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Frazzled wrote:

Ouze wrote:I also would like to see the documents, because apparently a 6th movie got greenlighted? How does that even happen? Someone should have gone to jail for the 5th one, let alone continuing the franchise.

Wrong thread? Wrong reality?

He's probably talking about the movie franchise...

Yes indeedy.

d-usa wrote:

2) FaF was a fethed up operation on almost all levels. Even if it started out well, at some point when arrests should have been made it appears that they kept on waiting for a bigger fish and eventually things got away.

That's a tremendous understatement. Operations like this are pretty well targeted. They detained the guy at the top of their list, like in the first month or some gak (IIRC) and then released him. I feel like that says everything that needs to be about the operation that needs to be said. Now we are down to the accountability part and both sides are playing pussyfoot and acting like the ATF and DoJ should be able to investigate themselves with any kind of integrity. Obama dropping in and trying to shield Holder with executive privilege only cranks it to 11.

Emperor almighty, I thought F&F was just an incredibly lame movie series.

If they try and do the 3rd one, I can see the American military bases in Japan getting removed, after the US is told "You feth up for last time! You leave now!"

Um, there's five of those gakky gakky movies, Squig.

I know. I just don't know about the content of 2, 4 or 5.

The thing about 'security operations' and Obama is that if they are going well he is right there, however if anything bad happens he has nothing to do with it.

Obama had nothing to do with the killing of Bin Laden. He just moved the planning to the white house and stepped in to a procedure already running. He didnt arrange the air cover patterns, he didnt move the satellites, he didnt put in the HumInt man hours in Pakistan, and the hunt was started by his predecessor. Obama was merely lucky that the hunt picked up the trail while he was in office.
Yet immediately Obama starting jumping up and down saying 'look what I did'.

Fair enough, if he carries the 'intel can' then he can also take reponsibility for the catastrophic amount of info given to Wikileaks, take responsibility for this 'Fast and Furious', take responsibility for the feth ups with drone raids that kill score of the wrong people including a platoon of Pakistani border guards.


If Obama is the president who got Bin Laden, he is also the president who lost the files and cant keep a secret.
He cant have it both ways.

Orlanth wrote:
He cant have it both ways.

Yes he can, its called politics. You might learn of it.

Orlanth wrote: He just moved the planning to the white house and stepped in to a procedure already running.

Yes because Bush wasn't in the White House, nor was Clinton.

dogma wrote:

Orlanth wrote:
He cant have it both ways.

Yes he can, its called politics. You might learn of it.

If you knew what your talking about (hint here) you might learn that politics can run both ways.
Obama might try to be selectively responsible, but that is an opening for his opponents to use. It's about time they tried.

Orlanth wrote:Obama had nothing to do with the killing of Bin Laden.

He directly ordered it. Without his okay, it would not have gone through.

At great political risk to himself, I should note.

I'm not making any statements about the "fast and furious" nonsense, just about this one in specific.

Melissia wrote:

Orlanth wrote:Obama had nothing to do with the killing of Bin Laden.

He directly ordered it. Without his okay, it would not have gone through.

At great political risk to himself, I should note.

I'm not making any statements about the "fast and furious" nonsense, just about this one in specific.

The hunt was already on, Obama stepped in for a photoshoot opportunity.
You think they werent looking for OBL until soldiers who happened to be serving while Obama was president found him?

Orlanth wrote:
If you knew what your talking about (hint here) you might learn that politics can run both ways.

And yet you just said that one person cannot have a thing two (as though there were only two) ways.

Orlanth wrote:
Obama might try to be selectively responsible, but that is an opening for his opponents to use. It's about time they tried.

You've tried many times, and the best you could do was contradiction; see above.

Orlanth wrote:You think they werent looking for OBL until soldiers who happened to be serving while Obama was president found him?

And you are deluded enough to think that they'd have done that particular military operation-- in foreign soil, without permission of the nation they acted in-- without Obama's say so?

If Obama has to take credit for the economy and other stuff, which are largely beyond his control, you'd think he'd also be able to take credit for one of the few things he did have direct control over.

I just want to point out. Hussien was caught in Iraq during ongoing combat operations there. Obama got involve due to the fact that a US military unit was going into another country to conduct a combat operation. From what I'm reading from some of you all is that he had operational control of the mission.

Due to the sensitive nature of the operation- a covert insertion into a foreign country without permission, only the President had the authority to have the mission go ahead. It was always a gamble; they did not know for certain that Bin Laden was there. They knew they would anger Pakistan, and it took stones to decide to take the chance. The President made the call, and everyone else involved who has spoken on the matter has said so. He gets responsibility for having made the call; in this case having gambled successfully.

Just like Bush and Cheney and Rumsfeld and company got the responsibility for their gambles- like choosing to invade Iraq with the shakiest possible evidence of WMDs, choosing to do it with insufficient manpower, and choosing to dismissing Iraq's existing military rather than use them as additional security forces. Which were all bad gambles which they, we, and the people of Iraq lost on. They meant we went to war under false pretences, that we failed to properly secure the country's infrastructure, resulting in the destruction of museums, hospitals, and power facilities which have caused immeasurable physical suffering and cultural losses to the Iraqis, and that we gave destabilizing elements in the country a ready-made supply of disaffected and unemployed people who had access to guns and knew how to use them.

------------------------------

All the above is off-topic, of course. Fast & Furious is a terrible scandal, and a clusterF of epic proportions. Holder should probably go down. I am no fan of his.

I just wanted to point out that Obama did not have operational control of the mission. SInce he was the CoC set the paremeter of the mission and was a observer. He did not have control of the unit per say but claiming he was instrumental in killing OBL. Now look at FaF.

He had direct responsibility for OBL because he was the guy who said "Do it." The mission would not have happened if he did not give that order. The decision was his. He did not command the troops on the ground; that would be dumb and he knows better.

FaF is not his direct responsibility, but he gets some indirect responsibility because Holder's his appointee. And yes, exerting Executive Privilege in this way does increase the degree to which he is associating himself with the problem.

Orlanth wrote:
The hunt was already on, Obama stepped in for a photoshoot opportunity.

So did Bush, so do most Presidents.

Some actions are actually taken by Presidents, though most things are just indirect responsibility, as "the buck stops here".

Clinton issued the original executive order to kill Bin Laden. Bush took a lot of personal action in steering us to war with Afghanistan and Iraq. Obama gave the order to execute the mission which actually got Bin Laden.

Missing my point. Of course I didn't really clarify it much. A leader is always responsible for the actions of individuals that are below him. Since he appointed Holder he is responsible for what that individual does. Yes he gave to "go" command so hence he can claim OBL. Holder actions with the investigation is also his responsibility. Claiming executive previlige on possible misconduct of the FaF operation won't stand just delay the investigation.

Either you are not clearly communicating whatever your point is, or it's really inaccurate, or both. So your opinion is that Obama's personally responsible for all actions of any and every person in the US military, Justice Department, and every other office under the Executive Branch?

I don't think you can honestly, reasonably or justly give the same degree of credit/responsibility for both operations. Even though both were performed by people under him, one was performed on his order, and the other he may not have even been aware of.

He's not "claiming executive privilege on possible misconduct". Are you repeating something Hannity said? EP is claimed on the basis that the offices advising the President, and their deliberations in so doing, are supposed to be granted a certain degree of confidentiality, so as to let them spitball and toss around ideas freely and effectively, without constantly second-guessing and restricting themselves.

Overall I'm not a huge fan of it, but it's not done just to hide misconduct, or it wouldn't exist.

Melissia wrote:And you are deluded enough to think that they'd have done that particular military operation-- in foreign soil, without permission of the nation they acted in-- without Obama's say so?

The MO of hunt down Bin Laden wherever he may be found was already established.
Why do you think Afghanistan was invaded in 2001, to get a suntan.

Besides Obama was attacking targets in Pakistan already, he had crossed that line earlier and everyone knew it, in Pakistan at least.

Orlanth wrote:

Melissia wrote:And you are deluded enough to think that they'd have done that particular military operation-- in foreign soil, without permission of the nation they acted in-- without Obama's say so?

The MO of hunt down Bin Laden wherever he may be found was already established.
Why do you think Afghanistan was invaded in 2001, to get a suntan.

Besides Obama was attacking targets in Pakistan already, he had crossed that line earlier and everyone knew it, in Pakistan at least.

So since Bush said "go get Osama" the armed forces decided on their own to invade Afghanistan, without asking the Commander in Chief for permission.

No need to engage any more in this off-topic diversion in this thread. If folks wants to draw an equivalence between drone strikes and SEAL raids, or discuss whether there were any previous targeted SEAL raids in Pakistan, they can do it in a new thread.

House finds Holder in contempt of Congress.
http://www.cnn.com/2012/06/28/politics/holder-contempt/index.html?hpt=hp_t1

Yes and now we have to trust one of his underlings to prosecute the charges....

Anyone seeing that working out?

Fortune has a nice article/explanation of the whole F&F history.

Orlanth wrote: wrong people including a platoon of Pakistani border guards.

The same pakistani border guards who had been aiding the enemy and doing anything BUT guarding the border?

That drone strike hit it's intended target.






Automatically Appended Next Post:

Frazzled wrote:House finds Holder in contempt of Congress.
http://www.cnn.com/2012/06/28/politics/holder-contempt/index.html?hpt=hp_t1

Codex: Witch Hunt

Janthkin wrote:Fortune has a nice article/explanation of the whole F&F history.

The Fortune article is absolute crap. they couldn't track the guns yet forced gun sellers to sell them, even when the sellers reported them. Then they tried to prosecute one seller but he had tapes of their conversations telling the seller to go ahead and sell them despite misgivings. That case was dropped.

Don't forget they also tried the implement a a new weapon policy to but was shot down