Wednesday, June 29, 2011

Start making the popcorn

John Solomon of The Daily Beast is reporting that the Senate Judiciary Committee has reached a deal that will allow Ken Melson, the acting head of the ATF, to testify before that body next month about the disastrous "Project Gunwalker" debacle that has claimed the lives of at least two U.S. law enforcement agents as well as those of countless innocent Mexican citizens.

Since Mr. Melson has already stood up for himself by refusing to be the fall guy and resign his position amid the fallout from the botched "investigation", he will presumably be quite eager to explain in great detail exactly who among his superiors at Justice (and at State, since this mess involved an international border) knew about and authorized allowing thousands of straw-purchased guns to be sent to Mexico over the objections of street-level ATF agents and even the gun dealers themselves

Bob Owens of Pajamas Media theorizes about the possible repercussions from Melson's upcoming appearance.  We think Owens's third scenario is the one most likely to come about - that Attorney General Eric "Neutral, leaning towards favorable" Holder will ultimately be held accountable over this.  Why?  We think it's because Senator Chuck Grassley smells important blood in the water, otherwise he wouldn't have paid the relatively high price he did (releasing holds on three Obama nominees) for securing Melson's on-the-record testimony.  Representative Darrell Issa is also apparently convinced (and is working like mad to prove) that Holder perjured himself when he testified in front of Issa that he didn't know about the failed scheme until it broke in the national news. 

Be sure to tune in for this particular hearing.  We look forward to watching the roaches scurry away from the light.

4 comments:

Bike Bubba said...

OK, tell me exactly why the Senate needed to "negotiate" to subpoena a non-appointee to a job that the Senate has the right to "advice and consent" about.

Put simply, there is the possibility of getting rid of one or two Obama appointees at the cost of three.....one step forward, two steps back, it seems.

Chris Mallory said...

The question will be if Melson was given immunity or if we will get a series of "Senator, my attorney has advised me not to answer that question..."

Douglas Hester said...

Grassley had to "negotiate" the appearance because Judiciary Chairman Pat Leahy apparently felt that gaining a few cheap political points was worth risking not getting to the bottom of Project Gunwalker.

Anna Lencioni said...

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