Federal Agencies: Lawless, Incompetent, Untrustworthy, Partisan
Government excesses and misconduct have been common for millennia, especially among totalitarian states in Europe, Asia, Africa, Central and South America where history records many examples of abuses by monarchs, dictators, socialists and communists.
Most people assume America’s “enlightened democracy” to be an exception. However, while once uncommon here, the last fourteen years have proven that America is not immune to partisan government overreach, incompetence, illegalities and oppression.
Barack Obama’s presidency provided comprehensive examples.
Verified and emerging evidence makes it appear likely that, using his son as bagman, Obama’s then-Vice-President Joe Biden enriched himself and his family with payoffs from influence peddling schemes involving Ukraine, China and Russia, some of which may have compromised American interests and national security.
Obama’s Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, ran official communications and classified documents through an unsecure personal residential email server in violation of strict federal laws governing access to/storage of classified information.
A review of 30,000+ emails showed at least 671 sent or received by Clinton containing classified information, a revelation that stands in stark contrast to Clinton’s carefully-parsed, pinky-swear promise, “I am confident that I have never sent nor received any information that was classified at the time it was sent and received.”
Obama’s Attorney General, Eric Holder, authorized a program called “Operation Fast and Furious” that sold more than 2,000 firearms to known or suspected straw purchasers, all of which disappeared.
In December, 2010, an Arizona Border Patrol Agent was shot and killed by a group of Mexicans believed to be illegal border crossers – cartel members. The attackers left behind two semi-automatic rifles containing serial numbers matching the Fast and Furious database. Holder falsely claimed ignorance of the operation, and Obama personally obstructed the investigation by claiming executive privilege over documents requested by Congress.
A bipartisan vote held Holder in contempt of Congress for failure to cooperate.
Mr. Obama’s National Security Agency obtained direct access to web servers owned and operated by Google, Facebook, Apple and other Big Tech companies. The program, “Project Prism,” allowed officials to unconstitutionally collect any American’s personal online information without FISA warrants, including search history, emails, file transfers and live chats. Tech executives insisted they had no knowledge of Prism.
In a scheme orchestrated from Washington, D.C., Obama administration official Lois Lerner, former director of the Exempt Organizations Unit of the Internal Revenue Service (IRS), illegally targeted politically-conservative organizations, either denying them tax-exempt status or delaying that status until they could no longer effectively take part in the 2012 election. Lerner didn’t merely target conservative groups to deny them tax-free status, she illegally handed over more than a million pages of tax returns to the Justice Department.
Some IRS employees even claimed that Obama himself requested the crackdown.
Then, just when people thought things couldn’t get any worse…
Lacking the evidence to justify opening a criminal investigation of Donald Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign, Barack Obama’s CIA and FBI directors, John Brennan and James Comey, opened a counterintelligence investigation blessed by the White House, took powers that enable the government to monitor foreign adversaries, and used them illegally to spy on fellow American political opponents.
None of the malefactors faced serious investigations, indictments, trials, or legal penalties. In fact, some of the worst have been rewarded.
Joe Biden is in the White House. Hillary, Holder, Lerner, Brennan and Comey are free citizens.
Now “senior counsel” at a power law firm, Holder “…advises clients on complex investigations and litigation matters…,” Lerner has received a $100,000 annual pension since she retired in September, 2013. Former-Secretary, candidate, cum political gadfly, Clinton is a “professor” at Columbia University’s School of International and Public Affairs.
Brennan is a “Senior Analyst” at NBC/MSNBC, and Comey is writing…wait for it…crime fiction!
Barack Obama did much to convince Americans that government agencies are lawless, incompetent, untrustworthy and partisan.
President(ish) Joe Biden, his Obama-era White House retreads, and appointees/allies at the Departments of Defense, Homeland Security, Justice, and Transportation, plus the Centers for Disease Control finished Obama’s job. And they’re still prosecuting their political opponents.
Perhaps not coincidentally, since taking office in January, 2021, an aged, mentally/physically-impaired Biden has spent more than a full year, about 40 percent of his presidency on “vacation” …and counting…
Under the circumstances, one might reasonably conclude that Barack Obama and Obama administration alumni are still calling the shots.
