As a student of history, I’ve always wondered what must have gone through Richard Nixon’s mind when he was ordered to turn over the secret recordings that blew the covers of Watergate in 1974.
What degree of consternation must he have felt when the court order for those tapes sealed his doom?
For that matter, what was going through Bill Clinton’s mind when “I did not have sexual relations with that woman, Ms. Lewinsky” no longer sufficed? I’ve wondered what he must have thought when the game was uncovered, and he knew he was going to have to come clean (for a change).
Now, with the rapidity of events surrounding the investigation of “Fast and Furious,” and the extremes to which the current administration seems willing to go in order to cover its tracks, I’m actually wondering what’s going through President Obama’s mind right now?
And what is Eric Holder thinking?
In my opinion, with every release of new documents in the Fast and Furious investigation and every discovery of new aspects of the cover-ups related to the operation, Obama and Holder are inching closer to the days when they’ll be forced to admit their roles in a scandal that dwarfs Watergate and makes the crimes for which Clinton was impeached seem like misdemeanors.
For example, in the past few days alone it has been verified beyond a shadow of doubt that the White House received and maintained detailed knowledge of Fast and Furious via regular updates between ATF Supervisor William Newell and White House Official Keith O’Reilly. This explains why when Obama said neither he nor Holder authorized Fast and Furious (in March 2011), he quickly qualified the statement by adding that “[But] this is a pretty big government, the United States Government, I’ve got a lot of moving parts.” (In other words, he covered his butt just in case a connection between people like Newell and O’Reilly was discovered.)
And of course, as I wrote last week for Big Government, the secret recorders have already put Holder in a bind by showing that his May 3rd testimony to Congressman Issa was not accurate. In that testimony Holder made claims that indicated he learned of Fast and Furious some time in April, but on the secret recordings it was clear he had thorough knowledge with the operation and the people involved in the operation by mid-March at the latest.
For the record, Holder’s search for a scapegoat has now grown so desperate that he’s thinking about abolishing the ATF all together. (But such a move is a non-starter, because everyone knows Fast and Furious was a top down operation and that the ATF agents on the street were themselves victims of this ludicrous crime.)
Yet, for anyone who still isn’t convinced of the magnitude of this lawless operation, and the subsequent need to prosecute those involved to the fullest extent of the law, documents released last week contained a diagram that shows the areas of Mexico that were blanketed with the illegal guns of Fast and Furious.
As you look at the chart, keep one thing in mind – the White House knew about this, the Department of Justice knew about this, and of course the ATF knew as well:
COMMENTS
Please let us know if you're having issues with commenting.