Fast And Furious: What Did Obama Know, When Did He Know It?

Watergate Complex and adjacent Kennedy Center

 The Obama administration's Fast and Furious gun running program will go down in history as an object lesson in how not to manage potentially controversial policies and programs. For over two years, Fast and Furious has been a smoking but reasonably dormant story for the nation's traditional media. After all, in their eyes we're experiencing the most transparent administration in history. Today, they can no longer ignore a story that brought a contempt of Congress citation to Attorney General Holder's desk. Today, they can no longer ignore a contempt citation that suddenly forced President Obama to exercise executive privilege over thousands of Fast and Furious documents. Last week's Holder problem is this week's Obama problem. Last week search for transparency is this week's search for a cover up. Had Obama invoked executive privilege two years ago, the investigation of Fast and Furious would likely be a small footnote in the history books. Now it's taking on the hallmarks of Watergate.

And all of this is spilling across the media just 120 days before the November election. With virtually no positives to bolster his campaign and a Supreme Court decision coming next week that could demolish his health care overhaul, a Watergate is the last thing Obama needs.

Unfortunately, this story simply reinforces the amateur, if not reckless, management Americans have endured under this administration. It's like a horrendous big-budget Hollywood flop: bad plot, bad direction, bad acting, cheap CGI, overcooked score, sloppy cinematography, poor editing, and a bad end.

For more interpretation of Fast and Furious:

Hiding Behind Executive Privilege, National Review Online 

The Politics of Fast and Furious, Power Line

Those Fast and Furious Documents Must Be Dynamite, Power Line

The Fast and Furious Scandal is turning into Watergate, The Telegraph, H/T Drudge