Perry Op-Ed: Eric Holder Must Resign

Matthew Boyle at the Daily Caller had written a piece suggesting that Perry was approaching this issue in a too-tentative manner.

Well, Perry now publishes an Op-Ed calling for Holder to step down. The reason he waited for the Op-Ed to make this demand, I understand, was that he didn't want to seem flippant about it, and just mention it in a stump speech as a bit of red-meat rah-rah. He wanted to make sure that if he was calling for the resignation of a cabinet officer, he had laid out the case for that in a serious manner.

The op-ed was published in the Washington Times yesterday.

Ever since the Department of Justice’s gun-running operation known as Fast and Furious became public, the Obama administration’s response has been slow and infuriating. Of particular concern is Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr.’s lack of candor concerning what he knew and when he knew it.

This is not a typical case of bureaucratic bungling. A 40-year-old Border Patrol agent, Brian Terry, and possibly a U.S. immigration agent, are dead because of a horribly ill-conceived Justice Department operation that went tragically wrong.

Looks like the "bureaucratic bungling" line has been rejiggered into "This is not a typical case of bureaucratic bungling," a subtle change in wording designed to not preculde something more than "bungling."

Perry turns to the evidence that Holder was lying when he claimed, earlier, to have only heard of Fast and Furious a few weeks before, an answer seemingly concocted to forestall questions about it -- after all, if he doesn't know anything about it, what can you ask him?

I'm skipping that recap, as it's widely available, and there's a Fair Use thing.

Mr. Holder’s proclaimed ignorance leaves Americans to draw one of two conclusions: Either he is guilty of extraordinary bureaucratic incompetence or he is guilty of a cover-up meant to shield him from the consequences of an operation that has left at least one federal agent dead and continues to imperil many more.

Either way, it is high time for Mr. Holder to step down. If he refuses to resign, Mr. Obama must fire him immediately.

...

America simply cannot tolerate an attorney general who arms the very criminals he is supposed to protect us from and then refuses to comfort the grieving parents of a slain Border Patrol agent. Nor can we tolerate a president who lacks the courage to take decisive action in restoring justice to the Department of Justice.

It is time for Mr. Holder to go.

Perry was in the Center Seat on Bret Bair's Special Report last night. As usual, he sounded prepared and fluent in an interview setting, even with several questioners. He also apologized again -- and castigated himself -- for that "you don't have a heart" line.

It does seem that Perry has a particular problem with debates, not a general problem with speaking.

Yeah, I know, the polls show him out of it. But I think that's partly due to preference falsification, as people don't support him because they guess that most other people don't support him.

All I know is that, despite Newt Gingrich's verbal agility, if he's our nominee, we cannot talk about the central role that the Democratic client-organizations Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae played in the destruction of our economy. We can't point out that it was not a lack of government intervention that caused the meltdown, but rather it was government intervention itself which created, and then overfilled, the bubble, with all sorts of ridiculous mortgages.

We also can't talk too much about Obama's individual mandate, as Gingrich was an early champion of it. (As Mitt Romney claimed in one debate -- "I got it from you.")

And if we nominate Romney, of course we cannot talk about ObamaCare at all.

I think these are central issues. If our nominee has to soft-pedal them due to the fact he's compromised on them as well, we're ceding an awful lot to Obama.

My belief is that while it's possible, albeit unlikely, that Perry will become better in debates, it is not possible for Gingrich to go back in time and refuse to consult with Freddie Mac (consult? okay), and it is not possible for Romney to go back in time and undo RomneyCare.

I gotta admit I'd really like a candidate whom the media cannot brand "dumb." I gotta admit that -- I'll be happy with Gingrich or Romney, if only for that reason.

Let's face it, Obama's not particularly smart and both Gingrich and Romney are. What a wonderful change of pace for the Republican to be demonstrably more intelligent than his Democratic opponent.

But still, as nice as that is (and it is pretty sweet, I admit), I think I'd rather have the issues.

I'd also like to have that tiny little apparently-inconsequential point that Perry's Texas has created half the country's jobs in the past two years.

I sort of think the election will be fought and won on that issue. And not so much on anything else.

posted by Ace at 03:43 PM

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