The Atlantic Wire, with what I can only assume to be a rhetorical question:
On Thursday, NBC News reported on Holder’s involvement in another prominent investigation of a media outlet. Following a 2009 leak of classified information, the Justice Department acquired a search warrant for emails from Fox News reporter James Rosen. In the warrant, the Department indicates that there is “probable cause to believe that the reporter has committed or is committing a violation of section 793(d), as an aider and abettor and/or co-conspirator, to which the materials relate.” In other words: The Department of Justice considered that there was probable cause Rosen violated the law.
As reported by the Huffington Post, Justice the next day acknowledged that Holder had been involved in the Rosen case — officially, U.S. vs. Kim, after Rosen’s alleged source for the leak, Stephen Jin-Woo Kim. The department released a statement reading, in part:
The Department takes seriously the First Amendment right to freedom of the press. In recognition of this, the Department took great care in deciding that a search warrant was necessary in the Kim matter, vetting the decision at the highest levels of the Department, including discussions with the Attorney General. After extensive deliberations, and after following all applicable laws, regulations and policies, the Department sought an appropriately tailored search warrant under the Privacy Protection Act. And a federal magistrate judge made an independent finding that probable cause existed to approve the search warrant.After the NBC report, the conservative blog Gateway Pundit called attention to the discrepancy between Holder apparently authorizing the search warrant, including a reference to possible criminal action, and the Attorney General’s testimony. That night, Karl Rove raised the issue on Fox News itself. Today, it reached Capitol Hill.
[…]
What will Holder’s defense be? We reached out to several legal experts for their assessments of his case, and will provide their thoughts when we hear back. But one possible response seems fairly obvious: Holder’s is likely to claim, if asked, that his statement was not willfully false.
If Holder can claim that he didn’t remember the Rosen case during the House hearing — news of it didn’t break until last week — he can present at least some defense on this front. He might also argue that there was no “potential prosecution” in the Rosen case; that, in other words, the Department never had any intention of prosecuting Rosen for any conspiracy charges. It’s not clear if this will address the concerns of the Judiciary Committee, but it’s safe to assume that Holder know some good attorneys who could put the best face on that argument.
The Atlantic Wire then goes on to note that Holder has long been the target of “antipathy,” which I suppose is their best effort at trying to suggest ulterior motives to a perjury investigation traceable to the Vast Right Wing Conspiracy (and it’s consuming racism) — an effort of easy, oblique conflation in which their readers make the desired connections; consequently, Atlantic Wire avoids having to suggest that any long-held “antipathy” toward Holder might have something to do with his history of scandal and near overt political partisanship, using the Justice Department to shield “his people” and go after those who he believes pose the biggest threat to “his people.”
But leaving that aside, here’s the nut:
If the committee determines that Holder did lie under oath, it’s not entirely clear what would happen next. When Scooter Libby, an aide to Vice President Cheney, was charged with perjury in 2005, he faced a federal grand jury. If the Holder investigation gets that far, it’s safe to say that the president’s opponents would already be able to claim at least some victory.
Note that it’s only “the president’s opponents” who would be able to claim “at least some victory” if the Attorney General is punished for lying to the American people through their representatives in Congress. The lying itself being less important than the politics of how it shakes out.
Evidently, those who support the president will find in Holder’s perjury only cause to be outraged that the AG could (potentially) be punished for lying to them. Because a lie told in the service of their side is the same as the truth. The ends justifying the means and all that.
All of a piece when you live inside a soft tyranny.
I felt sorry for myself because I had no clothes.
Until I met a man who had no soul.
Pluss, I’m BUCK NEKKID! So there’s that.
I felt sorry for myself because I had no shoes. Then I met a man who had no class.
In this sociopolitical climate, jackass, it’s more than safe. It’s formula policy.
the sole from nev.
Harry Reid: GOP Needs to Rid Itself of Tea Party Republicans
I think that’s actually true, and thus, he didn’t perjure himself to the Committee in that respect. But that means he did perjure himself by attesting to that affidavit. Rosen is no criminal, but Holder assured the Court that he was.
The GOP should move to another country and not tell the Tea Party Republicans. I hear Libya’s nice this time of year.
i had hoped that was what mccain was doing in syria
i had hoped that was what mccain was doing in syria
– But he didn’t stay long enough for anything good to happen.
– Strip club shooting of embassy personel? Why not, it’s Tuesday.
– But wait: “”My understanding is that they are other agency personnel, not from the State Department,” Ventrell said.
– So now the CIA is gun running in Venezuela?
Must have been a slow quarter. Things are sure to pick up soon in the gun free zone called Venezuela.
John McCain’s “Rebels”, aka al-Qaeda, Slaughter Entire Christian Village In Syria…
– Meghan sweetie, your daddy is a 24 caret fuckup, and always has been. His heroic actions in Nam consisted of disobeying orders twice, and twice getting his “badass” shot out of the sky.
– Sorry to burst your air-head bubble.
Obama: “We’ll Be There for Folks of ‘Monroe, Oklahoma’…”
Too bad Monroe, OK is 200 miles east of Moore.
I’ll bet he really had a time figuring out West, Texas, unless his handlers just told him “Waco”. Progs love remembering Waco, and would probably build a victory mosque there if they went in for those things.
Did Eric Holder Lie Under Oath?
Did Bill Clinton Have Sex With That Woman, Ms. Lewinski?
Did Hitler Have A Silly Mustache?
The Scooter Libby defense isn’t it?
In Holder’s case, it just might work.
Were I Holder, I’d be more concerned about the judge who issued the warrant deciding he’d been lied to than anything the Judiciary Commitee might be concerned about.
Or, what Pablo said.
Who on that committee has the balls to ask Holder “so, who’d you lie to? Us, or the Judge who issued you your warrant?”
Do you suppose the judge who issued the warrant has any self-respect to guard Ernst? ‘Specially after the judge shopping story reveals that two others refused to be fooled by the DoJ’s claims? The rest of the bench may have something to say (privately) to the gullible clown who signed the warrant, like, “Hey, numbnuts! You’re making the rest of us look bad. Shape up.”
This all sounds pretty dire for Holder until you consider he runs the department that would prosecute his case.
Oops. Time for “Dancing”!
Holder will not resign and nothing that the Republican’s do can make him, and he knows it. Any enforcement action against a member of the executive has to go through Reid and or Holder and even then Obama can backstop everything with his pardon power. All it takes is the audacity to just do whatever it takes and ignore any costs to the nation.
They will simply do whatever they want to do, devil take the hindmost, and give the Courts and Congress the middle finger if they don’t like what comes from there. After all how many SWAT teams does SCOTUS have? Or Congress?
Power comes out of the barrel of the gun and in the government, they all point where Obama says they should. Another reason to get them out of private hands as they are the only countervailing source of power when push comes to shove.
Holder will hang on until there is another “Look, squirrels!” moment. Perhaps some other scandal with someone lower-level who can be blamed can be brought to the forefront.
And it will be the Republicans fault naturally, for making them do whatever it is they have to do.
Kinda like how Tina kept splitting Ike’s knuckles with her face, I suppose.
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– Beckle, that indominable FOX resident demoratic apologist, disagrees geoffb.
Does polite society get upset when democrats lie under oath? I thought “lying under oath” was an axe behind glass that says “Break in Case of Republican or Other Opposition”
Oaths are for little people and smart people don’t lie, they parse their words in such a way that inaccuracies pass into circulation amongst the dullards through no fault of their own.
For the elite there can be no such thing as rape rape. Rape rape is only ever committed by others and throwbacks and outsiders and monsters. The elite merely has unfortunate incidents that are sometimes misunderstood to be related somehow to rape by the stupid and the evil.
“Harry Reid: GOP Needs to Rid Itself of Tea Party Republicans”
Harry Reid: GOP needs to be smaller, weaker, poorer, and more unelectable and do what we tell them to do, and still get blamed for everything until they are politically dead and then we can laugh and piss all over their political graves on youtube.
Boehner: No! No! Not me! Eat the tea party first! Not in the face! I ‘m too young to politically die! I have so much left to give! Just give me more time to unleash my inner Specter/Crist…
…and Harry Reid wants nothing but the best for the GOP.
Right?
Holy moley, who’s the genius who thinks Reid’s bloviations about what’s best for the GOP is anything but a waste of pixels. I mean other than Democrat operatives with press credentials, that is?
Michele Bachmann calls it quits
I refuse to believe that nobody said anything about bears shitting in the woods.
He might also argue that there was no “potential prosecution” in the Rosen case
So Holder’s defense will be that instead he lied to the federal judge ?
He might also argue that there was no “potential prosecution” in the Rosen case
So Holder’s defense will be that instead he lied to the federal judge ?
Yes. The end result will be the same. The worst thing that can happen to him is being asked to resign. A cushy job awaits no matter what. This is not cynicism. It’s reality.
Or what geoffb said.
Here is someone who agrees with Bob Beckel.
In Dirty Hairy Reid’s Senate, nothing happens to Chicago thugs. It’s kind of an unwritten law.
Resolved: Eric Holder is a lying, criminal scumbag.
Debate!
I agree SW. If that link I put up is right then everything is a scripted play written in advance by Hollywood screenwriters and the whole scandal mess is a production being rolled out with the end already known to the Dems at least.
Heck our politics often seems like a script being played out. All the heavy hitters and even the minor ones have their parts to play.
The Tea Party is like an audience who boos the actors and is throwing rotten fruit at them. Security [IRS] must deal with them and throw them out of the house so the show can go on. After all the play exists for the good of the actors, the audience is just there to be fleeced and be quiet.
– The reentry shields are not holding.
Yes geoff. The only scenario in which something interesting would happen would be if a Tea Party majority Senate was in place. Short of that implausible hypothetical, even a largely anti-Obama House is meaningless. There is no pressure in the current setup to force Bronco’s hand.
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