RUTHFULLY YOURS

The lid may finally blow off the Fast and Furious cover-up by the Obama administration, as a federal judge ordered the release of thousands of emails showing how then-attorney general Eric Holder obstructed, stonewalled, and misdirected congressional investigators looking into the program.

People in the Nixon administration went to jail for less.

New York Post:

“The documents reveal how senior Justice Department officials — including Attorney General Holder — intensely followed and managed an effort to carefully limit and obstruct the information produced to Congress,” he asserted.

They also indict Holder deputy Lanny Breuer, an old Clinton hand, who had to step down in 2013 after falsely denying authorizing Fast and Furious.

Their efforts to impede investigations included:

• Devising strategies to redact or otherwise withhold relevant information;
• Manipulating media coverage to control fallout;
• Scapegoating the Bureau of Alcohol Tobacco and Firearms (ATF) for the scandal.

For instance, a June 2011 e-mail discusses withholding ATF lab reports from Congress, and a July 2011 e-mail details senior Justice officials agreeing to “stay away from a representation that we’ll fully cooperate.”

The next month, they went into full damage-control mode, with associate Deputy Attorney General Matt Axelrod warning an ATF official that providing details about Fast and Furious “strikes us as unwise.”

Then in late August 2011, another e-mail reveals that Holder had instructed his staff to have an official at ATF “close the door to his office” to prevent information about the mushrooming scandal from leaking.

Talking points drafted for Holder and other brass for congressional hearings made clear that Justice intended to make ousted ATF officials the fall guys for the scandal.

“These (personnel) changes will help us move past the controversy that has surrounded Fast and Furious,” Assistant Attorney General Ron Weich wrote in August 2011.

In an October 2011 e-mail to his chief of staff, moreover, Holder stated that he agreed with a strategy to first release documents to friendly media “with an explanation that takes the air out” of them, instead “of just handing them over” to Congress.

“Calculated efforts were made by senior officials to obstruct Congress,” Chaffetz fumed.

“Over the course of the investigation,” he recounted, “the Justice Department has provided false information, stonewalled document requests, produced scores of blacked-out pages and duplicate documents and refused to comply with two congressional subpoenas.”

These emails show that the administration went far beyond the normal efforts to manage a hot political scandal.  There is criminal activity here – most notably obstruction of justice – that needs to be investigated, with the perpetrators tried and sent to jail.

But there is no pressure for an investigation.  Indeed, the entire Fast and Furious scandal is now ancient history, the press having concluded there was nothing there.  No amount of new information will get the New York Times or Washington Post to reopen the files on the case, and the rest of the media will almost certainly fall into line.

The Obama administration can claim success.  They were able to stretch out their response to the investigation to the point that with just months to go in Obama’s term, no one cares if the facts of the case are revisited or not.  They conducted a classic Washington cover-up campaign that did as it was supposed to do: it protected the principals – Obama and Holder – from being held accountable for their stupidity and criminal activity.