

More calls for Holder’s resignation. And the no-confidence tide swells.

FBI Director Bob Mueller may get Fast and Furious questions today.

Bob Owens spotlights Mother Jones trying to shoot the messenger on F&F.

How long will national media outlets keep up the Fast and Furious blackout? Mary Chastain is keeping tabs.

Holder, Blago, Richardson: Triangle of Sleaze
by Michelle Malkin
Creators Syndicate
Copyright 2011

It was a rough week for the corruptocracy. White House officials better ho-ho-hold on tight because the sleigh ride isn’t going to get any smoother.

On Wednesday, disgraced former Gov. Rod Blagojevich, D-Ill., received a 14-year prison sentence for scheming to sell President Barack Obama’s Senate office, along with several other pay-for-play schemes. Blago played the distressed daddy for the federal judge, invoking his young daughters and wife (who held her notoriously foul tongue in check) to bemoan how his “life is in ruins.”

How far Blago’s fallen from the glory days of 2008, when he was gloating at the prospect of naming a candidate to fill then-President-elect Obama’s seat. “I’ve got this thing, and it’s f**king golden,” he crowed. All that glitters now, though, are the paparazzi flash bulbs that Blago faces on his perp walks.

Earlier this week, Bill Richardson, former Democratic governor of New Mexico, disgraced former presidential candidate and failed Obama Commerce Secretary nominee, faced new reports of a federal grand jury into his possible violations of campaign finance laws. The funny-money business is tied to an alleged mistress payoff a la disgraced former presidential candidate and Sen. John Edwards, D-N.C.

Additionally, the Wall Street Journal reports, investigators are probing how “Richardson’s close allies steered more than $2 billion of public money into investment funds run by money managers who in turn agreed to pay millions of dollars in consulting fees to high-profile Democratic fundraisers and other supporters of Richardson.”

The star that joined together this little constellation of sleaze? Disgraced U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder.

Holder and Blago go way back. Holder himself suffered selective amnesia about the relationship during his confirmation hearing. He somehow “forgot” to mention that Blagojevich had appointed him to probe corruption in Illinois casino licensing decisions. State officials had objected to Blago’s crony appointment of fundraiser Christopher Kelly to the state Gaming Board. Kelly’s business partner was now-convicted felon and shakedown artist Tony Rezko, Obama’s former bagman and real-estate fixer.

Holder pocketed $300,000 from Blago to “investigate” and — surprise, surprise — concluded that no corruption existed. They stood shoulder to shoulder at a 2004 news conference to make the announcement. But Holder failed to disclose it on his Senate Judiciary Committee questionnaire, which he signed five days after Blagojevich’s arrest in December 2008 for putting Obama’s U.S. Senate seat up for sale.

After duping a Senate majority (including 19 Senate Republicans) into approving his AG nomination despite multiple admissions of failure, neglect and sabotage of the rule of law, Holder moved up to perform more cover-ups for Obama’s pals. In August 2009, Holder’s DOJ announced it was dropping federal corruption charges against Richardson after a yearlong federal probe into pay-to-play allegations involving one of his large political donors and state bond deals.

“It’s over. There’s nothing. It was killed in Washington,” a source close to the investigation told the Associated Press. Even as they tapped Richardson to serve as Obama’s first Commerce Secretary, the White House transition team knew about Richardson’s pay-to-play scandal involving a California company, CDR Financial Products. FBI and federal prosecutors had launched their probe of CDR’s activities in New Mexico in the summer of 2008.

The feds had been digging into a nationwide web of favor-trading between financial firms and politicians overseeing local government bond markets. CDR was tied to a doomed bond deal in Alabama, which, according to Bloomberg News, threatened to cause the biggest municipal bankruptcy in U.S. history. CDR raked in nearly $1.5 million in fees from a New Mexico state financial agency after donating more than $100,000 to Richardson’s efforts to register Hispanic and Native American voters and to pay for expenses at the 2004 Democratic National Convention, the news service reported.

The state agency that awarded the money consisted of five Richardson appointees and five members of his gubernatorial cabinet. CDR made contributions both shortly before and after securing consultant work with the state of New Mexico. CDR’s president also contributed $29,000 to Obama’s presidential campaign. After Holder dropped the case, New Mexico Republicans blasted the lack of transparency in the decisions and the refusal to heed the advice of experienced, non-political prosecutors and FBI investigators.

Mother Jones writer James Ridgeway’s comment on the day of Richardson’s Commerce Secretary nomination withdrawal proved quite prescient: “It may be premature to say that Obama and his team have too high a tolerance for corruption. But this first self-destruct among his cabinet picks could well prove all the more damaging because it’s something they should have seen coming from miles away.”

The same applies, of course, to Holder himself — who admitted at a House hearing that the Operation Fast and Furious scandal under his watch was “flawed,” “reckless,” “tragic” and deadly.” How much longer will America tolerate this reign of error and terror?

***

Related: The RNC recaps Obama Day on Capitol Hill yesterday…

A no-confidence vote for Holder?

Busy day in Washington today.

If you’re not near a TV, you can watch the Eric Holder live testimony re. Fast and Furious and other matters here. Here’s how C-SPAN previews:

Attorney General Eric Holder testifies before the House Judiciary Committee today about when he first became aware of the tactics used by the ATF’s failed sting operation aimed at gun smugglers.

Previously, Holder vowed that the tactics used during operation Fast and Furious would never be used again by the Justice Department. The operation allowed guns to be smuggled across the U.S.-Mexico border in order to establish links between arms dealers and drug cartels.

The Attorney General has also said that the Justice Department never knowingly provided Congress with false information about Fast and Furious, a charge leveled by House and Senate Republicans. Mr. Holder will testify before the full House Judiciary Committee.

New RNC ad blasts F&F cover-up:

Update: 10:05am Holder will NOT be sworn in under oath as requested by Rep. Issa. Rep. Smith argues he’s technically already under oath.

Right on cue. Or rather, left on cue: Conyers opens by pushing more gun-control legislation at Holder hearing.

Conyers heaps praise on Holder’s dedication and civil rights championship. Antidote: Christian Adams’ book, Injustice.

Issa: He has “no confidence in a president who has confidence in Eric Holder.”

Holder’s dulled praise for border officials –followed by whining about politics–is the emetic of the morning.

I’m marveling at how Holder testifies so bloodlessly about the bloodiest disaster of the Obama administration.

GOP Rep. Lamar Smith turns to Obamacare/Supreme Court justice Kagan conflict/recusal issue. Holder going in circles on whether he’s asserting a legal privilege in refusing to hand over the documents.

Update 10:30am

GOP Rep. Sensenbrenner: DOJ official Lanny Breuer should be fired. Whaddya gonna do to clean up this mess?

Holder: Nobody at Justice lied.

Sensenbrenner: Letter was wdrawn! What’s dif between lying & misleading?!

Sensenbrenner raises prospect of impeachment. Story here.

Holder: The Justice Dept has released facts. Pats self on back for explaining Breuer LIES.

Here’s vid:

10:40am House hearing in recess for a series of four votes.

Check out Issa’s new Fast and Furious investigation website here.

Act II.

Sheila Jackson Lee can’t even remember BP Agent Brian Terry’s name while pretending to care.

Holder is stammering in response to q’s from Goodlatte about how many #fastandfurious guns recovered. He doesn’t know.

Maxine Waters calls the ATF the “AFT” in crusading for Holder power grab legislation.

Waters play-acts shock comparing legal sales to govt-forced illegal sales.

Ignores that the federal licensees involved actually pre-reported multiple long gun sales. ATF approved them.

Hank “Guam is sinking” Johnson is shamelessly playing the race card, invoking “white supremacists” and gun dealers instead of Fast and Furious.

Johnson: How many weapons are sold to “white supremacists” at “unregulated gun shows”?

Issa with boxes of docs at his side: 5,000 emails on #fastandfurious, but not a single one from Holder. Why?

Issa asks if Holder is a prolific e-mailer. Holder says no. Issa asks if has personal email. Holder-Yes. #fastandfurious

Holder brags about “unprecedented” doc turnover. Issa retorts about Holder’s ignorance.

Issa focuses in on what CoS Gary Grindler knew. Nailing Holder. Jackson Lee tries to play human shield.

Issa nailing DOJ IG for leaking #fastandfurious to object of investigation.

Issa is treating Holder as “hostile witness” because…he is one.

GOP Rep Franks going back to ATF memos using scandal to expand power.

Franks reestablishes that Holder hasn’t produced all pertinent #fastandfurious emails and won’t.

In response to GOP Rep Ted Poe, Holder acknowledges it was “flawed,” “reckless,” “tragic,” and “yes,” more people are going to die.

After GOP Rep Poe points out reckless standard could invite crim prosec, Holder walks back “reckless.” #fastandfurious #cya

Here’s the vid:

More…

Vid: GOP Rep. Dan Lungren nails Holder on gun-control exploitation memos reported by CBS’s Sharyl Attkisson, blasts Holder for blame Bush games, blurring distinction betwn Gunrunner/WideReceiver & #fastandfurious:

Democrat Rep Judy Chu = tool. Reading straight from DOJ cheerleading talking points touting crime fighting record.

Chaffetz to Holder: Have u spoken to J-Nap, Clinton about #fastandfurious? No. Obama? Doesn’t think so.

Chaffetz: Dead bodies in US, Mexico and you haven’t spoken to JNap, Clinton, or President?

Holder lecturing Chaffetz on the “way Washington works.” Dems snicker.

Chaffetz presses forward on shooting of Jaime Zapata, agents on ground in panic. DOJ/DHS release but no Holder/JNap talk?

Holder: I have made personnel changes. Chaffetz: You haven’t fired anyone! Holder: It’s not all I am possibly going to do.

Emetic: Holder lecturing Chaffetz on need for establishing facts.

House #fastandfurious hearing recesses for votes until 2:30pm.

***

Meanwhile Jon Corzine is on a House hot seat. Hearing’s livestreaming here.

Corzine don’t know nuttin:

Jon Corzine, the former New Jersey senator who ran the derivatives broker-dealer MF Global Holdings as its chief executive leading up to its historic failure on Oct. 31, told a congressional panel on Thursday that he does not know what happened to an estimated $1.2 billion in missing customer funds.

“I simply do not know where the money is, or why the accounts have not been reconciled to date,” he said in prepared testimony before the House Agriculture Committee. MF Global failed because it over leveraged itself and made bad bets on European sovereign debt. Regulators have said it invested with customer funds that were supposed to be segregated.

“I do not know which accounts are unreconciled or whether the unreconciled accounts were or were not subject to the segregation rules,” Corzine said in his prepared remarks.

Corzine apologized in his testimony and said he was “stunned” the day before the firm collapsed when he learned that the firm could not account for hundreds of millions of dollars in client funds.

He said that as CEO he takes “responsibility for the firm,” but he readily admitted he did not involve himself deeply or understand the complexities of its day-to-day operations.

Takeaway: Holder holds out possibility of firing underlings at DOJ once “facts” are established. #fastandfurious

***
And as I spotlighted in my column yesterday, today’s the day of the Cordray super-czar vote.

McConnell is on the Senate floor now drawing the line: “we’re not going to let the president put another unelected czar in place.”

Vote falls short. Update here.

The Eric Holder Resignation Bandwagon is growing, and apparently, Eric Holder is upset about it.

Matthew Boyle at the Daily Caller has done nice work chronicling the EHRB movement on Capitol Hill. Holder chewed out the publication yesterday. No dice. Boyle reports today that GOP Sen. Johnny Isakson of Georgia is the first in the Senate to go on record demanding Holder’s resignation.

There will no doubt be more GOP Senators following in his footsteps.

But as I pointed out last night on Twitter, Isakson was 1 of 19 Senate GOPers who voted to confirm Holder despite his Clinton-era corruption.

The Johnny-come-latelys had all the evidence they needed more than two years ago during his confirmation hearings that Holder would trample over the rule of law, put politics above national security, and make a mess of the DOJ.

They confirmed him, anyway. And now, they’re griping about the corruptocrat they put into office.

Flashback Feb. 2, 2009:

The full roll call vote is up.

Here are your 19 Bend Over Republicans who voted yes on Holder. Some disappointing names on the list in addition to the usual suspects:

Alexander (R-TN)
Bennett (R-UT)
Bond (R-MO)
Chambliss (R-Ga)
Collins (R-ME)
Corker (R-TN)
Graham (R-SC)
Grassley (R-IA)
Gregg (R-NH)
Hatch (R-UT)
Isakson (R-GA)
Kyl (R-AZ)
Lugar (R-IN)
McCain (R-AZ)
Murkowski (R-AK)
Sessions (R-AL)
Snowe (R-ME)
Specter (R-PA)
Voinovich (R-OH)

Reminder:

…Sen. Kit Bond (R-Mo.) had seriously considered voting against Holder but eventually supported him.

“I found Mr. Holder to be a good listener, which is an important prerequisite for any good leader,” said Bond, the ranking Republican on the Senate Intelligence Committee. “I believe him when he says that he’s willing to take good ideas from wherever they come.”

Reminder:

The former Republican chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee will support Eric Holder’s nomination for attorney general, giving him a major boost toward confirmation.

Sen. Orrin Hatch (Utah), who chaired the panel for a decade beginning in 1995, told The Hill that he will support Holder.

“I intend to,” said Hatch.

His decision could undermine GOP efforts to stall or block the confirmation. Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell (Ky.) said Friday that Holder would be the only Cabinet nominee to face a tough confirmation fight.

Hatch said that Republicans should try to strike a cooperative tone with President-elect Obama during the first days of his administration.

“I start with the premise that the president deserves the benefit of the doubt. I don’t think politics should be played with the attorney general,” he said.

“I like Barack Obama and want to help him if I can.”

Holder’s GOP rubber-stampers should have listened to the victims of Eric Holder’s malfeasance.

We need a conservative takeover of the U.S. Senate — and officeholders who will refuse to pander and capitulate at confirmation time in the spirit of bipartisanship.

As the Eric Holder Resignation Bandwagon grows, use my handy list to compare GOP Senators’ election-year words with their confirmation-year actions.

The Accountability Charade
by Michelle Malkin
Creators Syndicate
Copyright 2011

You can’t spell “accountability” without “A,” “C” and “T.” But in Washington, government officials routinely get away with “taking personal responsibility” by mouthing empty words devoid of action. Heads nod in collective agreement that mistakes were made. But heads never roll. The Obama administration has raised this accountability charade to an art form.

At a House Energy Committee hearing on the half-billion-dollar bankrupt Solyndra loan-guarantee disaster, Energy Secretary Steven Chu made a grand pretense of falling on his sword. The neon-green solar energy zealot told lawmakers in prepared testimony that the “final decisions on Solyndra were mine, and I made them with the best interest of the taxpayer in mind.” But again and again, Chu admitted, those decisions were made with serial cluelessness about the political jockeying, dire financial warnings, legal red flags and conflicts of interest that “everybody (else) and their dog” knew about (as GOP Rep. Joe Barton of Texas politely pointed out).

While former Democratic chief inquisitor Henry Waxman praised Chu’s “reputation for integrity” as “unimpeachable,” Chu came across as more Mr. Magoo than Mr. Clean.

Chu said he was “unaware” of the Department of Energy’s own staff predictions two years ago that Solyndra would face a serious cash-flow crisis today.

Chu said he was “unaware” of administration pressure on Solyndra to suppress layoff announcements until after the November 2010 midterm elections. “I don’t know. I just learned about that,” he shirked.

In fact, he used the phrase “I am aware of it now” at least a half-dozen times. If there were a Nobel Prize for Unknowing, Chu would be two-time shoo-in. GOP House Energy Committee Chairman Cliff Stearns summed up:

“We talked about the August 2009 email predicting Solyndra would be out of cash in September 2011. You knew about that, but you didn’t seem to know about that.

The request to hold off announcement of the DOE loan, and request by your agency to Solyndra to hold off on announcing layoffs till after the midterm election, you don’t have any recollection of this. So what I am saying is that through all of this you seem to have an unawareness.”

In short, Chu took full responsibility for everything he wasn’t aware of … until it was too late.

Sound familiar? It was the leitmotif played in last week’s Fast and Furious hearings with Attorney General Eric Holder.

Despite a raft of briefing memos with his name on them, Holder claimed he never received or read them. Rhode Island Democratic Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse ran interference, sanctimoniously explaining for all the non-career government attorneys in the audience — including the family of murdered Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry — that nooooooo one in the top echelons of the federal lawyers’ bureaucracy actually reads memos addressed to them. It’s merely a “convention” for junior staff to feel better and more important about themselves.

Taking his boss’s lead, former Holder Chief of Staff Kevin Ohlson — who is seeking a federal judicial slot — explained away his failure to do anything about the festering Fast and Furious gunwalking scandal. He had “been informed that routine courtesy copies of weekly reports were forwarded to me that referred to the operation by name, but that did not provide any operational details and did not refer to gun walking or anything similar.”

Although his name was on the documents, Ohlson just didn’t bother to read them because they weren’t marked important or sensitive. Imagine an ordinary small businessman or taxpayer trying that one out on the IRS.

Situational unawareness in the private marketplace or on the battlefield will cost you your livelihood or your life. In the Age of Obama, however, such willful ignorance is a job prerequisite. The less you know the better.

***

Related reading…

On the lost Solyndra funding and the illegal maneuver to put Solyndra investors ahead of taxpayers:

The Energy Department approved in February a refinancing that put taxpayer debt behind $75 million in new funding from private investors in a last-ditch effort to rescue Solyndra. Republicans said the agreement violated a 2005 energy law prohibiting subordination of public money.

Representative Steve Scalise, a Louisiana Republican, asked who would be paid first as money is recouped from the sale of Solyndra’s assets.

“Does the taxpayer have first dibs?” Scalise said.

“After restructuring? No,” Chu responded.

Chu said the restructuring gave Solyndra a “fighting chance to survive.”

“It was a difficult decision, and we were always, always focused on that path that could get as much taxpayer recovery as possible,” he said.

Chu said his department’s general counsel determined that the law banned subordinating taxpayer debt only for an initial loan guarantee, not for a refinancing. Scalise predicted the Solyndra subordination will be found illegal.

From GOP Rep. Cliff Stearns:

“The American people have the right to know how the Obama Administration risked and lost $535 million in taxpayer funds,” said Rep. Cliff Stearns (R-FL), Chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee’s Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations. “This hearing shows that Secretary Chu failed to require appropriate oversight over the loan guarantee process, is unaware of the financial condition of the other loan guarantee recipients after two of the first three have filed for bankruptcy, did not seek legal input from the Department of Justice before subordinating taxpayers to two hedge funds, and is unable to identify who at DOE asked Solyndra to withhold announcing impending layoffs until after the November 2, 2010 elections. The appointment of Herb Allison to review all of the loan guarantees indicates that the President has lost faith in Secretary Chu. I agree with the point of Dan Carol, an Obama campaign senior advisor, who called on the White House to replace Chu earlier this year in an email. Chu has failed the test, and in my personal opinion I agree with Mr. Carol that he should be replaced by the President.”

A Chu fact-check from…WaPo on his jobs claims and solar prices:

We always warn readers to be wary of claims about the number of jobs created by some government, congressional or corporate initiative. These are almost always suspect and based on dubious assumptions. (Chu, we should note, carefully used the word “employ” instead of “create.”)

As it happens, Carol D. Leonnig and Steven Mufson of The Washington Post examined the job-claim figure two months ago and found it wanting. “The program — designed to jump-start the nation’s clean technology industry by giving energy companies access to low-cost, government-backed loans — has directly created 3,545 new, permanent jobs after giving out almost half the allocated amount, according to Energy Department tallies,” they reported on The Post’s front page.

The Energy Department disputed that analysis as “incomplete and inaccurate,” as evidenced by the fact that Chu repeated the claim in sworn testimony before Congress. But if you dig deeper into the 60,000 number, you find that more than half of it comes from a single program — 33,000 jobs at Ford that were supposedly converted to green technology because of a $5.9 billion loan. The Energy Department translated those as “saved” jobs, even though the number amounts to nearly half of Ford’s total workforce.

It’s one of the oldest tricks in the Washington spin book: Lump a bunch of tiny projects with one big project, and then claim all of them — 38 in this case — created a bunch of jobs.

… Chu’s other quote — concerning the unexpected collapse in solar prices — is also open to question. Chu rightly noted that there were some analysts — “outliers,” as he put it — who might have predicted a huge plunge in the solar module market. But he contended that most did not predict prices would drop below $2.

At the same time, however, the shakiness in the market was readily apparent at the time DOE pressed the White House budget office to sign off on the Solyndra loan. Note the Aug. 31, 2009 e-mail below, from an Office of Management and Budget official to a DOE official, asking that an announcement of the loan be postponed.

The e-mail includes links to articles with headlines like “As Prices Slump, Solar Industry Suffers.”

…While Chu said that Wall Street analysts generally were not predicting such a steep price drop, it is clear from the articles mentioned in the e-mail that they were warning that prices would fall further. The Fact Checker once covered Wall Street, and analysts promoting stocks are almost always bullish. When analysts start getting skittish, it’s time to get wary. In fact, one of the articles cited in the e-mail reported that a major investment firm had downgraded the solar energy sector from “positive” to “neutral.”

On Wall Street, that usually translates as “sell.”

“Nothing in the e-mail you cited or the stories it mentions predicted the prices would fall as far as they did,” DOE spokesman LaVera said.

***

Fast and Furious backlash grows: 51 congressmen to Eric Holder: You must resign immediately

Attorney General Eric Holder’s status as the most shameless corruptocrat in the Obama administration has now been RE-confirmed.

Fox News (h/t Christian Adams) reports on the DOJ’s cynical exploitation of Border Patrol agent Brian Terry and his family that will leave you speechless (or using the most profane speech in your vocabulary):

The Terrys watched Holder’s appearance before the Senate Judiciary Committee on Tuesday. Asked if he wanted to apologize to the family, Holder declined, saying only he regretted what happened.

“That shows what kind of a person he is,” Kent lamented. “To me, he is not much of a person. I don’t know if he has a son. But if he lost his, he would think different.”

“I sat in a chair and cried,” Josephine said. “It was so inhumane. An apology to anybody means at least they are trying to fix it. He didn’t.”

… Blasted for his response, Holder did send the Terrys a letter Wednesday saying he was sorry for their loss. The letter was released to the press before the Terrys received it.

Holder doesn’t just need to be fired.

He needs to be prosecuted.

***

Previous this week:

Fast and Furious: Holder “regrets” lies, condemns “distraction,” redistributes the blame; Holder denies receiving F&F memos; NO STRAIGHT APOLOGY TO TERRY FAMILY; Grassley and Cornyn nail Holder: “Are you winging it?”

Your public service reminder: 19 Senate Republicans voted to confirm Eric Holder despite his decades-long record of corruption, incompetence, and sabotage of the rule of law.

Nope, you are not off the hook, AG Eric Holder. Not by a long shot. No way in hell.

GOP Rep. Darrell Issa and Sen. Charles Grassley are back with a new letter demanding more information about the murder of Immigration and Customs Enforcement Agent Jaime Zapata and the tactics used while conducting surveillance on known straw purchasers, a la Operation Fast and Furious.

Issa’s office informs us about the new letter:

“The letter explains the inconsistent statements by the Justice Department regarding Otilio Osorio, his brother Ranferi Osorio, and Kelvin Morrison. The three straw purchasers were known to the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, or ATF, long before one of the guns purchased by the brothers was linked to the murder of Agent Zapata.

To make matters worse, Grassley and Issa wrote in their letter that documents indicate the ATF failed for more than three months to create a Report of Investigation on the November 9 transfer of firearms between the brothers and Morrison and a confidential informant, witnessed by ATF agents. The report was finally written on February 25, 2011—the same day the ATF received the report tracing the Zapata murder weapon back to the purchase by Otilio Osorio.

Grassley and Issa said that documenting investigative steps three months after the fact and only after a trace returned to the murder of a federal agent raises red flags about the nature of ATF’s investigation.”

Here’s the full text:

2011-10-25 DEI Grassley to Holder-DOJ – Zapata ATF Fast and Furious Osorio Brothers Due 11-8

We first mentioned blog reports on a Project GrenadeWalker scandal last month. (See here).

CBS reporter Sharyl Attkisson is out with a new report on grenades crossing the border to Mexico. Government officials shrugged at the breaches because they deemed grenades “novelty items.” Details:

CBS News investigative correspondent Sharyl Attkisson, who has reported on this story from the beginning, said on “The Early Show” that the investigation into the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF)’s so-called “Fast and Furious” operation branches out to a case involving grenades. Sources tell her a suspect was left to traffic and manufacture them for Mexican drug cartels.

Police say Jean Baptiste Kingery, a U.S. citizen, was a veritable grenade machine. He’s accused of smuggling parts for as many as 2,000 grenades into Mexico for killer drug cartels — sometimes under the direct watch of U.S. law enforcement.

Law enforcement sources say Kingery could have been prosecuted in the U.S. twice for violating export control laws, but that, each time, prosecutors in Arizona refused to make a case.

Grenades are weapons-of-choice for the cartels. An attack on Aug. 25 in a Monterrey, Mexico casino killed 53 people.

Sources tell CBS News that, in January 2010, ATF had Kingery under surveillance after he bought about 50 grenade bodies and headed to Mexico. But they say prosecutors wouldn’t agree to make a case. So, as ATF agents looked on, Kingery and the grenade parts crossed the border — and simply disappeared.

Six months later, Kingery allegedly got caught leaving the U.S. for Mexico with 114 disassembled grenades in a tire. One ATF agent told investigators he literally begged prosecutors to keep Kingery in custody this time, fearing he was supplying narco-terrorists, but was again ordered to let Kingery go.

The prosecutors — already the target of controversy for overseeing “Fast and Furious,” wouldn’t comment on the grenades case. U.S. Attorney Dennis Burke recently resigned and his assistant, Emory Hurley, has been transferred. Sources say Hurley is the one who let Kingery go, saying grenade parts are “novelty items” and the case “lacked jury appeal.”

Bruno Mars needs to record a new version of “Grenade”…

Oh, the cynicism of it all.

It reeks.

But I’m not fooled.

Are you?

Via ABC News:

FBI and DEA agents have disrupted a plot to commit a “significant terrorist act in the United States” tied to Iran, federal officials told ABC News today.

The officials said the plot included the assassination of the Saudi Arabian ambassador to the United States, Adel Al-Jubeir, with a bomb and subsequent bomb attacks on the Saudi and Israeli embassies in Washington, D.C. Bombings of the Saudi and Israeli embassies in Buenos Aires, Argentina, were also discussed, according to the U.S. officials.

U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder said in an announcement today that the plan was “conceived, sponsored and was directed from Iran” by a faction of the government and called it a “flagrant” violation of U.S. and international law.

“The U.S. is committed to holding Iran accountable for its actions,” Holder said. He said the White House will be meeting with federal agencies before announcing “further action” in regards to Iran.

Here’s the DOJ press release.

Note the Mexico connection:

The criminal complaint alleges that, from the spring of 2011 to October 2011, Arbabsiar and his Iran-based co-conspirators, including Shakuri of the Qods Force, have been plotting the murder of the Saudi Ambassador to the United States. In furtherance of this conspiracy, Arbabsiar allegedly met on a number of occasions in Mexico with a DEA confidential source (CS-1) who has posed as an associate of a violent international drug trafficking cartel. According to the complaint, Arbabsiar arranged to hire CS-1 and CS-1’s purported accomplices to murder the Ambassador, and Shakuri and other Iran-based co-conspirators were aware of and approved the plan. With Shakuri’s approval, Arbabsiar has allegedly caused approximately $100,000 to be wired into a bank account in the United States as a down payment to CS-1 for the anticipated killing of the Ambassador, which was to take place in the United States.

According to the criminal complaint, the IRCG is an arm of the Iranian military that is composed of a number of branches, one of which is the Qods Force. The Qods Force conducts sensitive covert operations abroad, including terrorist attacks, assassinations and kidnappings, and is believed to sponsor attacks against Coalition Forces in Iraq. In October 2007, the U.S. Treasury Department designated the Qods Force for providing material support to the Taliban and other terrorist organizations.

The complaint alleges that Arbabsiar met with CS-1 in Mexico on May 24, 2011, where Arbabsiar inquired as to CS-1’s knowledge with respect to explosives and explained that he was interested in, among other things, attacking an embassy of Saudi Arabia. In response, CS-1 allegedly indicated that he was knowledgeable with respect to C-4 explosives. In June and July 2011, the complaint alleges, Arbabsiar returned to Mexico and held additional meetings with CS-1, where Arbabsiar explained that his associates in Iran had discussed a number of violent missions for CS-1 and his associates to perform, including the murder of the Ambassador.

At a press conference this afternoon, Holder ducked questions about the Fast and Felonious scandal.

Transcript.

Subpoenas are-a-coming:

Congressional investigators probing the failed anti-gunrunning operation Fast and Furious are sending a new subpoena to Attorney General Eric Holder — seeking communications from about a dozen top Justice Department officials, including Holder; his chief of staff, Gary Grindler; and the head of the department’s criminal division, Lanny Breuer, Fox News has learned.

The subpoena, which could be filed as early as Tuesday, will focus on the Justice Department. The first and only subpoena issued so far dealt with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives. That subpoena was issued back in March.

Congressional investigators probing the failed anti-gunrunning operation Fast and Furious are sending a new subpoena to Attorney General Eric Holder.

In the new subpoena, congressional investigators will apparently demand information regarding the investigation into the death of U.S. Border Patrol agent Brian Terry. Two guns found at Terry’s crime scene were linked to the failed operation that allowed more than 2,000 weapons to “walk.”

The subpoena is expected to ask for correspondence that Justice Department officials had with the White House about the gun trafficking operation, as well as what information was shared by Justice officials in Mexico.

Eric Holder is on the hot seat, and GOP Rep. Darrell Issa’s cranking up the temperature.

Sent this morning:

WASHINGTON, D.C. – House Oversight and Government Reform Committee Chairman Darrell Issa today sent a letter to U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder responding to his letter of October 7. The text of Chairman Issa’s letter to Attorney General Holder is below:

Sincerely,
Darrell Issa
Chairman
House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform

ICYMI over the weekend:

Fast and Furious weapons were found in Mexico cartel enforcer’s home

Reporting from Washington—
High-powered assault weapons illegally purchased under the ATF’s Fast and Furious program in Phoenix ended up in a home belonging to the purported top Sinaloa cartel enforcer in Ciudad Juarez, Mexico, whose organization was terrorizing that city with the worst violence in the Mexican drug wars.

In all, 100 assault weapons acquired under Fast and Furious were transported 350 miles from Phoenix to El Paso, making that West Texas city a central hub for gun traffickers. Forty of the weapons made it across the border and into the arsenal of Jose Antonio Torres Marrufo, a feared cartel leader in Ciudad Juarez, according to federal court records and trace documents from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.

The smugglers’ tactics — quickly moving the weapons far from ATF agents in southern Arizona, where it had been assumed they would circulate — vividly demonstrate that what had been viewed as a local problem was much larger. Six other Fast and Furious guns destined for El Paso were recovered in Columbus, N.M.

Cartoon of the day from ATF Report:

Resignation calls grow:

[Rep. Raul Labrador (R-Idaho)] is not the first Republican to call for Holder’s resignation over Fast and Furious.

Earlier this week, Rep. Blake Farenthold (R-Texas), a member of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, said the “only honorable thing” for Holder to do is resign — though he said he doubted he would.

“There are two options: He was lying or he was not doing his job, keeping up with what the Justice Department was doing,” Farenthold said in an interview on NRA News radio. “I would probably resign if that came out, if I had done that.”

There have been a plethora of calls for Holder to resign since he became attorney general in 2009.

Rep. Allen West (R-Fla.) called for Holder to resign in June over his role in Fast and Furious.

Bachmann joins the calls.

Just a reminder: The 19 Senate Republicans who joined Dems to approve corruptocrat Holder’s nomination in the first place:

Alexander (R-TN)
Bennett (R-UT)
Bond (R-MO)
Chambliss (R-Ga)
Collins (R-ME)
Corker (R-TN)
Graham (R-SC)
Grassley (R-IA)
Gregg (R-NH)
Hatch (R-UT)
Isakson (R-GA)
Kyl (R-AZ)
Lugar (R-IN)
McCain (R-AZ)
Murkowski (R-AK)
Sessions (R-AL)
Snowe (R-ME)
Specter (R-PA)
Voinovich (R-OH)

Here are the 21 Republicans who voted no…and can say “I told you so:”

Barrasso
Brownback
Bunning
Burr
Coburn
Cochran
Cornyn
Crapo DeMint
Ensign
Enzi
Hutchison
Inhofe
Johanns
McConnell
Risch
roberts
Shelby
Thune
Vitter
Wicker

The other night on Hannity, I said we need an “Occupy Justice” campaign to protest the deadly corruption and incompetence that have infested our Justice Department from Day One of the Obama administration (vid here). A friend on Twitter wrote back that what we really need is a “Liberate Justice” movement to free Americans of Eric Holder and Barack Obama’s bloody malfeasance.

House GOP Oversight and Government Reform leaders are keeping up the pressure. They’ve released a new YouTube video to re-cap the week’s fast and felonious developments:

WASHINGTON, DC – The House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform today released a new video asking a simple question: who is accountable for the Obama Justice Department’s failed Operation Fast and Furious? Oversight Committee Watchdogs and Senator Chuck Grassley (R-IA) have pushed Attorney General Eric Holder and the Justice Department for a full accounting of the deadly program, but this investigation has been meet with silence, stonewalling and spin. New documents, however, show that Holder received at least five weekly memos – beginning in July 2010 – that contradict the Attorney General’s May 3, 2011 sworn testimony denying knowledge of Fast and Furious until just weeks before.

“Attorney General Holder and the Justice Department have failed to honestly answer clear and legitimate questions about Operation Fast and Furious,” said Oversight Chairman Darrell Issa (R-CA). “Americans deserve to know the truth.”

Spread the word:

Programming note: Tonight on Hannity, Fox News will update and re-air its Fast and Furious special. Tune in at 9pm Eastern.

***

This week:

A Fast and Felonious question for the president; Update: Obama reiterates “complete confidence” in Holder; Document drop: an avalanche of Holder F&F memos

Scandal Watch: Fast and Furious round-up

***

The American Thinker sheds light on acting inspector general at DOJ Cynthia Schnedar. Whole thing is must-read. Foxes guarding the henhouse.

Since the release of the damaging memos, Justice Department spokespeople have given several spurious reasons to explain Holder’s statements: that he was confused during his testimony, that he thought he was being asked about another investigation, that he doesn’t see every memo that passes his desk. And after calls from Congress for a special counsel, a Justice spokesman attempted to fend off that plan by saying that once Holder had learned of the operation’s “questionable tactics” earlier this year, he then “promptly asked the inspector general to investigate the matter.”

Cynthia A. Schnedar is the acting inspector general, and just this past month, in yet another stunning revelation, it was discovered that she had released secret audio tapes of candid conversations from last March between Hope McAllister, an ATF (Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms) agent in the Phoenix office, and Andre Howard, owner of a Phoenix-area gun shop, who had been authorized by the ATF to sell weapons to known Mexican cartel members in the botched sting operation.

On one of the tapes, they discuss a third Fast and Furious rifle that was found at the scene of the murder of Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry in a remote area of southern Arizona last December. It had been widely reported that only two rifles were found at the scene, but recent reports tell of a cover-up. The third rifle would have led to an FBI informant.

As for the tapes, it was discovered by congressional investigators that Schnedar had inexplicably given a copy to the U.S. attorney’s office in Phoenix before she had even reviewed them. The tapes then ended up being shared with the ATF office there. Both those agencies are among the many entities under investigation in the ever-expanding scandal.

So just who, one may wonder, is Acting Inspector General Cynthia Schnedar?

Until last January, she was deputy inspector general at the Justice Department, having served in that post since June of 2010. When longtime Inspector General Glenn Fine retired from his post in January of this year, Schnedar, as had been expected, was named as acting inspector general on January 29.

…It turns out that Ms. Schnedar has long and close ties to Mr. Holder. According to her biography on the Justice Department website, she became assistant U.S. attorney in Washington, D.C. in 1994. Eric Holder had become the U.S. attorney in Washington the previous year, so he in effect was Schnedar’s boss from 1994 until 1997, when he left to become President Clinton’s deputy attorney general. Holder would become a key player in the scandalous pardons of fugitive billionaire Marc Rich and members of the Puerto Rican nationalist terrorist group known as FALN.

But during Ms. Schnedar’s tenure before Holder had departed, it happened that they had ended up working a number of cases together. According to the LexisNexis website, there were at least fourteen of them, usually at the appellate level. For Holder, it was more than just “in name only”; in some of those cases, they apparently co-filed legal briefs.

In one case, they had represented the ATF. In another, they represented both the ATF and DEA (Drug Enforcement Administration), an agency that has now also been linked to Fast and Furious.

Whenever either Eric Holder or President Obama is pressed on Fast and Furious, both refer to the Justice Department’s internal investigation that happens to be headed by Ms. Schnedar.

…In a recently released letter to Schnedar, Issa and Senator Grassley noted that the investigator’s actions had “undermined and obstructed” their investigation (the Oversight Committee had also obtained copies of the tapes), and they demanded answers concerning her behavior.

After the first tape was made public by CBS News as a result of Schnedar’s actions, her office released a highly dubious explanation: that the U.S. attorney’s office in Phoenix needed them for the pending prosecution of drug traffickers.

There are several questions about Ms. Schnedar that beg to be answered.

First, as she well knew, the U.S. attorney’s office in Phoenix was also a target of the investigation. Both the U.S. attorney and the assistant U.S. attorney have since left because of the scandal.

Second, should Ms. Schnedar have immediately recused herself from the Fast and Furious investigation because of her long and deep ties to Mr. Holder?

Third, when Ms. Schnedar began her employment as assistant U.S. attorney in Washington in 1994, was it Mr. Holder (then the U.S. attorney) who hired her?

Lastly, Federal Election Commission records show that Schnedar donated to the Democratic National Committee in 2005. Does she now think that was proper?

On a related note: I recently contacted Ms. Schnedar to ask those very questions. She angrily told me to call her office. No answers have been forthcoming from either source, including her spokesman, Jay Lerner.