Barack Obama,  President 2008

Barack Obama Watch: Another Obama VP Mistake – Eric Holder

June 12, 2008 /

Former Deputy Attorney General Eric Holder and Pardon Attorney Roger Adams testify on the pardon that former President Clinton gave to Marc Rich during a Senate Judiciary Hearing February 14, 2001 in Washington DC

Now that James Johnson has resigned as a member of Barack Obama’s Vice President search committee, Flap wonders why a character like Eric Holder continues to serve in the same capacity?

In a new book about Bill Clinton, Clinton in Exile by Chicago author Carol Felsenthal, Holder — then the No. 2 man in the Clinton Justice Department, with responsibility for pardons — was seen as “so ambitious to be attorney general in the expected Gore administration” that he “played ball” with a Gore confidant, Jack Quinn, who was Rich’s lawyer. Felsenthal wrote that Holder ”adamantly denies there was any secret deal.”

Several people I talked to in Obama’s orbit were surprised that Obama tapped Johnson. For a candidate running on a change platform and against Washington, Johnson is an insider’s insider. He vetted vice presidential contenders for Walter Mondale in 1984 and John Kerry in 2004.

Alex Conant, spokesman for the Republican National Committee, said if Obama “is concerned his campaign’s ties to special interests are distracting from his VP search and message, why is Eric Holder still on his search committee,” adding “Obama’s hypocritical attacks show he can’t stand up to his own standard — and that he just isn’t ready to make change.”

As Chris Muir said in an earlier comment, PLUS CA CHANGE.

3 Comments

  • Andrew Yu-Jen Wang

    March 7, 2009 at 5:07 pm

    Speaking of U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder:

    Eric Holder is a racial-minority individual, and in his heart and mind he inevitably does not endorse hate crimes committed by George W. Bush.

    George W. Bush committed hate crimes of epic proportions and with the stench of terrorism (indicated in my blog).

    George W. Bush did in fact commit innumerable hate crimes.

    And I do solemnly swear by Almighty God that George W. Bush committed other hate crimes of epic proportions and with the stench of terrorism which I am not at liberty to mention.

    Many people know what Bush did.

    And many people will know what Bush did—even to the end of the world.

    Bush was absolute evil.

    Bush is now like a fugitive from justice.

    Bush is a psychological prisoner.

    Bush has a lot to worry about.

    Bush can technically be prosecuted for hate crimes at any time.

    In any case, Bush will go down in history in infamy.

    Submitted by Andrew Yu-Jen Wang
    B.S., Summa Cum Laude, 1996
    Messiah College, Grantham, PA
    Lower Merion High School, Ardmore, PA, 1993

    “GEORGE W. BUSH IS THE WORST PRESIDENT IN U.S. HISTORY” BLOG OF ANDREW YU-JEN WANG
    ______________________
    I am not sure where I had read it before, but anyway, it is a linguistically excellent statement, and it goes kind of like this: “If only it were possible to ban invention that bottled up memories so they never got stale and faded.” Oh wait—off the top of my head—I think the quotation came from my Lower Merion High School yearbook.