Their Contempt Is Contemptible

So, the Republicans in the US House of Representatives have stamped their feet, held their breath and threw a little collective temper tantrum. The end result is that they found Attorney General Eric Holder in contempt of Congress. I got news for them. Many people hold contempt for Congress.

Anyway, Holder won't be prosecuted, as is proper, since the whole hullabaloo is nothing more than a political stunt by the Republicans to try to smear President Obama during an election year and to cover their own NRA-funded asses.

Fortune has done quite the in-depth investigation into "Fast and Furious." Their findings show what a farce the Republican's contempt finding really is:

"Republican senators are whipping up the country into a psychotic frenzy with these reports that are patently false," says Linda Wallace, a special agent with the Internal Revenue Service's criminal investigation unit who was assigned to the Fast and Furious team (and recently retired from the IRS). A self-described gun-rights supporter, Wallace has not been criticized by Issa's committee.

The ATF's accusers seem untroubled by evidence that the policy they have pilloried didn't actually exist. "It gets back to something basic for me," says Sen. Charles Grassley (R-Iowa). "Terry was murdered, and guns from this operation were found at his murder site." A spokesman for Issa denies that politics has played a role in the congressman's actions and says "multiple individuals across the Justice Department's component agencies share responsibility for the failure that occurred in Operation Fast and Furious." Issa's spokesman asserts that even if ATF agents followed prosecutors' directives, "the practice is nonetheless gun walking." Attorneys for Dodson declined to comment on the record.

For its part, the ATF would not answer specific questions, citing ongoing investigations. But a spokesperson for the agency provided a written statement noting that the "ATF did not exercise proper oversight, planning or judgment in executing this case. We at ATF have accepted responsibility and have taken appropriate and decisive action to insure that these errors in oversight and judgment never occur again." The statement asserted that the "ATF has clarified its firearms transfer policy to focus on interdiction or early intervention to prevent the criminal acquisition, trafficking and misuse of firearms," and it cited changes in coordination and oversight at the ATF.

Irony abounds when it comes to the Fast and Furious scandal. But the ultimate irony is this: Republicans who support the National Rifle Association and its attempts to weaken gun laws are lambasting ATF agents for not seizing enough weapons—ones that, in this case, prosecutors deemed to be legal.

Do read the whole article for a fascinating, and horrifying, way that this as taken a life of its own, fabricated out of whole cloth.

Also worth the read is the overview of the Fortune article by Mother Jones.

When reading this, keep in mind that Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) who is leading this mass tantrum, is also the the Chairman of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform.

That means he is the one that could and should be calling Scott Walker back to Washington, D.C. to answer for his perjury before a Congressional committee, even as members of the same committee would like to see happen.

Amazingly, Issa denies there's any politics involved with his selective contempt.

Right.

It just so happens that he is going after the Democratic President Obama through his staff, based on nothing but a cover up by a rogue agent, but is not touching the Republican Walker even though he has videotaped evidence, but it's not political.
But if he's after Holder, and Obama, but not Walker, and it's not political, the only thing left is that he is doing it because of racial reasons.

Either way, the behavior of Congressional Republicans is what is truly contemptible.

Mr. Walker, Congressional Committee On Line One

Note to Scott Walker: You might not want to perjure yourself before a Congressional committee, especially while under oath.

They tend to not like that sort of thing.

Did Scott Walker Lie Under Oath?

Why yes he did! Look here and decide for yourself! We know that just prior to the election, Scott Walker said that he would be tough but he will negotiate with unions. Then in February, he dropped the bomb of ACT 10 on the people of WI. In the craziness of last year, Scot Walker ended up testifying in front of Congress at a hearing titled “State and Municipal Debt: Tough Choices Ahead”. Thats where, under oath, Governor Walker was asked, when he got the idea for ACT 10.

“In December, after the elections, but before I was sworn into office,” Walker said(under oath).

There was one problem with that:

Records obtained by FOX6 News show it was actually November when the Legislative Reference Bureau – the state office that essentially creates bills – was directed to start drafting what would become Act 10. An internal memo entitled “Alternative Approach to Collective Bargaining” sketched out plans to require unions to recertify every year, and to prohibit them from collecting dues. An email spells out a strategy for “prohibiting public employee unions from collectively bargaining over health care benefits.” This all occurred before Walker had taken office.

Thankfully, Mike Lowe asked him about this very issue last night and here is the report. The timeline is there for you to decide if Scott Walker lied under oath to Congress. Can we really elect a Governor who plays this loose with the truth and being under oath does not matter to him?

One thing for sure is that Governor Walker's answer to this question seriously rivals Miss South Carolina's:

Walker: If You're Going To Commit Perjury, You Might As Well Go All The Way

Walker and his bald spot
 being sworn in

For months, I've been pointing out that Scott Walker committed perjury when he testified, under oath, before a congressional committee last year.

I even went so far as to point out that not only did he lie to the committee, he lied in an entirely different direction when he appeared before the Oshkosh Northwestern's editorial board.

More people started to catch on to the fact that Walker was lying when they saw the video in which he kissed the lips and ass of Diane Hendricks, the billionaire crackpot, and boasted of his "Divide and Conquer" plan for busting the union.

Today, more proof of Walker's perjury came to light when WTDY reported on emails regarding the planning of Act 10, just days after Walker's masters bought the election for him in November 2010 (emphasis mine):

But drafting documents obtained by WTDY News from the non-partisan Legislative Reference Bureau reveal that Act 10 was actually being drafted in November, just weeks after Walker was elected governor. As lawmakers struggled to pass state worker contracts in December of 2010, a non-partisan state attorney was already hard at work drafting the very provision in ACT 10 that stripped away bargaining rights for nearly all public employees in Wisconsin.

Cathlene Hanaman is the Deputy Chief at the Legislative Reference Bureau and has drafted all the collective bargaining changes in recent years, which she says were always minor until Governor Walker was elected. When shown an email she sent to another non-partisan bill drafter on December 3rd, 2010, Hanaman confirmed that the legislation described in the email was part of a project she had been assigned in November and that veteran Department of Administration budget staffers were working with her on behalf of then governor-elect Walker. In the email, the intent of the legislation lists “prohibiting public employee union from collectively bargaining over health care benefits.” An undated memo entitled “Alternative Approach to Collective Bargaining,” given to Hanaman at an early meeting with Department of Administration staffers, lays out plans to prohibit any state or local public employer from collecting union dues, require public sector unions to vote to recertify each year, and allow police and firefighter unions to keep all their bargaining rights.

As they point out in the article: "It is a Federal offense to knowingly and willingly tell false statements under oath."

Will anything happen though? It would seem unlikely while the Republicans hold the House of Representatives and chair that committee. However, if Walker were to lose the recall and/or get indicted in Walkergate, the Republicans, who have a propensity of eating their own, might find it useful to throw Walker under the bus.

The real question is whether anyone, besides the unreliable James Wigderson, believe that Walker wouldn't go straight to his right-to-work-for-less legislation if we don't take him out. Oh sure, Walker has said he doesn't support it, but he sure seems to say a lot of things to a lot of people. And not one bit of it can be trusted to be true.