Eric Holder Vows To Protect Voting Rights At La Raza Meeting In Vegas (Decision 2012)

Holder vows fight for civil rights at La Raza meeting

U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder on Saturday told an Hispanic civil rights group that the nation's fight to ensure racial equality, fairness and justice for all "remains far from over" and he vowed to step up prosecution of those who discriminate against Latinos, African-Americans and other minorities.

He thanked the National Council of La Raza for leading the way for decades to protect Latinos and other disenfranchised immigrants and Americans. And he said President Barack Obama's Justice Department would work hard this election year to ensure voters have equal ballot access no matter their heritage or race.

"Our nation's struggle to overcome injustice and eliminate disparities remains far from over," Holder said, speaking to a luncheon audience of 1,850 people on the opening day of the four-day conference in Las Vegas. "We have further to travel on the road to equality."

The nation's first African-American attorney general, Holder was the keynote speaker at the conference of the largest U.S. civil rights organization representing Latinos, a rising political power in Nevada and the nation. In general, Hispanics are a Democratic-leaning voting bloc that could decide the White House race.

President Obama is sending Vice President Joe Biden to address the group on Tuesday, the last day of the conference of 5,000 La Raza members at the Mandalay Bay Convention Center.

Presumptive GOP presidential nominee Mitt Romney sent one of his top Hispanic advisers to the conference. Former U.S. Commerce Secretary Carlos Gutierrez wasn't offered a speaking role, but he greeted people attending a Latino Expo on Saturday as part of the conference.

Holder appeared relaxed, joking it was good to get out of Washington. Two weeks ago, lawmakers voted to hold him in contempt of Congress as Republicans pummel him over a botched government gun-tracking operation nicknamed " Fast and Furious."

"It's particularly nice to be outside of Washington, D.C.," Holder said.

A member of the audience shouted, "We love you!"

"I love you back," Holder said. "It's been an interesting few weeks in Washington."

In his 18-minute speech, Holder said he was pleased the U.S. Supreme Court recently threw out most of an Arizona law to crack down on illegal immigrants in the border state next to Mexico. But Holder said he was disappointed the high court upheld the most controversial part of the law that would allow police to ask for papers proving a person's immigration status if the person is stopped for some other reason.

The "show me your papers" part of the law must be narrowly enforced, the high court said, or it, too, would be open to a separate legal challenge.

The attorney general said the Justice Department would be watching enforcement of the Arizona law carefully, ready to intervene if it is abused and used to indiscriminately stop suspected illegal immigrants.

"Such laws cannot be seen as a license to engage in racial profiling," Holder said to applause.

Holder praised Obama for recently instructing federal authorities not to deport young adult children of undocumented immigrants who grew up in the United States. Instead, the Obama administration will launch a program to let young immigrants apply for two-year work permits.

Holder said the administration would continue to press Congress to pass the DREAM Act, which would provide a path to U.S. citizenship for those young immigrants who attend college or join the U.S. military. Meanwhile, he said there's no reason to waste money and effort to deport them.

Obama's new policy will "make our immigration enforcement effort not only more efficient and cost-effective, but also more just," Holder said. "There's no question this action represents a significant and a long overdue improvement of our immigration policy."

U.S. Rep. Shelley Berkley, D-Nev., addressed the conference lunch ahead of Holder. She, too, praised Obama's actions on immigration and called for passage of the DREAM Act . She also contrasted her views with those of her Republican opponent for U.S. Senate, incumbent Sen. Dean Heller, who doesn't support the DREAM Act and has praised the Arizona law.

"He says he wants to bring it here to Nevada," Berkley said. "Nevada doesn't want the Arizona law. Nevada doesn't need the Arizona law. And Nevada will do just fine without it."

Holder praised Berkley, calling the Democratic supporter of Obama "an extremely effective advocate for the people of Nevada."

"And I think she would make an excellent U.S. senator," he said.

Heller did not attend the La Raza conference. His campaign said he was spending the weekend celebrating his 28th wedding anniversary with his family and campaigning in Reno. Heller is among the Nevada politicians on the conference's honorary host committee, however.

Heller and Romney campaign officials manned booths at the Latino Expo, a free event for Hispanics and other members of the community being held with the conference. Democrats also reached out to the Latino crowd with more than 25,000 people expected to visit the free expo.

In an interview at the expo, Romney's Hispanic adviser, Gutierrez, said Latinos should have a natural affinity for Republicans' conservative policies, including "family, faith and hard work."

Gutierrez criticized Obama for not working on comprehensive immigration reform and only offering Hispanics short-term solutions in an election-year pitch for votes. He said stimulus spending didn't offer long-term job prospects for Americans, including Hispanics who suffer higher rates of unemployment - about 11 percent compared with 8.2 percent overall.

Gutierrez said Obama's offer of two-year work permits for young adult children of immigrants was a "patchwork solution" that didn't solve the long-running undocumented immigrant problem.

The presidential election, Gutierrez said, would come down to who could do a better job at boosting the economy to create jobs and improve the lives of Hispanics and all Americans. He said Romney's business experience makes him more qualified than Obama, a former U.S. senator.

"It's about who can do the job because this country is in trouble," Gutierrez said. "We need the right leadership. This is the biggest CEO job in the world. … It is obvious that we need a change. We need a positive change."

In recent weeks, Romney has been stepping up his outreach to Latinos, particularly in battleground states such as Nevada where they made up about 15 percent of the electorate in the last election. Four years ago, Obama overwhelmingly won Hispanics in Nevada by a ratio of 3 -to-1 over his GOP presidential foe, John McCain, and he remains popular among Latinos.

In June, Romney named dozens of top Republican Hispanics as national and state advisers to his campaign, including Gutierrez and Nevada Gov. Brian Sandoval. Gutierrez was commerce secretary for four years under former President George W. Bush.

Sandoval delivered a videotaped welcome to the La Raza conference.

Lisa Navarrete, an adviser to the president of the La Raza organization, said Romney lost a good chance to address Latinos. She said his Hispanic adviser Gutierrez could only come on Saturday and the conference organizers couldn't fit him into the schedule at the last minute.

"We think it was a missed opportunity," Navarrete said. "Our community doesn't know Governor Romney very well. If he wants to engage the community he has to address the community. For us, we're disappointed."


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Sources: AP, lvrj.com, Youtube, Google Maps

Darrell Issa's Unnecessary Contempt Vote Against Holder May Help Sink Romney's Ship In November!

Fist Bump For Eric Holder! Two Thumbs Down For Darrell Issa!

The same Darrell Issa who once Arrested for Felony Car Theft & who Plead Guilty to a Concealed Weapons Charge is now the SAME member of Congress who wants to hold A.G. Eric Holder in Contempt for some E-mails.

A Judge later Dismissed the Felony Car Theft Charges.

Now Fast forward to the 21st Century.

Congressman Issa where is Your Mercy for Eric Holder?

The same type of Mercy previously extended to you via a Judge when you were charged with Felony Car Theft?

Pres. Obama & Eric Holder are being blamed for a Gun Running Operation started under George Bush's Administration as "Wide Receiver" and later re-named "Fast & Furious" under Obama's Administration.

"Wide Receiver" placed thousands of Guns into the hands of Young, BLACK Men living in America, yet NO One in Congress said a Word!

"Wide Receiver" contributed to Thousands of Young, BLACK, Male Americans losing their lives via BLACK on BLACK Crime, yet NO One in Congress EVER opened their mouths to question George W. Bush on the program.

Pres. Obama used "Fast & Furious" to locate & help Destroy Mexican Drug Cartels, but yet the GOP Members of Congress want to FIRE U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder.

It was NOT Pres. Obama or Eric Holder who Murdered U.S. ATF Agent Brian Terry.

It was a Drug Cartel Leader.

Thus ATF Agent Brian Terry was Killed while in the line of Duty.

YES it was very Unfortunate, however he was Killed while in the line of Duty.

So how can Pres. Obama or Eric Holder be Personally blamed for Terry's Death?

What about the Thousands of BLACK Youth Murdered under George W. Bush's "Wide Receiver" Gun Running Program?

The Mothers of those Young, BLACK Males Murdered with Guns from the "Wide Receiver" Gun Running Operation Cried and Mourned just as ATF Brian Terry's Mother Cried and Mourned his Death at the hands of Mexican Drug Cartel Leaders who possessed Guns from Obama's "Fast & Furious" Gun Running Operation.

Its quite obvious this entire GOP-Sponsored Theater, led by Congressman Darrell Issa is Politically Motivated to Help Mitt Romney.

Instead its turning away Voters, even some GOP Voters.
i.e., its Backfiring!

Pres. Obama is sure to Benefit from this Contempt Vote against Eric Holder and Darrell Issa's Political Career will be Destroyed soon after.

All for the sake of Bitter Partisan Politics.

Thanks Congressman Issa!

Its so Sad!

You could have chosen to use your Congressional Oversight Authority to help Eliminate Medicaid, Medicare Abuse & Fraud, Increase Child Abuse Protection laws, help Eliminate Disability Payment Fraud, Affordable Housing Funding Fraud,

Investigate Widespread Employment Discrimination against Minorities and Women over the age of 40, Food Stamp Fraud, For-Profit School Student Loan Fraud carried out by School Administrators, etc.,

Instead Congressman Issa you chose to Harass America's First BLACK U.S. Attorney General over some E-mails.

E-mails which by the way were already Submitted to Congress Months ago.

This type of foolishness and waste of Taxpayer Money is why Congress currently has a 9% Approval Rating!

Keep Standing Eric Holder!

We have your Back!

GET OUT THE VOTE AND RE-ELECT PRES. OBAMA FOR U.S. PRESIDENT IN 2012!








Why contempt case against Holder may be doomed


For veteran Congress watchers, President Barack Obama's formal claim of executive privilege regarding certain Justice Department documents related to Operation Fast and Furious will generate a sense of déjà vu.

Disputes over legislative access to executive documents occur in almost every presidential administration. Their resolution inevitably entails a set of legal and political considerations that change from episode to episode.

Unfortunately for the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, its legal position is uncertain at best, and almost all political considerations would seem to favor the White House.

Whether or not the full House votes Attorney General Eric Holder in contempt, the likeliest resolution will be an informal settlement in which the Justice Department expands slightly on its current offer of disclosure, the committee narrows the range of documents it is demanding, or both compromise in a mutual, face-saving gesture.

At least, that would be likely in politically "normal" times.

The form of executive privilege at stake in the current dispute is "deliberative privilege."

Deliberative privilege aims to protect documents generated anywhere in the executive branch that embody only the executive's internal deliberations, not final policy decisions.

Deliberative privilege is not a legal absolute.

The executive branch concedes that when another branch of government demands privileged documents within the executive's control, they sometimes have to be turned over.

They have to be turned over when the demanding branch can articulate a compelling need for the information to fulfill one of its own constitutional functions -- a need that outweighs the executive branch's interest in confidentiality.

A key problem now for the House Oversight Committee is thus far it has yet to state in a very concrete way why it needs the particular documents it is demanding.

In contrast, the executive branch has articulated a strong and highly specific reason for withholding the documents at issue: Forced disclosure to Congress of internal deliberations concerning how best to interact with Congress would undermine the executive's capacity to function as a co-equal branch.

It would undermine the prospects for future candid deliberations about interactions with the other institutions of government.

Resolving such a dispute sounds like a matter for the courts, but the judiciary is unlikely to be of much practical help now to the House.

If the House brings a civil action to enforce its subpoena, the matter is unlikely to resolved by the courts before the election or, indeed, before the expiration of the current Congress.

The House could ask the U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia to prosecute Holder for contempt, but the Justice Department long ago took the position -- in a very careful opinion written by then Assistant Attorney General Theodore Olson -- that the department is not required by law to prosecute executive officials for contempt when the ground for subpoena noncompliance is a claim of executive privilege.

So that would leave the House with the one remaining legal option of launching an impeachment investigation, which brings us to the political side of things.

The reality Congress faces in separation of powers disputes, no matter how genuine or how principled, is that the public will almost certainly not rally around Congress if it perceives the dispute as more political food fight than anything else.

With no Democrats supporting the committee vote -- and I am guessing few, if any Democrats supporting a contempt citation by the entire House -- that's just what this will look like.

Moreover, as with Whitewater, it will be hard for House Republicans to explain exactly what the problem is. Fast and Furious appears to have been a disaster, but the Justice Department has shared documents freely on Fast and Furious.

The Justice Department sent a letter to Congress in February 2011 that mistakenly denied reports about what the Bureau of Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives actually did in Fast and Furious.

But the department has been forthcoming in sharing information about the events leading up to that letter, which Holder subsequently withdrew.

The fight, then, is not about a botched ATF operation or about a botched letter to Congress.

It is about how the attorney general reached his eventual conclusion that Fast and Furious was "fundamentally flawed" and decided how to respond to congressional and other requests for information about a program he now concedes should not have happened.

Politically, this now begins to sound like Whitewater -- a story hardly anyone can follow, which really does not seem to implicate fundamental issues of public policy or official integrity.

(One caveat: The dynamics of this dispute could change if it turns out that Republican Committee Chairman Darrell Issa actually has information that the process of responding to Congress after the February 2011 letter entailed specific instances of corruption.

Were he to bring such specific information to the attention of the White House, it would be consistent with past White House practice to release all documents related to that misconduct.)

A prolonged fight over Fast and Furious led by Republicans will do two things their presumptive presidential nominee, Mitt Romney, surely does not want.

It will fill up air space that could otherwise have been spent discussing the economy, and it will intensify the appearance of congressional Republicans as the obstructionists blocking the changes Obama so famously promised.

It also must be said that Issa's past attacks on the administration amply feed a narrative that his subpoena is about politics, not principle.

Having months ago called Obama "one of the most corrupt presidents in modern times" -- in the face of such modern historical escapades as Watergate, Iran-Contra or the Terrorist Surveillance Program -- the chairman is not well-situated to play a Sam Ervin-like role, policing the presidency more in sadness than in angry partisanship.

In short, unless the House has specific information not yet disclosed suggesting the information it seeks is closely linked to the exposure of government malfeasance we have not yet heard about, this fight will end in a standoff or the parties will finally compromise.

To put the matter in yet fuller context, here are some questions and answers about the dispute and the history of executive privilege:

What is executive privilege?

Executive privilege is really an umbrella concept that encompasses a variety of privileges. History's most famous claim of executive privilege -- President Richard Nixon's unsuccessful attempt to withhold the "Watergate tapes" -- was an example of "presidential privacy" privilege.

That privilege covers executive communications when the president is involved.

The executive branch, however, historically claims a much broader privilege, the so-called "deliberative privilege."

Deliberative privilege aims to protect documents generated anywhere in the executive branch that embody only the executive's internal deliberations, not final policy decisions. The current dispute involves "deliberative privilege."

Where does executive privilege come from?

The Supreme Court has held that the authority of the executive branch to withhold certain documents from mandatory disclosure is rooted in the separation of powers.

The court stated, in United States v. Nixon (1974), that the importance of confidentiality to protect "communications between high government officials and those who advise and assist them in the performance of their manifold duties ... is too plain to require further discussion."

It concluded that "the privilege can be said to derive from the supremacy of each branch within its own assigned area of constitutional duties."

In that sense, executive privilege is a form of power that the Constitution never mentions, but which the Supreme Court has found implicit in our constitutional structure. In that respect, it is just like Congress' investigative power, which is also not mentioned in the Constitution.

Why is the president involved in claiming privilege over Justice Department documents?

Withholding documents from Congress is always a sensitive matter, legally and politically. For this reason, presidents have long reserved to themselves the final decision of when and whether to invoke any kind of executive privilege against Congress.

President Ronald Reagan formalized this process in a November 1982, memorandum.

It states: "Historically, good faith negotiations between Congress and the executive branch have minimized the need for invoking executive privilege, and this tradition of accommodation should continue as the primary means of resolving conflicts between the branches.

To ensure that every reasonable accommodation is made to the needs of Congress, executive privilege shall not be invoked without specific presidential authorization."

Why is the White House claiming executive privilege regarding Operation Fast and Furious?

Operation Fast and Furious appears to have been a gravely misbegotten attempt by the ATF to nab drug traffickers in Mexico by allowing lower-level gun traffickers to buy weapons in the United States for the Mexican cartels and then tracing the guns' movement, rather than stopping their export.

One of the guns may have been involved in the December 2010 killing of U.S. Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry.

On February 4, 2011, Assistant Attorney General Ronald Weich wrote a letter to Sen. Chuck Grassley of Iowa, the ranking minority member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, which mischaracterized the operation.

He incorrectly denied that ATF "knowingly allowed the sale of assault weapons to a straw purchaser who then transported them into Mexico."

As a result, the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, chaired by Issa, has been investigating not only the original operation but also the circumstances that led to the erroneous February 4, 2011, letter.

For his part, Holder directed the Justice Department's inspector general to investigate Fast and Furious and publicly denounced the operation in October 2011 as "fundamentally flawed." The Justice Department has released to Congress more than 7,600 pages of documents revealing how Fast and Furious was initiated and carried out.

What the Issa committee is now demanding, and what the White House and Justice Department are withholding, are documents generated after February 4, 2011, relating to how the Justice Department handled its responses to Congress regarding Congress' oversight of Fast and Furious, following the erroneous Weich letter.

In his June 19 letter to the president seeking the invocation of executive privilege, Holder argued that to disclose these documents would " 'significantly impair' the Executive Branch's ability to respond independently and effectively to matters under congressional review."

More specifically, "Congressional oversight of the process by which the executive branch responds to congressional oversight inquiries would create a detrimental dynamic" that would, in turn, "chill the candor ... of executive branch discussions and 'introduce a significantly unfair imbalance to the oversight process.' "

Is the executive privilege claim valid?

United States v. Nixon held that, with the possible exception of documents pertaining to military and state secrets, executive privilege is not absolute but "qualified."
Under a "qualified privilege," documents that are potentially exempt from mandatory disclosure might still have to be released to another branch of government.

This would happen when the institutional needs of the demanding branch to acquire the information in support of its own constitutional functions are weightier than the harms that would follow should the executive branch be forced to disclose it.

Congress typically takes the position that this balancing process always favors Congress, a proposition with which the executive disagrees and for which there is no judicial precedent.

As matters stand, the executive branch has articulated a strong and highly specific reason for withholding the documents at issue: They would shed no light on any policy issue before Congress and would directly intrude on the executive branch's capacity to figure out how to respond to legislative inquiries, consistent with the executive's own independent constitutional role.

To Congress, the Justice Department is saying, in effect: You can ask us questions, you can judge our answers, but you cannot eavesdrop on the process by which we formulate our answers.

For its part, Issa's committee has not made clear in any concrete terms why it needs the documents it is demanding.

It has not, for example, made a prima facie case of criminal wrongdoing in the Justice Department's post-February 11, 2011, actions, on which the documents now demanded would shed some light.

As long as the dispute remains in this posture, the Justice Department's claim falls well within the executive branch's longstanding interpretation of its prerogatives under the separation of powers.




House Investigator Issa Has Faced Allegations As Well

The man driving the investigation into the General Services Administration, California Republican Rep. Darrell Issa, took the top seat on the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee after the GOP won a majority in 2010.

Issa has led several splashy investigations since. But he's also been dogged by allegations of his own.

Issa has made news in recent months by threatening to subpoena Attorney General Eric Holder, and by calling a panel of only men to talk about women's contraception.

The Car Alarm Voice

Issa made his fortune building and selling Viper car alarms. He is the wealthiest member of Congress, worth as much as $450 million. In fact, it's Issa's voice on the popular alarm's signature warning to would-be thieves: "Protected by Viper. Stand back."

What's less well known is how Issa got into car alarms in the first place.

"For years I used to tell everyone that I went into it because my brother was a car thief. Then they found out when I ran for office my brother did spend time in prison as a car thief, and it ruined the whole joke I'd had for 20 years in business," Issa said during an interview with WhoRunsGov.

Issa himself was accused several times of auto theft. In the early 1970s, he and his brother were arrested after police suspected them of stealing a Maserati sports car from a dealership in Cleveland. Issa says the police mistook his identity, and the charges were later dismissed.

Another time, Issa was arrested and eventually pleaded guilty to carrying a concealed weapon. Police found a handgun and a tear-gas gun — plus ammunition for both — in Issa's glove compartment.

Questions In The Past

These stories first arose when Issa ran for the Senate in 1998. An investigative reporter named Lance Williams was looking into the then-candidate's biography.

"He had been a soldier, and he claimed that he was part of an elite bomb detecting unit that guarded President Nixon at the 1971 World Series," said Williams.

Williams called up the Nixon Presidential Library, and was told that Nixon hadn't gone to any World Series games that year. Then Williams looked into Issa's purportedly stellar career in the Army.

"The biography that he was providing the press in the context of his campaign was all wrong. He had a bad conduct rating. He was demoted, and a fellow soldier accused him of stealing his car," said Williams.

Issa eventually took over the company that built car alarms.

Ryan Lizza, a reporter for The New Yorker magazine, detailed Issa's early business moves in a 2011 story.

The Fire

Issa had a warehouse full of electronics that, one night in 1982, caught fire. Investigators later found "suspicious burn patterns," Lizza reported, and found that Issa had done some odd things.

A co-worker claimed that before the fire, Issa had put important electronic prototypes in a fireproof box, and that he'd removed the business's computer and financial files from the building. Investigators also found that less than three weeks before the blaze, Issa had increased the company's fire insurance from $100,000 to more than $400,000.

"So you add the more than quadrupling of the insurance along with the taking the computer and putting the other stuff in a fireproof box, and you can see why both the arson investigators and the insurance investigators pointed a finger, you know, at Issa after this fire," said Lizza.

Issa said he had nothing to do with the fire, but the insurance company refused to pay the claim. The two later settled out of court.

It was in part because of these allegations that Issa lost his Senate bid in 1998. He went on to win his House seat, he worked to recall the governor of California, and now he chairs the powerful House Oversight and Government Reform Committee.

Issa would not talk to NPR about this, but he has told several news outlets over the years that he's surprised the allegations from his past continue to dog him.


Sources: CBS News, CNN, NPR, The Blaze, Youtube

Holder vs Issa: Will Releasing "Fast & Furious" Docs Save Holder's Job? (Stop & Frisk)

As it relates to the "Fast & Furious" Feud between Congressman Darrell Issa & U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder, my advice to Eric Holder is this:

Please DON'T Allow Congress To Pressure You Into RESIGNING!

Just Give Congressman Darrell Issa what he's seeking (those "Fast & Furious" Documents), maintain your Professional posture and Keep STANDING STRONG!

We Got You!

Now how about using the U.S. Dept of Justice's Authority to clamp down on NYPD's Racist "Stop & Frisk" Program?




Darrell Issa And Eric Holder Meeting Over Operation Fast And Furious


A Republican House committee chairman said Tuesday he is prepared to follow through on a contempt vote against Attorney General Eric Holder unless the Justice Department provides Congress with documents on a flawed gun-smuggling probe.

The likelihood of a contempt vote on Wednesday rose after Rep. Darrell Issa, R-Calif., and Holder failed to reach agreement in a 20-minute meeting at the Capitol.

"If we receive no documents, we'll go forward," Issa told reporters.

Holder told reporters he would not turn over documents on the gun-smuggling probe called Operation Fast and Furious unless Issa agreed to another meeting.

The attorney general said he would explain what is in the materials at that time. Holder wants an assurance from Issa that the transfer of the records would satisfy a subpoena from the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee that Issa chairs.

"We have offered to make materials available, documents available ... to brief on those documents, to answer any questions that might come up with regard to the documents that we produced," the attorney general said.

"The ball's in their court," Holder said. "We made what we thought was an extraordinary offer."

Issa took a different view: "After this meeting I cannot say that I am optimistic" for avoiding a contempt vote, he said.

Issa spokesman Frederick Hill said that at the meeting, "The attorney general indicated he would only be willing to produce a subset of documents that numbered fewer than 1,300 pages if the committee would first agree that the production of these documents would end the committee's investigation of the Justice Department."

Issa declined the offer.

Holder said he is prepared to turn over material detailing how the department arrived at the conclusion that federal agents engaged in a risky tactic called gun-walking. It resulted in hundreds of weapons purchased at gun shops in Arizona ending up in Mexico, many of them at crime scenes. Initially, the department denied that gun-walking had taken place.

"It's a whole variety of material, and it's consistent with what we have already made available – emails, documents of that nature – that really go into the way in which the department handled itself from February of 2011 until December of 2011," Holder said.

The material "pretty clearly demonstrates that there was no intention to mislead, to deceive," Holder said.

Relying on the gun-walking tactic, federal agents from the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives abandoned their usual practice of intercepting all weapons they believed to be illicitly purchased. Instead, the goal of gun-walking was to track such weapons to high-level arms traffickers, who had long eluded prosecution, and to dismantle their networks.

Gun-walking has long been barred by Justice Department policy, but federal agents in Arizona experimented with it in at least two investigations during the George W. Bush administration before Fast and Furious.

These experiments came as the department was under widespread criticism that the old policy of arresting every suspected low-level straw purchaser was still allowing tens of thousands of guns to reach Mexico. A straw purchaser is an illicit buyer of guns for others.

The agents in Arizona lost track of many of the weapons in Operation Fast and Furious. Two of the guns that "walked" in the operation were found at the scene of the slaying of U.S. border agent Brian Terry.

Issa's committee has been investigating Fast and Furious for the past year and a half. Holder says the Justice Department has already turned over 7,600 pages of documents.

Issa said he was willing to postpone Wednesday's contempt vote if the attorney general first provided the documents the panel still seeks.

In addition to Holder and Issa, the participants in the meeting were Deputy Attorney General James Cole; Senate Judiciary Committee chairman Patrick Leahy, D-Vt.; Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, the ranking Republican on the Senate Judiciary Committee, and Rep. Elijah Cummings of Maryland, the ranking Democrat on Issa's committee.


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Sources: AP, AOL, CNN, Huffington Post, MSNBC, Politico, Youtube, Google Maps

Issa vs Holder: Its About Jobs Issa NOT Contempt Of Court Dude! Where Are The Jobs??

Congressman Darrell Issa's push to hold AG Eric Holder in Contempt will actually hurt the GOP. It will be viewed as Petty by Voters.
Right now Most Voters don't really care about Issa's beef with Holder. We are ONLY focused on JOBS! Where are the Jobs?
Picking a Fight with Holder will be seen by many Voters including GOP Voters, as Vindictive and a Blatant waste of Taxpayer Money!
So Here's a final word for Congressman Darrell Issa: Keep beating that "Fast & Furious" Drum and see where it gets the GOP in November.
Congressman Issa: Sir where are the Jobs?? Does "Fast & Furious" have anything to do with JOBS??? I didn't think so!



Issa Complains Holder Is ‘Not A Good Witness’

House Oversight Committee Chairman Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA) in a House hearing on Thursday pressed Attorney General Eric Holder about the Justice Department’s response to a subpoena requesting information on the botched ATF operation known as “Fast and Furious.”

Issa said Holder was “not a good witness” and he was unsatisfied with Holder’s answer about whether DOJ had internally pulled material responsive to the subpoena. Issa said there was “hostility” between Holder and himself but Holder said he disagreed.

“With all due respect to Chairman Issa, he says there’s hostility between us, I don’t feel that, you know, I understand he’s asking questions, I’m trying to answer them as best I can. I’m not feeling hostile at all. I’m pretty calm. I’m okay,” Holder said.

Issa has threatened to pursue a contempt resolution against Holder but aides to House Speaker John Boehner (R) have been in discussions with the Justice Department in an attempt to resolve the matter without having House Republicans pursue contempt in an election year.

Fast and Furious was an operation in which agents with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) instructed gun dealers to sell weapons to individuals they suspected were “straw purchasers” for Mexican drug cartels. Two of the weapons were found at the scene of Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry’s death. Holder has said he wasn’t aware that guns walked during Fast and Furious until reports became public in early 2011. The Justice Department has said the pursuit of contempt is “unwarranted,” “unprecedented” and “ill-advised.”


Sources: Politico, TPM

Obama & Bush Investigated On Stimulus, Health Care & Countrywide Deals??

Soon-To-Be GOP chairman Darrell Issa: "Obama Must Answer Several Hundred Inquiries

The House Republican set to lead an important committee that will have jurisdiction over many government operations said Wednesday that he expects the White House to respond to "several hundred" letters.

As chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, Darrell Issa (R-CA) will wield Subpoena power, but in an interview with MSNBC, he wouldn't say exactly how he would use it.

"I don't have any Subpoenas to the White House," Issa said. "I have several hundred letters, most of which have not been responded to that I'll ask the White House to dust off and answer our questions. Some of them are obsolete but most of them are still important."

"Undoubtedly, there will be mistakes made by the president. I have been a critic of how they score jobs created or saved under the Stimulus but at the same time I want to start working with this administration to make things work better," Issa continued.

"I will be asking the president to give Subpoena authority to all 74 inspector generals. I'll offer a bill this coming or two weeks from now to do just that because I think it's the government employees, the I.G.s that are so important that they do their job so this administration can be better and I look forward to strengthening those internal controls," he said.

But it's not just Obama that will be under the microscope. Issa expects his investigations to go back to the Bush administration.

"A lot of chairmen in your position of the other party have used the position to annoy and harass and, frankly, score political points on the president," noted MSNBC's Savannah Guthrie. "Will you resolve not to do that and what's your internal gut check? Will you ask yourself before you conduct an investigation, 'Would I be doing this if this were a president of my own party?'" she asked.

"I'm going to be investigating a president of my own party because many of the issues we're working on began on President Bush or even before and haven't been solved," replied Issa.

"Certainly, when we look at the failures of Freddie and Fannie, the Countrywide scandal, those all began during President Bush's time. When we look at the ultimate failure in the Gulf, that began years before," he said.

In a Wednesday morning conference call, Issa said that his main goal was not to destroy the Obama administration.

"I want to prove the pundits wrong. My job is not to bring down the president. My job is to make the president a success," Issa told reporters.

Rep. Lamar Smith (R-TX) is set to be Chairman of the Judiciary Committee and he has been more specific about where he will begin investigating the Obama administration.

Talking Points Memo's Ryan J. Reilly and Johanna Barr made predictions Wednesday about where Issa and Smith will begin their investigations.

In a column for Fox News, Smith hinted that he may investigate the Justice Department because they dropped a voter intimidation case against the New Black Panther Party.

Smith and Issa have called for an investigation to an alleged job offer made by the White House to Rep. Joe Sestak in exchange for his dropping out of the Senate race in Pennsylvania.

Issa's spokesman has also indicated that he may be looking into the organization that was once known as ACORN.

As Issa told MSNBC Wednesday, the BP oil spill is another investigation that will be on his plate.

"And it's been suggested that Issa has a leg to stand on when it comes to this issue," noted Talking Points Memo. "He has blown the whistle on the Interior Department's Minerals Management Service in recent years, an agency whose lax regulation may have helped contribute to the spill."


Sources: Eyeblast TV, MSNBC, Newsbusters, NY Times, Pajamas Media, Politico, Raw Story, Washington Post

Rep. Issa Says Obama Is Hiding HAMP Failures, Calls It A Hoax

The HAMP Hoax: How the Obama Administration is Hiding the Failures of a Disastrous Program



The centerpiece of the Obama administration's foreclosure mitigation policies is failing. Republicans and Democrats in Congress both readily acknowledge the effort, called the Home Affordable Modification Program (HAMP), is a boondoggle of a government program. The only entity that won't face the facts is the Department of the Treasury, which runs the program and has been desperate to hide the program's poor performance.

HAMP modifications start with a three-month trial, then -- if the program's one-size-fits-all conditions are met -- become permanent. The problem for Treasury is that more than two-thirds of homeowners in the program never make it into permanent modifications. Treasury initially promised that HAMP would "reach up to 3 to 4 million at-risk homeowners" and reduce their monthly payments to "sustainable" levels. But the most recent progress report, released last week, shows only 170,207 permanent modifications. At best, that's six percent of Treasury's goal.

By anyone's standard, a six percent success rate is a pathetic result, and only underscores that the reality of HAMP is far from the promise.

But instead of fixing its program, Treasury is trying to move the goal posts -- by counting the program's 1.3 million offers of temporary modifications as an indicator of success. At last month's hearing before our Committee, the head of Treasury's Homeownership Preservation Office, Phyllis Caldwell told skeptical members of Congress that "the program was designed to offer three to four [million] homeowners an opportunity for a mortgage modification - not a permanent modification, an opportunity."

Treasury's revisionism makes little sense, except as cover for another massively expensive, failing government program. It's clear that the initial promise of 3 to 4 million "sustainable" mortgage modifications was referring to permanent, not temporary, fixes -- to suggest otherwise is an assault on common sense and insults every American facing foreclosure and seeking permanent relief through this program. To pretend that temporary modifications count toward HAMP's target number glosses over the costly toll exacted on those who find false hope in the promise of HAMP.

These cash-strapped homeowners are sending mortgage payments to banks in a desperate effort to avoid foreclosure -- believing that temporary assistance will lead to permanent mortgage modifications to keep them in their homes. The sad fact is that the HAMP mortgage modification plan, in most cases, won't ultimately grant them the permanent modification enrollees believe they're on track to receive. This only delays foreclosure -- but doesn't prevent it -- and these homeowners wind up wasting their mortgage payments. It's cynical for Treasury to log progress toward its goal of preventing "3 to 4 million" foreclosures by counting homeowners who might actually be worse off, thanks to HAMP.

As a program, HAMP has chronically underperformed in almost every metric. The facts are clear, even if Treasury's report is not. The Obama administration needs to focus on helping families find ways to weather troubled times and stay in homes they can afford instead of finding ways to mask the program's failure.


Sources: Huffington Post, C-Span, Youtube

Congress Probes Obama's Failed HAMP Foreclosure Relief Program

Foreclosure Relief Plan Still Coming Up Short


The government’s foreclosure relief program just isn’t working.

That was the assessment Thursday of two reports from government watchdogs and a panel of witnesses at a congressional hearing trying to find out why the Obama administration is falling far short of its goal of preventing millions of Americans from losing their homes.

Treasury officials at the hearing acknowledged problems in the year-old mortgage-modification program and announced changes designed to address issues that have limited its effectiveness. Only 170,000 homeowners have completed the process to get their monthly payments reduced out of 1.1 million who began it over the past year.

A failure of the government's latest effort to stem the tide of foreclosures would threaten more than the roughly 8 million homeowners at risk of losing their homes in the next two years, according to John Taylor, president of the National Community Reinvestment Coalition.

"If we have another 8 million homes to go into foreclosure it will have a devastating effect on our economy, and job losses will continue to rise," Taylor told the House Committee of Government Oversight and Reform.

Three years after the housing bubble burst, the number of homeowners falling behind on their mortgages continues to rise. A separate report Thursday from U.S. banking regulators showed that the number of seriously delinquent mortgages jumped in the fourth quarter, led by a sharp increase among the most creditworthy borrowers. Some 13.6 percent of all homeowners with mortgages — more than one in seven — are behind in their payments, according to the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency. It was the seventh consecutive quarterly rise.

A Treasury official at Thursday's hearing acknowledged that the government's Home Affordable Modification Program had encountered a series of unforeseen roadblocks. But he also announced changes designed to speed the modification of loans to more affordable terms.

“We've been learning as we went along,” said Assistant Treasury Secretary Herbert Allison Jr. “We want to continue to improve this program."

The HAMP program is designed to head off foreclosures by lowering borrowers' monthly payments through a series of voluntary concessions from lenders. Guidelines call for cutting mortgage rates to as little as 2 percent for five years, with the difference subsidized by the government, and extending the loan’s term to 40 years. More than 100 lenders have agreed to follow the guidelines, but the decision to modify an individual loan is entirely up to the lender or investors holding the mortgage.

The program has been riddled with problems from the beginning, drawing fire from homeowners, housing counselors, consumer advocates and attorneys working with borrowers. Many report long wait times getting through to lenders, multiple requests for paperwork, lost documents and little or no explanation when applications are denied.



The Treasury also said it will make changes in response to one of the most frustrating complaints. In many cases, lenders are moving to foreclose on a property — even after homeowners get approved for loan modification.

"The new guidelines will make clear that if the homeowner enters into a fully verified modification plan, all pending foreclosure actions must be stopped," Allison told the congressional panel.

But such changes have been a major source of "confusion and delay," according to a report from Neil Barofsky, the special inspector general for the Troubled Asset Relief Program, who testified Thursday. He criticized the Treasury for not setting clear targets for how many homeowners are expected to get help under the $75 billion program.

"We believe it is unacceptable that one year into the program Treasury has yet to identify its goals," he said.

The program also has yet to tackle the issue of millions of homeowners who have second mortgages that must also be modified to make their first mortgage affordable. A year into the program, those guidelines still have not been established, according to Gene Dodaro, acting comptroller general of the Government Accountability Office, which issued a report Thursday critical of HAMP.

"A lot of program details aren’t very clear yet,” Dodaro told the panel. “Until the details are established (mortgage) servicers are going to be reluctant, understandably, to sign up for the program.”

Housing counselors and attorneys say those servicers — companies that handle mortgage payments on behalf of lenders — have been slow to add enough staff to cope with the flood of calls and mail from distressed homeowners. Allison acknowledged the bottleneck.

“I’m not cutting them any slack but they’ve had to get up to speed and they’ve had teething problems along the way,” he said. “All of us know we have more to do, and they have more to do.”

Members of the panel told of constituents who have faced numerous hurdles trying to get their mortgages modified. Reps. William Lacy Clay, D-Mo., and Diane Watson, D-Calif., expressed concerns about what they said was a disproportionately higher foreclosure rate for African-Americans than for whites.

“We have a dual system of mortgage finance in this country — one for whites and one for blacks,” Taylor said. “Black and brown communities were targeted by subprime lenders after banks had closed their branches in those.”

Allison said the current disparity in foreclosure rates between blacks and whites is a reflection of “widespread predatory lending practices during the the mid-part of the decade.”

“The damage already exists," he said. "And we want to make sure that in our program there is no discrimination as people are considered for modifications."

Pressed for details about what measures are being taken, Allison said the Treasury is collecting data on the modification program and will “confront servicers" if they are discriminating against homeowners.

Despite the changes, Dodaro told the panel Congress should “explore some other alternatives.” But it will also have to consider how to continue to work with families who have already signed up with the HAMP program.

“You have 800,000 people in trial modifications that have to be dealt with equitably," Dodaro said.

But members of the the panel also noted the risk of continuing to promote a program that is falling short of its goals.

“We are ourselves setting up for failure,” said Rep. Jackie Speier, D-Calif. “The program doesn’t work.”


Sources: C-Span, MSNBC

Damage To Toyota's Image Permanent, Electronics The Problem

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Tough Hearings Leave Dents In Toyota’s Image


It can take decades to build a reputation and just months to watch it collapse. Just ask Toyota President Akio Toyoda, who found himself sitting in the hot seat Wednesday, facing skeptical members of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee.

Barely a year ago, when the executive was appointed to run the company his grandfather founded, the Japanese automotive giant seemed to be on top of the world. True, it was running a rare loss, losing more than $4 billion in its latest fiscal year, but it had just nudged past its long-time archrival, General Motors, to become the world’s largest automaker.

The cornerstones of that growth were safety, quality and reliability. In the United States, Toyota’s largest market, the maker also scored points with its aggressive expansion of facilities. With billions invested in North American assembly, design and engineering operations that employ tens of thousands, Toyota has taken pains to promote itself as much an American company as its competitors in Detroit.

But the hearings on Capitol Hill have torn asunder Toyota’s carefully cultivated image, leaving observers to wonder whether it was ever more than a Potemkin village.

In prepared remarks, CEO Toyoda, 53, conceded to the committee, "We pursued growth over the speed at which we were able to develop our people and our organization," adding that, "I regret that this has resulted in the safety issues described in the recalls we face today, and I am deeply sorry for any accidents that Toyota drivers have experienced."

The humble tone is one that both Toyoda and Toyota have sounded repeatedly in recent months, starting with last October’s recall of 3.8 million cars, crossovers and trucks for problems with “carpet entrapment.” Things got worse in January, when millions more vehicles were recalled due to potentially sticky accelerators. In recent weeks the situation has spun seemingly out of control, with still more recalls and investigations launched for matters ranging from faulty steering to intermittent brakes.

Toyota has tried to balance its corporate mea culpa with pledges — aired on TV and in full-page newspaper ads — aimed at convincing consumers it has the situation under control. Yes, there are problems, but Toyota officials know how to fix them.

But that spin lost momentum in two tough days of testimony on Capitol Hill.

Members of Congress initially were polite, praising Toyoda for agreeing to step into a lion's den. But he and a top deputy drew heavy fire from both Democrats and Republicans for the company's slowness in dealing with safety defects in its vehicles.

"I sincerely regret that some people actually encountered accidents in their vehicles," said Toyoda, who gave his opening remarks in heavily accented English but chose to respond to questions in Japanese with a translator.

Toyoda pledged his company would change the way it handles consumer complaints, including seeking greater input from drivers and outside safety experts when considering recalls. Toyota managers will also drive cars under investigation to experience potential problems first hand, he said.

A previous hearing Tuesday before a House Energy and Commerce panel did not go well for the company.

Jim Lentz, Toyota’s top U.S. executive, declared he was confident “the solutions we have developed are both effective and durable.” He went on to dismiss critics who contend faulty electronic control systems might be at the root of some problems on Toyota vehicles.

Both assertions now seem questionable. In his testimony Lentz eventually conceded that as many as 70 percent of the complaints over so-called “unintended acceleration” are not necessarily covered by the two related recalls now under way.

(Other Toyota officials have separately confirmed that the recall for faulty brakes on the 2010 Prius may be only a partial solution since it now appears there is a similar issue with earlier versions of the high-profile hybrid.)

Making matters worse, lawmakers heard testimony from David W. Gilbert, a professor of automotive technology at Southern Illinois University, who countered Toyota’s long-standing assertion that its electronics are well-designed and well-tested. Gilbert said testing showed that Toyota's electronic throttle control could malfunction which, in turn, could lead to unintended acceleration.

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At least one member of the panel raised questions about the testing because it was partly funded by attorneys who are involved in litigation against Toyota.

By the end of the first day of hearings, Lentz’s own confidence in Toyota’s ability to identify and fix the problems with its vehicles seemed to have been shaken, as seen in this exchange between Lentz and Rep. Henry Waxman, D-Calif:

WAXMAN: Do you believe that the recall on the ... carpet changes and the recall on the sticky pedal will solve the problem of sudden, unintended acceleration?

LENTZ: Not totally.

WAXMAN: OK, what do you need to do?

LENTZ: We need to continue to be vigilant and continue to investigate all of the complaints that we get from consumers, that we have done a relatively poor job of doing in the past.

Lentz also said he was "embarrassed" to hear testimony from a driver who said her nearly new Lexus ES350 suddenly accelerated up to 100 mph in 2006 before she was able to bring it under control.

One can only wonder where that leaves the millions of people driving Camry sedans, Tundra pickups and Prius hybrids.

Perhaps feeling a bit snookered by a well-oiled machine that made plenty of promises during the good times but which now appears to be imploding. Consider the way Toyota has been billing itself as an “American” company, in recent years, devoting a fair chunk of its marketing budget to talk about its U.S. plants and people. The problem is that the company has been exposed as more of a modern-day trading post, doing business with the native population.

The hearings have revealed that virtually all key decisions, other than how to market and sell Toyota products, are made in Japan. The flow of information, particularly on safety matters, is one-way, from the California headquarters of Toyota Motor Sales, U.S.A., to corporate headquarters in Japan.

Lentz conceded that his corporate superiors didn’t share information about global recalls with him — or, for that matter, with the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. And that leaves the door open to potentially serious problems.

The automaker has received a subpoena from U.S. District Court, which has empowered a grand jury criminal investigation, along with another subpoena from the Securities and Exchange Commission, which is looking into possible disclosure issues and securities fraud.

While most of the action this week is taking place on Capitol Hill, the problems for Toyota seem to be coming from every angle. A new report, released Wednesday, provides still more reason for concern. The 2010 Customer Service Index, compiled by quality gurus J.D. Power and Associates, notes that the Toyota brand ranked well below average in terms of how its dealers handle customers.

With those dealers reportedly racing to fix as many as 50,000 recalled vehicles daily, that could be a significant source of friction. For some nervous motorists, it will take weeks to get a service appointment scheduled. To drive away angry — and uncertain the fix will work — is not a recipe for renewed loyalty.

If Toyoda truly believes that the company his grandfather founded has grown too fast for itself, he may have that problem solved for him. Toyota owners are, in fact, among the industry’s most loyal, but the steady drumbeat of bad news, compounded by lingering concerns about the safety of its vehicles, will likely stall the company’s momentum. Whether it can ever rebuild its tattered image and regain the trust of the public can’t be answered after two days of testimony.


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Sources: MSNBC, Toyota, Google Maps