Washington Post: Eric Holder’s Kind Of An Awesome AG, Isn’t He?

Unsurprisingly, the authors of the letter to the editor served under Holder


Eric Holder has been an excellent attorney general

We were disappointed to read David Ignatius’s June 9 op-ed column, “A mediocre attorney general,” purporting to represent the views of a number of unnamed Washington lawyers about Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr.’s tenure. Mr. Ignatius didn’t contact us, nor any of the 22 other former senior Justice Department officials who have signed this letter, for his column.

Our work, spanning a wide range of issues that come before the department – from national security prosecutions to violent crime prevention, from Supreme Court litigation to civil rights enforcement, from prosecuting financial fraud to remedying the impact of children’s exposure to violence – showed Mr. Holder to be a leader with excellent judgment and an unwavering commitment to do the right thing without regard for partisan preferences. That is exactly what this nation should expect of an attorney general, and precisely what they have in Mr. Holder.

People should express their disagreement with the attorney general’s decisions, but impugning his motivations only adds to the coarse tone that has plagued Washington for too long.

Let’s consider:

  • Holder blowing off and ending the New Black Panthers voter intimidation issue
  • All the agencies involved with Fast and Furious, including the DOJ at the top, were run with Holder as the boss, yet he knew nothing, and stonewalled, and is still stonewalling, Congress. Not too mention the hundreds of dead Mexican citizens and 2 US federal agents
  • Revealed the identities of 9 CIA interrogators.
  • His departments spying on the AP, and he knew nothing
  • Spying on James Rosen and people associated with him, forgetting that he signed off on the warrant, and still he knew nothing
  • Retaliation against whistleblowers, who he is supposed to protect as the nation’s top cop
  • Going after Arizona and other states that passed immigration tightening laws (and admitting he never read the massive 10 page Arizona law), while simultaneously ignoring sanctuary cities which blow off federal law
  • Failing to apply federal law to Colorado and their legalization of marijuana, a federal Schedule I drug
  • Lawsuits against states which violate the 10th amendment
  • The aforementioned prosecutorial misconduct in the Ted Stevens case.
  • The FBI comes under the DOJ: what took them to get so long to Benghazi?
  • As the nation’s top cop, being head of the DOJ, his seemingly inability to have any knowledge as to what goes on in the DOJ, which is known as “incompetence”.
  • And more.

Citizens need confidence in their government, from the President to the Congress to the Supreme Court, and down to those who run federal agencies. If we cannot trust the nation’s top cop to do his job and know what is going on around him, to apply justice in a fair and impartial manner devoid of politics, to have integrity, then we have a big problem. And the DOJ under Holder has been heavily politicized. Holder shouldn’t be allowed to resign, he should be fired. Or impeached. He darned sure hasn’t been an excellent AG, and none of the people who signed the letter saying he has been super mega awesome, all Democrats, can give reasons beyond writing “showed Mr. Holder to be a leader with excellent judgment and an unwavering commitment to do the right thing without regard for partisan preferences.” One would think that all these lawyers could provide a bit more evidence of Holder’s super mega awesomeness beyond that while attempting to defend Holder.

Crossed at Pirate’s Cove. Follow me on Twitter @WilliamTeach.

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