This also shouldn't fly under the (political) radar

[earendel]

Here, a DOJ-sponsered operation actually killed people and.....crickets.

Just how many crickets were killed?

[silverscreenselect]

All the frickin companies that have had to let go people in the past three years are greedy and inept in your stupid opinion?

Flock, as long as people like you and the tea partiers continue to believe that everything would be just fine in this country if it wasn't for the government and various worthless handout-consuming lowlifes, then corporate profits and executive pay packages will continue to go up, while unemployment also goes up and the standard of living for the vast majority of people in this country goes down.

For the vast majority of companies, your management is not looking out for you. You are an expense item, the same as the power bill and the chicken feed they buy. Any way they can find to reduce expenses while maintaining a semblance of quality they will do.

While all the companies that let people go aren't greedy or inept, a heck of a lot of them are; otherwise, those worthless mortgage securities wouldn't have been passed around as if they were gold bullion. And the people who made money by peddling those worthless securities or got huge bonuses by inflating corporate profits as a result of those worthless securities still have their money. That's because our economic system today rewards short term profit at the expense of long term prudence or profitability.

Do you think that if the executives at your company were actually in a position where their lives or careers would be ruined if they screwed up (rather than just having to accept a slightly smaller bonus package for the year), that they would have spent a bit more time thinking about the consequences of their actions? If you and I screw up, we can go bankrupt. Even if we don't screw up but we have the misfortune to be working for someone who screw up, we can go bankrupt. They can't, because they have used people like you to manipulate the system to reward them extravagently for good short term results while allowing them to avoid most liability for short or long term failures.

[Flybrick]

What do you mean "people like you?"



I believe it was such language that got one radio shock jock fired for racism.

What are you saying, sss?

Perhaps you are racist as well?

[flockofseagulls104]

All the frickin companies that have had to let go people in the past three years are greedy and inept in your stupid opinion?

Flock, as long as people like you and the tea partiers continue to believe that everything would be just fine in this country if it wasn't for the government and various worthless handout-consuming lowlifes, then corporate profits and executive pay packages will continue to go up, while unemployment also goes up and the standard of living for the vast majority of people in this country goes down.

For the vast majority of companies, your management is not looking out for you. You are an expense item, the same as the power bill and the chicken feed they buy. Any way they can find to reduce expenses while maintaining a semblance of quality they will do.

While all the companies that let people go aren't greedy or inept, a heck of a lot of them are; otherwise, those worthless mortgage securities wouldn't have been passed around as if they were gold bullion. And the people who made money by peddling those worthless securities or got huge bonuses by inflating corporate profits as a result of those worthless securities still have their money. That's because our economic system today rewards short term profit at the expense of long term prudence or profitability.

Do you think that if the executives at your company were actually in a position where their lives or careers would be ruined if they screwed up (rather than just having to accept a slightly smaller bonus package for the year), that they would have spent a bit more time thinking about the consequences of their actions? If you and I screw up, we can go bankrupt. Even if we don't screw up but we have the misfortune to be working for someone who screw up, we can go bankrupt. They can't, because they have used people like you to manipulate the system to reward them extravagently for good short term results while allowing them to avoid most liability for short or long term failures.

What you are looking for has been tried in the USSR. Your above diatribe is pure Marx put in today's english. I am hoping that you are just trying to goad me, and that you really don't believe what you are writing. If you really do believe that, you have my pity.

[silverscreenselect]

What you are looking for has been tried in the USSR. Your above diatribe is pure Marx put in today's english.

I wasn't aware that the USSR was big on oversight and accountability.

What you advocate goes on every day in a large number of third world countries. Businesses run things the way they want with minimal government interference and the workers "prosper" as a result of all the wonderful things that trickle down to them.

[ne1410s]

It seems to me that the teabaggers objective is to turn the USA into Mexico. So far, so good.

[Beebs52]

It seems to me that the teabaggers objective is to turn the USA into Mexico. So far, so good.

Even most progressives have stopped using the term "teabaggers" Tennisguy. Anachronism much?

And, I am not a member of a Tea Party group. The local groups are conglomerations of people, some who are normal trying to shake the status quo up, but many who are like you and SSS who feel the local government, us, are hiding dead bodies in our desk drawers and refusing to produce accounting records to the public. Which, believe it or not, we don't do. I'm not a fan of another group trying to assert some imaginary power no different from the pols that be. So, you may want to rethink the "barb" that is teabagger.

[Jeemie]

The only time it might have been said to "work" was when john F. Kennedy did it.

And of course the massive amounts of spending Johnson started under the Great Society and Vietnam had nothing to do with it either.

Actually, the main spending from the Great Society didn't kick in until much later, so no, it had nothing to do with it.

And the Great Society programs, save maybe for Medicare, were an abject failure when it came to fighting poverty.

[mellytu74]

Like everyone else of your mindset, you conveniently ignore the part about taking the money away from the people that earned it. You believe that the government owns all capital, and they know how to spend it better than the person that earned it or created it. That's called Communism, and it has failed miserably and tragically every time it's been tried.

Uh, flock....

PLEASE tell me that you don't believe the only people who receive food stamps are people who are taking something away from "people who earned it" and never worked in their lives.

I know several people who are currently receiving food stamps. I have known a couple of them for more than 40 years.

Every single one of them are people who began working when they were young -- some part-time in high school, some right out of high school. They worked continuously until their mid-to-late 50s.

Social Security and Medicare -- programs they had been paying into since there were 16 years old -- that was one thing.

Food stamps, that's another matter entirely.

None of them ever expected to be in the position of needing food stamps. Or any other kind of help. But they do now.

I find it inconceivable that you wouldn't believe that there are people who need the safety net who aren't free-loading sponging welfare queen bums.

I have not made any value judgements on anyone who is receiving food stamps. But EVERYONE who is receiving food stamps is taking money away from someone else. That's just a fact. And to think that the food stamp program is a stimulus to the economy as a whole is insanity. The best stimulus is to get the government out of the free market and get everyone back to work again so that no one is on food stamps.

I'm sorry Melly, but the only person on this bored who has even written the words 'welfare queeen' is SSS. Not me. But your post is a good example of the problem in micro. Any time someone talks about a problem and proposes a solution to that problem, along comes the accusations that they are uncompassionate and mean spirited. I wrote about the Secreatry of Agriculture leaving out where the money comes from. I said nothing about the recipients of the program. But your post basically says that I have no compassion for your friends. Where did that come from? You can think that if you want, but I think it is the government bureaucracy that is uncompassionate and mean spirited, because they feed on the dependency as a way to get votes and keep themselves in power.

DELETING

[mellytu74]

Like everyone else of your mindset, you conveniently ignore the part about taking the money away from the people that earned it. You believe that the government owns all capital, and they know how to spend it better than the person that earned it or created it. That's called Communism, and it has failed miserably and tragically every time it's been tried.

Uh, flock....

PLEASE tell me that you don't believe the only people who receive food stamps are people who are taking something away from "people who earned it" and never worked in their lives.

I know several people who are currently receiving food stamps. I have known a couple of them for more than 40 years.

Every single one of them are people who began working when they were young -- some part-time in high school, some right out of high school. They worked continuously until their mid-to-late 50s.

Social Security and Medicare -- programs they had been paying into since there were 16 years old -- that was one thing.

Food stamps, that's another matter entirely.

None of them ever expected to be in the position of needing food stamps. Or any other kind of help. But they do now.

I find it inconceivable that you wouldn't believe that there are people who need the safety net who aren't free-loading sponging welfare queen bums.

I have not made any value judgements on anyone who is receiving food stamps. But EVERYONE who is receiving food stamps is taking money away from someone else. That's just a fact. And to think that the food stamp program is a stimulus to the economy as a whole is insanity. The best stimulus is to get the government out of the free market and get everyone back to work again so that no one is on food stamps.

I'm sorry Melly, but the only person on this bored who has even written the words 'welfare queeen' is SSS. Not me. But your post is a good example of the problem in micro. Any time someone talks about a problem and proposes a solution to that problem, along comes the accusations that they are uncompassionate and mean spirited. I wrote about the Secreatry of Agriculture leaving out where the money comes from. I said nothing about the recipients of the program. But your post basically says that I have no compassion for your friends. Where did that come from? You can think that if you want, but I think it is the government bureaucracy that is uncompassionate and mean spirited, because they feed on the dependency as a way to get votes and keep themselves in power.

EDITED TO ERASE.

NEVER MIND.

It isn't worth the effort for me to get upset. There are too many real-life concerns to worry about.

[Flybrick]

It seems to me that the teabaggers objective is to turn the USA into Mexico. So far, so good.

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/lanow/2 ... olicy.html

The news that the Obama administration was planning to halt virtually all deportations of Dream Act students and possibly their families drew cheers and applause from several students and immigrant rights activists who gathered at the downtown Los Angeles office of the Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights of Los Angeles.

[urlhttp://latimesblogs.latimes.com/lanow/2010/11/undocumented-students.html][/url]

The California Supreme Court decided unanimously Monday that illegal immigrants may continue to be eligible for in-state tuition rates at the state's colleges and universities rather than pay the higher rates charged to those who live out of state.

http://www.boston.com/news/education/hi ... mmigrants/

The mostly Democratic Board of Aldermen voted 25-1 this week to create all-purpose municipal identification cards designed to allow illegal immigrants to open bank accounts and take advantage of other services that may be unavailable without driver's licenses or state-issued IDs.

[Flybrick]

And in further news in the "allowed criminal activity that killed a US Border Patrol agent and a lot of innocent Mexicans" news,

http://www.cnn.com/2011/POLITICS/08/19/ ... cnn_latest

In a written document last month, the Justice Department told Sens. Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, and Patrick Leahy, D-Vermont, that the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms "is aware of 11 instances where a recovered firearm associated with this case was recovered in connection with a crime of violence with the United States," according to Beth Levine, a spokeswoman for Grassley.

Grassley has since been informed that the information will need to be corrected, Levine said, adding that Grassley does not know whether the number will be increased or decreased, nor by how much.

[jarnon]

Heads are starting to roll.

ATF chief, Arizona prosecutor resign amid gun inquiries

[Jeemie]

Heads are starting to roll.

ATF chief, Arizona prosecutor resign amid gun inquiries

This isn't good enough for me.

Political heads ought to roll for this.

[Flybrick]

One wonders if the U Attorny General's name was Gonzales and had an "R" after his name if this scandal where someone actually died (actually a lot of somebodies died) wouldn't be getting a lot more time on the networks and real estate in the papers.


http://dailycaller.com/2011/09/02/new-f ... volvement/

New emails obtained by the Los Angeles Times appear to show senior Obama administration and White House officials were briefed on the gun-walking operation. The three White House officials implicated by the LA Times’ reporting are Kevin M. O’Reilly, the director of North American Affairs for the White House national security staff; Dan Restrepo, the president’s senior Latin American advisor; and Greg Gatjanis, a White House national security official.

The emails were sent between July 2010 and February 2011, before the scandalous ATF program was exposed, according the LA Times

Another explosive new detail that emerged on Thursday was a set of documents showing senior officials in Phoenix attempting to cover up a connection between Fast and Furious weapons and U.S. Border Patrol agent Brian Terry’s death.

In a letter sent to Ann Scheel, the new acting U.S. Attorney for Arizona, House Oversight committee chairman Rep. Darrell Issa and Sen. Chuck Grassley wrote that high-ranking Phoenix officials tried to “prevent the connection [between Terry’s death and Fast and Furious weapons] from being disclosed.”

Internal emails also show that recently resigned Arizona U.S. Attorney Dennis Burke and his deputy Emory Hurley made the decision because “this way we do not divulge our current case (Fast and Furious) or the Border Patrol shooting case.”

[Flybrick]

Hmmm, the White House was notified, but not DOJ leadership?

For a combined ATF/FBI/DEA/US Attorny, perhaps others, operation and it never made the daily and/or weekly staff meeting update?

I'd be pretty p1ssed if my staff hadn't briefed me.

http://www.cnn.com/2011/US/09/07/holder ... cnn_latest

"The notion that this reaches into the upper levels of the Justice Department is something that at this point I don't think is supported by the facts and I think once we examine it and once the facts are revealed we'll see that's not the case," Holder told reporters.

[Flybrick]

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2011/09 ... er-agents/

Sources say emails support their contention that the FBI concealed evidence to protect a confidential informant. Sources close to the Terry case say the FBI informant works inside a major Mexican cartel and provided the money to obtain the weapons used to kill Terry.

Unlike the two AK-style assault weapons found at the scene, the third weapon could more easily be linked to the informant. To prevent that from happening, sources say, the third gun "disappeared."

However, in the hours after Terry was killed on Dec. 14, 2010, several emails written to top ATF officials suggest otherwise.

In one, an intelligence analyst writes that by 7:45 p.m. -- about 21 hours after the shooting -- she had successfully traced two weapons at the scene, and is now "researching the trace status of firearms recovered earlier today by the FBI."

In another email, deputy ATF-Phoenix director George Gillett asks: "Are those two (AK-47s) in addition to the gun already recovered this morning?

http://www.latimes.com/news/la-pn-white ... ?track=rss

Congressional investigators reviewing the failed gun-tracking program Operation Fast and Furious have formally asked the Obama administration to turn over copies of "all records" involving three key White House national security officials and the program, other ATF gun cases in Phoenix, and all communications between the White House and the ATF field office in Arizona.

Tick, tick, tick...

[Flybrick]

http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-31727_162-2 ... 91695.html

WASHINGTON - CBS News has obtained secretly recorded conversations that raise questions as to whether some evidence is being withheld in the murder of a Border Patrol agent.

Law enforcement sources and others close to the Congressional investigation say the Justice Department's Inspector General obtained the audio tapes several months ago as part of its investigation into Fast and Furious.

Then, the sources say for some reason the Inspector General passed the tapes along to the U.S. Attorney's Office in Arizona: a subject in the investigation. It's unclear why the Inspector General, who is supposed to investigate independently, would turn over evidence to an entity that is itself under investigation.

[wintergreen48]

http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-31727_162-2 ... 91695.html

WASHINGTON - CBS News has obtained secretly recorded conversations that raise questions as to whether some evidence is being withheld in the murder of a Border Patrol agent.

Law enforcement sources and others close to the Congressional investigation say the Justice Department's Inspector General obtained the audio tapes several months ago as part of its investigation into Fast and Furious.

Then, the sources say for some reason the Inspector General passed the tapes along to the U.S. Attorney's Office in Arizona: a subject in the investigation. It's unclear why the Inspector General, who is supposed to investigate independently, would turn over evidence to an entity that is itself under investigation.

What's 'unclear' about it? Seems kind of obvious...

[Flybrick]

1 of 3 updates for 5 Oct 11 - flybrick
http://thehill.com/homenews/administrat ... us-in-2010

Attorney General Eric Holder was issued multiple memos from senior Justice Department officials about a controversial gun-tracking operation months before he said he first became aware it, according to documents.

In response to questions from Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) on May 3, 2011, Holder testified before the House Judiciary Committee that he only recently learned about the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives’ (ATF) Operation Fast and Furious.

But in a memo from November 2010 Assistant Attorney General Lanny Breuer notified Holder about a sealed indictment against alleged gun traffickers in Arizona by the DOJ’s organized crime and gang section.

Breuer wrote that the indictment would remain sealed “until another investigation, Phoenix-based ‘Operation Fast and Furious,’ is ready for takedown.”

And in a July 2010 memo from Michael Walther, the director of the National Drug Intelligence Center (NDIC), Holder was notified that NDIC and a Phoenix drug enforcement task force would assist the ATF with an investigation of a suspected gun trafficker, Manuel Celis-Acosta, being run under Operation Fast and Furious.

[Flybrick]

2 of 3

http://dailycaller.com/2011/10/04/cbs-r ... s-scandal/

The DOJ woman was just yelling at me,” Attkisson said. “The guy from the White House on Friday night literally screamed at me and cussed at me. Eric Schultz — oh, the person screaming was Tracy Schmaler. She was yelling, not screaming. And the person who screamed at me was Eric Schultz at the White House.”

Attkisson explained the vicious tongue-lashing:

“In between the yelling that I received from the Justice Department yesterday, the spokeswoman — who would not put anything in writing — I was asking for her explanation so there would be clarity and no confusion later over what had been said. She wouldn’t put anything in writing,” she said.

Attkisson also said the DOJ and White House representatives complained that CBS was “unfair and biased” because it didn’t give the White House favorable coverage on the developing scandal.

“Is it sort of a drip, drip. And I’m certainly not the one to make the case for DOJ and White House about what I’m doing wrong,” she added. “They will tell you that I’m the only reporter, as they told me, that is not reasonable. They say The Washington Post is reasonable, the LA Times is reasonable, The New York Times is reasonable — I’m the only one who thinks this is a story, and they think I’m unfair and biased by pursuing it.”

[Flybrick]

3 of 3

http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2011/10/05/1 ... atest.html

WASHINGTON - Two top supervisors at ATF headquarters in Washington - the deputy director and the assistant director for all field operations - have been reassigned to lower-level positions as the beleaguered Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives attempts to remake itself amid the fallout from a failed gun-tracking operation along the Southwest border called Fast and Furious, according to two sources briefed on the changes.

[ne1410s]

Operation Wide Receiver

It was OK in 2006? Didn't think so.

http://content.usatoday.com/communities ... sh-years/1

[Flybrick]

Operation Wide Receiver

It was OK in 2006? Didn't think so.

http://content.usatoday.com/communities ... sh-years/1

Nope, not ok. Include it in a special prosecutor investigation.

BUT, did any of those guns kill a US Border Patrol agent in the US? "Fast and Furious" did. Not to mention the DEA agent killed in Mexico. Or the Mexicans killed by these guns.

Did any of the 2006 DOJ officials deny knowledge of the operation? I don't know. I do know the current Attorney General has denied knowing of the operation until May of this year. Which is either untrue or incompetent since multiple agencies under his command were participating in Operation Fast and Furious.

And blaming Bush is the best you can do? Even Biden has quit doing that.

And had anything like the fiasco of Fast and Furious occured during Dubya's time, don't you think the same media outlets noted above who are being "reasonable" now would have been all over this?

[Flybrick]

http://dailycaller.com/2011/10/06/fast- ... n-program/

These new documents show Holder received information and updates on Fast and Furious in at least five weekly memos starting in July 2010 — including over four consecutive weeks last summer.

“This investigation, initiated in September 2009 in conjunction with the Drug Enforcement Administration, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, and the Phoenix Police Department, involved a Phoenix-based firearms trafficking ring headed by Manuel Celis-Acosta,” each one of those briefings reads. “Celis-Acosta and straw purchasers are responsible for the purchase of 1,500 firearms that were then supplied to Mexican drug trafficking cartels.”