Obama's War on Transparency Endorsed by Court
The Obama administration has perfected the art of "selective transparency." It releases documents when it serves them and keeps them secret when it does not. We've seen this happen time and time again. When the Obamaadministration wanted to undermine enhanced interrogation techniques,it selectively released certain top-secret Department of Defense memosthat supported the administration's agenda, while conveniently leavingout those documents supporting the effectiveness of the techniques. (JWwas ultimately able to force the release of theserecords.) |
And unfortunately, an appellate court endorsed this unprecedented secrecy earlier this week.
On Tuesday, a ruling by theUnited States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia affirmed aU.S. District Court decision allowing the Defense Department and CIA to withhold 59 images from the raid on Osama bin Laden's compound and the terrorist mastermind's burial at sea. Here's the statement I offeredto the press in response:
The opinionis craven, absurd, and undermines the rule of law. The court seems toacknowledge that the images were improperly classified but gives theObama administration a pass. The court's interpretation would allowterrorists to dictate our laws. Americans' fundamental right to accessgovernment information and, frankly, the First Amendment are implicatedin this ruling.
As one of the judges on this panel suggested that the Benghazi attackwas caused by an Internet video, this decision is perhaps unsurprising.The courts need to stop rubberstamping this administration's impropersecrecy. There is no provision of the Freedom of Information Act thatallows documents to be kept secret because their release might offendour terrorist enemies. Our lawyers are considering our next legal steps. The Appeals Court decision upheld an April 26, 2012, ruling by theDistrict Court denying a FOIA request by JW seeking "all photographsand/or video recordings of Osama (Usama) bin Laden taken during and/orafter the U.S. Military operation in Pakistan on or about May 1, 2011." To be clear: We did not seek any information that would compromise thenational security of the country. (Certainly no details evenapproaching those provided to the "Zero Dark Thirty" filmmakers.) Andyet, the Obama administration withheld the release of these imagesunder the president's bogus "spiking the football" doctrine, whichclaims any information that might offend terrorists must be kept secret. Can you imagine the court endorsing such a policy? A policy thatsubjects our open records laws to the whims of radical Muslimterrorists? While ruling against Judicial Watch, U.S. District Court Judge JamesBoasberg had conceded, "Indeed, it makes sense that the moresignificant an event is to our nation - and the end of bin Laden'sreign of terror certainly ranks high - the more need the public has forfull disclosure." I couldn't agree more, which is why the judge's ruling - and thesubsequent appellate court ruling - are an affront not only to Freedomof Information Act law but to the public's right to know what thegovernment is up to. As I said in my statement, JW attorneys are reviewing our options andI'll be sure to keep you up-to-date. Justice was not served by thisdecision. MoreSecrets and Lies in the Obama IRS Scandal In the last installment of the Weekly Update, I said the IRSscandal was "one for the ages" and nothing that has transpired sincethen has changed my opinion. As you likely know by now, we learned last week that the Obama IRStargeted Tea Party and conservative organizations seeking tax exemptstatus and subjected conservative donors to painful and unnecessaryaudits - an unprecedented level of politicization inside the supposedlynon-political federal agency. (Click here to readlast week's Update for the full details.) This systemic attack on these organizations had a singular effect: tosuppress the Tea Party and other critics of the Obama administrationduring Obama's reelection 2012 campaign. This week there have been some major developments as Congress heldhearings to get to the truth in this matter, a task made more difficultwhen the head of the key IRS agency invoked the Fifth Amendment andrefused to answer any questions. As reported by The Washington Post:
The head ofthe Internal Revenue Service's tax-exempt organizations office, facedwith allegations of improper targeting of conservative groups, told aHouse committee Wednesday that she has done nothing wrong but declinedto answer questions, invoking her Fifth Amendment right againstself-incrimination.
Lois G. Lerner told the House Committee on Oversight and GovernmentReform in an opening statement that members of the panel have alreadyaccused her of providing false information to Congress... "I have not done anything wrong," she said. "I have not broken anylaws. I have not violated any IRS rules or regulations. And I have notprovided false information to this or any other congressionalcommittee." But on the advice of counsel, she said, she would notanswer questions or testify before the committee. But here's the problem for Ms. Lerner with that impassioned statementin self-defense. She just may have forfeited her rightto invoke the Fifth Amendment. Many legal analysts (along with members of Congress) have said thatLerner cannot have it both ways. She can't issue a statement beforeCongress professing her innocence in the scandal, even referring to herpast testimony, and then clam up and refuse to answer questions. Consider what the Supreme Court has said on theinvocation of the Fifth: "It has long been held that a defendant whotakes the stand in his own behalf cannot then claim the privilegeagainst cross-examination on matters reasonably related to the subjectmatter of his direct examination..." It certainly appears that Ms. Lerner, in effect, "took the stand" byissuing her statement. House Oversight and Government Reform Committeechairman Darrell Issa, for his part, plans to bring her back: "We areobligated to bring Lerner back because she did not properly take theFifth [Amendment]," Issa said according to Reuters. "Sheclearly chose to make her statements and then not open herself up toeven any questioning as to the statement she made." I'm not confidentthat much can be done about it legally, but it sure confirms that,practically speaking, the Obama administration has something to hide. In other developments regarding the question of who knew what and when,this week we also learned that the IRS had conducted its own investigation one yearbefore the Treasury Department Inspector General released the resultsof its probe. Both investigations came to the same conclusion regardingimproprieties, prompting Rep. Issa to chastise the IRS for the crimeand the cover-up:
Tempersflared in a House Oversight and Government Reform Committee hearingWednesday, with members on both sides of the aisle castigating theInternal Revenue Service for targeting conservative groups with specialscrutiny, and then hiding the practice from Congress...
"Just yesterday the committee interviewed Holly Paz, the director ofexempt organizations, rulings and agreements, division of the IRS,"Issa said. "While a tremendous amount of attention is centered aboutthe Inspector General's report, or investigation, the committee haslearned from Ms. Paz that she in fact participated in an IRS internalinvestigation that concluded in May of 2012 - May 3 of 2012 - and foundessentially the same thing that Mr. George found more than a yearlater." What this means is that it was a well-known fact within the Obamaadministration that IRS officials were illicitly targetingconstitutional government groups six months before the 2012 elections.And yet, IRS officials did not bother to tell Congress, and may haveeven falsely testified on the matter. But here's the million dollar question: Did they tell the president?House Majority LeaderBoehner says almost certainly: "It'spretty inconceivable to me that the president wouldn't know," he saidon Greta van Susteren's Fox News program that aired late Wednesday. "Ijust put myself in his shoes: I deal with my senior staff every day,and if the White House had known about this, which now it appearsthey've known about it for about a year, it's hard to imagine itwouldn't have come up in some conversation." It turns out that the former IRS Commissioner Douglas Shulman had atleast 129 visits to the Obama White House, including over 90 meetings with Obama's Obamacare Czar NancyDeParl. Even apart from the IRS scandal, inwhat world would the head of the IRS visiting the White House so manytimes be considered appropriate! Obama says he is outraged by the IRSscandal, but his White House advisers are meeting with old Clinton scandal hands in orderto devise a public relations strategy to handle the corruptionscandal. Now, while the IRS scandal took center stage in Congress, anotherscandal also erupted in as we learned the Obama Department of Justice(DOJ) seized phone records from at least five Fox News reporters aspart of a supposed criminal probe into leaks inside the DefenseDepartment. As reported by Fox News:
Newlyuncovered court documents reveal the Justice Department seized recordsof several Fox News phone lines as part of a leak investigation - evenlisting a number that, according to one source, matches the home phonenumber of a reporter's parents.
The seizure was ordered in addition to a court-approved search warrantfor Fox News correspondent James Rosen's personal emails. In theaffidavit seeking that warrant, an FBI agent called Rosen a likelycriminal "co-conspirator," citing a wartime law called the EspionageAct. Rosen was not charged, but his movements and conversations weretracked. A source close to the leak investigation confirmed to Fox Newsthat the government obtained phone records for several numbers thatmatch Fox News numbers out of the Washington bureau. This latest development follows on the heels of news last week that theDOJ seized the records of Associated Press reportersin a DOD leak investigation, a decision AP President and ChiefExecutive Officer Gary Pruitt called a "massive and unprecedented intrusion". (The"leaks" in question relate to an AP story last year regarding a CIAoperation in Yemen to stop a potential terrorist attack.) President Obama moved quickly to defend the attack on the FirstAmendment in the name of national security and then expressed "completeconfidence" in embattled Attorney General Eric Holder. He then said ina major defense policy speech that Holder was on top of the issue andwould spearhead an initiative to make certain that DOJ activities donot chill the First Amendment. And then this news hit, courtesy of NBC News:
AttorneyGeneral Eric Holder signed off on a controversial search warrant thatidentified Fox News reporter James Rosen as a "possible co-conspirator"in violations of the Espionage Act and authorized seizure of hisprivate emails, a law enforcement official told NBC News on Thursday.
The disclosure of the attorney general's role came as President BarackObama, in a major speech on his counterterrorism policy, said Holderhad agreed to review Justice Department guidelines governinginvestigations that involve journalists. This led ABC News reported Jonathan Karl to quip thatHolder will now be put in the position of investigating Holder! Holderis personally responsible for this dishonest investigation into FoxNews and each and every one of the news organization's sources (or atleast the ones that call on the phone). The attack on Fox News is no surprise to us. We exposed how the ObamaWhite Housetried to ban Fox News and then lied aboutit. Barack Obama hates Fox News so it is nosurprise that his corrupt attorney general would personally sign off ona warrant against Fox that is without precedent in the modern era. Of course, Judicial Watch has been shouting from the rooftop for fiveyears about rampant corruption inside the Obama administration. Andwhile it's nice to now see that the media is finally paying attention,it will mean nothing if these developments are not accompanied by realaccountability, which is Judicial Watch's mission. HappyMemorial Day On behalf of all the staff of Judicial Watch, which includes no smallnumber of veterans, I wish all of you a wonderful Memorial Dayholiday. As we honor the fallen, who fought and died so that we canremain free, I thought it appropriate to reprint a portion of the May5, 1868, Memorial Day proclamation (General Orders No. 11) byGeneral John Logan, national commander of the Grand Army of theRepublic:
Let us,then, at the time appointed gather around their sacred remains andgarland the passionless mounds above them with the choicest flowers ofspring-time; let us raise above them the dear old flag they saved fromdishonor; let us in this solemn presence renew our pledges to aid andassist those whom they have left among us a sacred charge upon anation's gratitude, the soldier's and sailor's widow and orphan.
Until next week...  Tom Fitton President |
No comments:
Post a Comment