Pigs fly: Eugene Robinson is angry at the Obama administration
Not because Eugene Robinson is so important, but because he has been one of the most consistent and stalwart of the president’s defenders. I cannot recall a single instance in which he has done anything but carry Obama’s water, with the energy and deep commitment of a true zealot.
So I would have thought Robinson would be the very last person to become alarmed by the AP and Rosen investigations, and the very first to leap to the administration’s defense. But no; he’s actually written a quite hard-hitting condemnation of what the administration has done.
Nor does he specifically exonerate Obama, although he doesn’t specifically incriminate him, either. But I read the entire article looking for an “of course, this was done by Holder or even some Holder underling, and Obama isn’t responsible at all,” and I didn’t find it. He speaks of “the Obama administration” as being the culprit.
Now, Robinson may have second thoughts later and decide to backtrack. Or someone in the administration may call him and cause him to rethink his position in the light of his own job and welfare, if you know what I mean. But for now, his article is one of the most encouraging signs I’ve seen in quite a while.
Has anyone quite managed to collect their jaw off the floor after the NY Times editorial by William Barr, Jamie Gorelick, and Kenneth Wainstein titled “Stop the Leaks”?
William P. Barr was the United States attorney general from 1991 to 1993. Jamie S. Gorelick was deputy attorney general from 1994 to 1997. Kenneth L. Wainstein was assistant attorney general for national security from 2006 to 2008.
Therefore, misrepresentation of facts from these professionals would be stunning.
But read their article and see if they don’t infer that because of the AP story, a spy was outed and overall terror fighting capacity was reduced. They flat out make the latter allegation; and the title and the nefarious way the article was written leads the reader to unconsciously assume that the AP leak disclosed the existence of an operative.
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/21/opinion/stop-the-leaks.html?hp&_r=1&
Of course, the truth is that either the operative was already exposed or he had left the area and his exposure was irrelevant. The complete omission by the three writer/attorneys that the AP and the White House were involved in negotiations about the timing of the release of the story is misrepresentation by omission of fact.
After reading just the NT Times piece, one would conclude, given the authority of the authors and their evidence, that the AP had endangered national security.
The truth is that the AP had endangered the White House’s spin on the event to maximize its news worthyness as proof of Obama’s CIC credentials.
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2013/05/17/plot-thickens-on-ap-records-scandal/
The White House used the DOJ not to protect national security but to punish journalists who did not subordinate their goals to Obama’s. That any of the MSM journalists could find outrage is a little thin. Welcome, but thin.
Now this is something leading to something, maybe:
http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Journalism/2013/05/21/IRS-Scandal-Lois-Lerner-To-Invoke-Fifth-Amendment
More juice, please!
http://pjmedia.com/rogerlsimon/2013/05/21/pjm-exclusive-ex-diplomats-report-new-benghazi-whistleblowers-with-info-devastating-to-clinton-and-obama/?singlepage=true
sharpie, I’m sure you are aware that Jamie Gorelick was responsible for erecting the wall between the FBI and CIA during the Clinton years. This may have led to the dots not being connected before 9/11/01. She also managed to escape from FNMA with a tidy amount of salary and bonuses prior to the financial blowup. Those bona fides give her great credibility among the hoi polloi. IMO, she and her coauthors are starting the damage control effort by the dems.
Eugene Robinson has been extremely liberal and loyal. I have read many of his columns during the Obama years and you would think he was getting his marching orders directly from the WH. For him to break ranks may have some significance. Can we hope? We’ll see.
hows this…
i just watched piers Morgan seem to come around and heard Penn Jillette basically say what the founding fathers said..
50 seconds of reality TWILIGHT ZONE
Piers: ‘Tyranny’
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=lKO8A285Rr0
@sharpie
ultimately there is no such thing as one form of “exposed”. one can be exposed in his trade, but not to the whole world publicly, or their actions made public. its not an all or nothing concept in the real world.
so when one is exposed, the issue may not be what you think it is that they are grousing but not explaining as to do so is to make it worse by telling you what they are peeved over, and so pointing a finger to it.
however, exposures to large audience attracts attention, changes attitudes, not to mention exposes craft and or technique, can be used publicly for various purposes (which i wont point out), and a whole lot more..
so its not like hide and seek and that they are found completely when found. the easiest and least costly method of avoiding issues is to be minimalist or invisible, and don’t add to it.
Thanks for the info on Gorelick, JJ. I wasn’t aware of her activities that erected the wall between the FBI and CIA. I might look into that.
But here’s an analysis from Orin Kerr of The Volokh Conspiracy on the AP leak which the NY Times would have done much better running. Leaks from agency employees jeopardizing national security are never okay. But it appears that the defend Obama spin on the subpoenas as well as the reason for the subpoenas shows a Nixonian response. I’m not sure just how unusual the leak was but it seems apparent that what piqued the Whitehouse was not the leak but AP’s refusal to let the Whitehouse break the story after the AP had been assured by the CIA no national security was at stake.
I wonder, what are the motivations of leakers for the most part?
http://www.volokh.com/2013/05/13/the-non-story-of-the-ap-phone-records-at-least-so-far/
“Or someone in the administration may call him and cause him to rethink his position in the light of his own job and welfare, if you know what I mean.”
Indeed we do know what you mean.
sharpie: About Gorelick.
I think that if they actually bully Robinson, it will reduce his willingness to carry water for them. Yeah, it will probably work, but could backfire long term.
The reality is –probably, at least I’m betting– these warrants to snoop on reporters goes way beyond the AP and a few people at FOX News. These are just the ones they’ve merely deigned to tell us about. What are they not telling us about yet? How many others are there? This administration seems too heavy handed to have restrained themselves. I’m thinking it’s much more widespread than just this. If and when we learn of yet more it’ll be the acid test for the media.
It will get increasingly harder for the media to give Obama a pass.
Gorelick (a name that conjures repulsive images) was a player in the 9-11 commission. She is the Mistress of Disaster.
There was a report on Fox News tonight that they’ve seen documents that show the government got phone records from multiple Fox phone lines – at the Pentagon, the White House and all over the company. Not just James Rosen.
The Left is still naive and young in their counter intelligence and counter revolutionary SOP.
If I were them, I wouldn’t request any FB posts or details. I would just make a private deal with FB, nationalize the company, or merely mirror copy all their data. With the excuse being that it is for “counter terrorism” purposes.
Making requests leaves a paper trail, especially to the victim. Knowing everything about them, having a free intel profile, can be very useful for a secret police intent on… doing things.
I should also note that CNN is using the tornado as a “saved by the bell” opportunity. It’s tornado coverage 24/7, with the only other topic making any kind of appearance being Jodi Arias. How convenient as an excuse to ignore the terrible threats to our freedom happening in Washington. What a joke CNN has become.
Excellent post on Gorelick.
I twice pulled out excerpts from the McCarthy article and somehow hit the wrong button and lost them.
I’ll offer just these two:
Intelligence is gimlet eyes in a world of rose-colored glasses.
The mantra that “9/11 changed everything” is omnipresent. But is it true?
@ Joubert,
On the contrary. At this point the Media is trying to make itself look respectable. They know they are not respectable. They know that they are rotten people bent on evil. They embrace that for the “cause”, which is the decimation of America and remaking it as a Marxist State that, in their minds, works!
The MSM is engaged in a feint, a deception, a luring in so that you might think (again) they are truth tellers.
They are liars, like the so-called President, like all these “witnesses” testifying in Congress.
As soon as the likes of Robinson feel they have done enough, they will re-defend Obama (their lord and master from Mordor) to the hilt. In fact, they will get much much much worse than they have been. They will becomes tools of the regime to target individuals and groups. They will give the official denunciations and the signals for the mobs to go and do harm, even the ultimate harm.
Anyone who has read history from Plato’s Athens to the French Revolution to the Bolshevik Revolution in Russia, and Mao’s (especially) Cultural Revolution in China knows what is about to happen.
This thing is going to get way way worse before anyone even begins to dream it might get better.
Liberalism delenda est.
“They will give the official denunciations and the signals for the mobs to go and do harm, even the ultimate harm.
Anyone who has read history from Plato’s Athens to the French Revolution to the Bolshevik Revolution in Russia, and Mao’s (especially) Cultural Revolution in China knows what is about to happen.”
Mobs in the streets are a target rich environment. Practice reloading until it is a just muscle memory. For those who live in the largely unarmed metro areas; think Korean merchants LA circa 1992. Don’t back down if TSHTF.
I am afraid that this is just going to be a wrinkle in the adoration of Obama by the American press. I have long lost my faith in the American press and the American people. Let’s hope that I am wrong, I sure hope that I am wrong, but I bet my money that I am going to be right, that the press will close their eyes no matter what this man does. We are quite a long way already on the journey to American dictatorship.
Wow, I really enjoyed reading McCarthy’s treatise. He and I are on exactly the same page. We have to defend ourselves. We have to quit trying to apply lawfare to warfare. The Islamists are not going to like us any better or worse if we treat them like citizens in good standing. Gorelick, Robinson and so many other dems just can’t seem to grasp that.
Much of what they have wrought was out of a fear that the government would start reading their mail and spying on them. They have become exactly what they feared.
Mike,
Tthe press can and will turn on the left and the Dems in the face of rampant abuse of power (LBJ) or plain incompetence (Carter). I say we are approaching that threshhold. We aren’t there yet, but if these revelations keep coming look for more Eugene Robinsons. Not all of them. Obama will always have his defenders (as did Nixon), but _enough_ of them.
I’m a history editor. Have read far and wide in history, starting in grade school.
This strikes me as worth contemplating: America is by far the richest and most glittering prize ever dangled before the sinful human race. Agreed? More power and more wealth than any nation in the history of mankind.
Now. Think of the track record of humans in pursuit of much smaller prizes. . . . is there anything, any horror, lies, violence, left undone?
What has saved us? I would say the Enlightenment and the mores of Protestant Christianity — the latter is why the Left trains its guns on “evangelicals” most of all. Both combine to make the moral and intellectual fiber of our former shield and guardian, the Constitution of the United States of America.
Leftists are even now bringing their guns to bear on “rampant individualism” (“Rampant” is the pejorative adjective the Hive Mind has chosen; I’ve seen it cropping up in the latest books). That, if you remember your European history, has its roots in the Protestant Reformation.
So. Nothing, no skulduggery, no malfeasance, no evil act, should surprise you in the Left’s pursuits of its goal — the total demolition of the Great Opponent of communism and Guardian of Freedom, America. Because nothing was ever off the table in previous contests with much smaller stakes.
Was it?
Oh, and Gore-lick (whatta name) should have had her head shaved and been whipped through the streets of Washington after September 11th. Instead, the b**** goes from prize to prize.
Yeah, the Rule of Law is over, folks. We as a nation are kind of in the Wile E. Coyote position of running on confidently, right off that cliff, and just before he looks down. The Leftists have never given a rat’s hairy posterior about law, for cryin’ out loud.
Yeah, but remember Beverly, Wily gets up.
Something will survive. Maybe it will be just snails and cockroaches as George Carlin says, well, better not say what he says here. But in polite words he reminds us of that existence which will go on.
Is there any wonder as to the swift race!
I’d like to offer this thought about Obama’s Scandalgate.
Having been sailing for 4+ years with the MSM at their back I suspect that many in this administration began to believe that they could get away with anything and the apologist press would cover for them.
Hubris begets Nemesis, however, and I think that the administration has committed two fatal flaws. First they used the IRS as a political tool in a particularly egregious manner. The fact is that the IRS is the “enemy” that everyone loves to hate; even those who support big govt can hate the IRS and not fear being called “hypocrites.”
Secondly, knowingly overstepping their constitutional bounds, this administration picked on Fox News. IMO they believed that the MSM which has, itself, criticized Fox as a “Republican mouthpiece,” would not only cover for them by making it a non-story, but cover for them by explaining the logical rationale of targeting Fox. After all, this has been the MSM pattern.
Let’s count the new critics: Bob Scheiffer, Jon Stewart, Piers Morgan, Eugene Robinson, Juan Williams, Maureen Dowd, Ryan Lizza . . . . It’s clear that Obama and Co. have chosen poorly. He has become America’s “Foundering Father.”
Preference cascade anyone?
Beverly,
“What has saved us?”
The answer to that question is, IMO, the brilliant concept of govt based upon a contract with the people and the unique non-violent transfer of power that our Founding Fathers created.
The older I get the more amazed I become at that unique and exceptional convergence of those great and prescient minds
Forgot Elijah Cummings on my little list above.
Those old dead white guys didn’t know jack. How could they have missed out on Uncle Sam being much better suited as Uncle Sugar?
“Those old dead white guys didn’t know jack.”
Perhaps they didn’t know Jack (Daniels) but they surely knew Sam (Adams).
The Leftist propaganda arm knows that Obama won’t be re-elected. So, barring Ayers advancing his plan far beyond what would be natural, the media thinks that now is a good time to get some credibility on the streets. After all, they aren’t harming the prospects of a future Democrat President with their actions. It isn’t betrayal of the Left, after all.
Unfortunately for them, they misunderestimate how the Left works.
Beverly,
It’s just Marx – subject, object, and alienation. Communism was just a particular application, but the Marxist philosophical system has permeated deeply the social-political and educational cultures.