Eric Holder Resigns, Tenure Marked by Some of Worst Scandals in Recent Memory

The Associated Press said outgoing Attorney General Eric Holder brought "change" to the office and the Obama Administration.  That's putting it mildly.

The AP also pointed out Holder's unflinching commitment to civil rights,  trying to spin many of his actions as positive.   But it's hard to find any area where he left the AG office better than when he came in.  The website Red State recently published a story called Sixteen Scandals: The Legacy of Eric Holder.

In no particular order, some of the scandals, blunders and gaffes he committed included:

*Despite his denials,  considerable evidence points to him knowing about and perhaps even overseeing, the notorious Fast and Furious debacle, where ATF and Federal officials allowed guns to be illegally sold to drug cartels with the hope of them being traced;  eventually leading up ladders of drug crime and pinpointing kingpins.   It failed miserably, and several dozen deaths have been directly linked to F & F guns.  Most notably, the still unprosecuted death of Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry, who was killed by guns traced back to the F & F program.   Thousands of guns are still unaccounted for.

*The New Black Panther cases in 2008 and 2012.    Members of the New Black Panther party were accused of intimidating white voters at various polling places in Philadelphia.  Despite evidence supplied by local law enforcement, witnesses and other information,  Holder refused to hold the group accountable for attempting to tamper with elections by voter intimidation.

*AP surveillance.   The Justice Department, over which Holder was responsible,  obtained several months of phone records,  emails and other information from various Associated Press reporters.  Critics called it a "massive and unprecedented intrusion" into how news is gathered and reported by the free press.

*The Fort Hood shooting massacre.   Not once during the investigation and subsequent trial of Fort Hood shooter Nidal Hasan did Holder or the Justice Department ever mention Hasan's Islamist ideology.   It was labled workplace violence by Justice, despite mounds of evidence to the contrary.

*Fox Reporter James Rosen targeted.    Holder's Justice Department monitored phone lines of Fox News, trying to accuse Rosen of conspiring with North Korean sources, when in reality he was just trying to obtain information on breaking news before other networks.

*Even before becoming Obama's Attorney General, Holder held conservative Americans in contempt.  In 2004 he uttered the following statements at an American Constitution gathering event:

"Conservatives have been defenders of the status quo, afraid of the future, and content to allow to continue to exist all but the most blatant inequalities.”

"Conservatives have “made a mockery of the rule of law.”

"Conservatives try to “put the environment at risk for the sake of unproven economic theories, to play to the fears of our citizens, and not to their hopes, and to return the nation to a time that in fact never existed.”

*Holder's Opposition to Second Amendment Rights.   In 2008, Holder tried to defy the 2nd. Amendment, the right to bear arms, by saying it didn't apply to individual citizens- but only militias.   On the record, Holder never opposed any gun control law ever presented while he was Attorney General.

*Treating Terrorists as Criminal Defendants instead of Enemy Combatants.  This was why Obama tried to have terrorists put on trial in New York City, instead of using military tribunals - which would have given terrorists much stiffer sentences.

Not since Watergate in the 1970's have we seen an Attorney General as tainted and ineffective.  In fact, he makes John Mitchell (Nixon's AG) look like a groundbreaking pioneer of justice.

Holder will definitely not be missed.