Political Ruminations

Wingnut Mike Vanderboegh Advocates Armed Insurrection Over Health Care Decision

Mike Vanderboegh, a wingnut blogger who among other things,  was  responsible for the Fast and Furious mess, continues to pose harm to this country with his idea of achieving a dubious sort of fame. Via Media Matters, emphasis mine:

Mike Vanderboegh, the ex-militia blogger who calls himself one of the "midwives" of the Operation Fast and Furious scandal, recently predicted that if the Supreme Court declared the health care reform bill to be constitutional, it would lead to violent insurrection against "government tyranny."

The blogger posted the statements, which come from a recent unpublished interview, the same day the House of Representatives voted to find Attorney General Eric Holder in contempt over his unwillingness to release documents related to Fast and Furious.

In the excerpts Vanderboegh posted on his blog "which deal with the decision today," he says of a then-potential decision upholding the health care law, "You may call tyranny a mandate or you may call it a tax, but it still is tyranny and invites the same response." He further predicts the response of his ilk: "If we refuse to obey, we will be fined. If we refuse to pay the fine, we will in time be jailed. If we refuse to report meekly to jail, we will be sent for by armed men. And if we refuse their violent invitation at the doorsteps of our own homes we will be killed -- unless we kill them first. ... I am on record as advocating the right of defensive violence against a tyrannical regime."

Vanderboegh gained fame in 2010 when he urged his readers to respond to the passage of health care reform by breaking the windows of Democratic offices, then took credit after vandals struck several such offices. The Alabama-based blogger has previously been part of the militia and Minuteman movements, and leads the Three Percenters, a group which claims to represent the three percent of gun owners who "who will not disarm, will not compromise and will no longer back up at the passage of the next gun control act" but will instead, "if forced by any would-be oppressor, ... kill in the defense of ourselves and the Constitution."

Vanderboegh was one of the first to break the story that ATF whistleblowers said that they had been ordered to knowingly allow gun trafficking suspects to take weapons across the border into Mexico. The operation was intended to allow law enforcement to identify other members of the trafficking network that for years has directed assault weapons into the hands of Mexican cartels, with the goal of bringing those cartels down. He has said that he and a fellow blogger were the "midwives of the scandal"  who introduced the whistleblowers to congressional investigators. He has theorized that the operation was part of a secret plot against the Second Amendment directed from the highest levels of government. 

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The Truth About Holder's Contempt Citation

You’ve probably either seen the news clips on television, or read something about Congress’ vote to hold U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder in contempt for supposedly withholding information in the investigation of  “Fast and Furious”.  And, if you have, there is a very good possibility that you’re confused considering how ridiculous and outrageous this whole mess is.

Not to worry, Rachel Maddow to the rescue, during 2 segments of her show. Watch this video/segment first in order to learn the basis of the latest wingnut conspiracy theory which got Holder in trouble with the congressional Frothing-at-the-Mouth-Republicans:

The second video talks about the congressional action on Holder yesterday, along with some discussion of the gun control issue. Watch:

Now, Holder’s contempt citation isn’t the end of it by any means, and in fact, the President asserted executive authority in this matter yesterday, and while conservatives would like you believe that this means he was somehow directly involved in the idiocy, it does not necessarily mean that. Steve Benen:

A spokesperson for House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) said the decision "implies" that White House officials were involved in the operation. Fox News' Andrew Napolitano made the same argument on the air: "Executive privilege protects communications with the president, the human being of the president, not with people that work for him and the Justice Department."

No matter what one thinks of the underlying controversy -- and for the record, I think the right's interest in the matter is kind of silly -- it's worth pausing to clarify that executive privilege doesn't necessarily involve communications with the president. Josh Israel noted there are actually "two types executive privilege: the robust 'presidential communications privilege' and the more limited 'deliberative process privilege.'"

The White House may invoke the latter to apply to executive branch officials outside of the president's inner circle, as long as they were involved with the government's decision-making process. Presidents Ronald Reagan, George H.W. Bush, and George W. Bush all asserted executive privilege in matters not involving presidential communications.

And Bush Administration Attorney General Michael Mukasey invoked the same "deliberative process privilege" as recently as 2008, rejecting congressional subpoenas for reports of Department of Justice interviews with the White House staff regarding the Valerie Plame Wilson identify leak investigation.

Republicans, including House Oversight Committee Chairman Darrell Issa (R-Calif.), are well aware of this -- they endorsed the distinction during the Bush/Cheney era -- and have acknowledged that executive privilege is not limited to the president's direct communications.

But they're playing a political game today, hoping you aren't well aware of this.

Now that you’re reasonably well informed you might be tempted to think that since this mess all hinges on both a George W. Bush policy, and a seriously crazy/whacko conspiracy theory by a ridiculous little man wingnut who counts for, well, nothing, that this will all go away soon.

You would be wrong. The contempt vote against Holder is just a step on the way to holding the president in contempt, then going for impeachment proceedings in his second term. They were always gonna do this. They made plans to “lynch them a Negro” ™ back when President Obama was elected or maybe even during the run-up to the election. After all, there was no way the good old boys with power were ever going to be alright with a black man as the president. If you thought otherwise, you were, like myself, deluded.

And, just as it will be a modern form of lynching, so too will it be a modern coup d’etat.

Adding………you can easily see where they’re going with this if you read a June 18 opinion piece by Cal Thomas.

H/T mrbrink