"Bully boys: A brief history of White House thuggery"

My thanks to Jackie J. for forwarding this from Michelle Malkin.

One other note: If they will do this to people they know have recourse to the courts and the resources to pursue it, what will their subordinate agencies do to people who are perceived as powerless? Just a thought.

Mike
III

Bully boys: A brief history of White House thuggery
By Michelle Malkin

July 29, 2009 07:51 AM

Just finished up on the Today Show, where I had a quick chance to briefly expose the Culture of Corruption in the age of Obama. My syndicated column today adds to the dossier with a round-up of fresh Bully Boy moments.

It’s the Chicago way.

***

Bully boys: A brief history of White House thuggery
by Michelle Malkin
Creators Syndicate
Copyright 2009

Six months into the Obama administration, it should now be clear to all Americans: Hope and Change came to the White House wrapped in brass knuckles.

Ask the Congressional Budget Office. Last week, President Obama spilled the beans on the Today Show that he had met with CBO director Douglas Elmendorf – just as the number-crunchers were casting ruinous doubt on White House cost-saving claims. Yes, question the timing. The CBO is supposed to be a neutral score-keeper – not a water boy for the White House. But when the meeting failed to stop the CBO from issuing more analysis undercutting the health care savings claims, Obama’s budget director Peter Orszag played the heavy.

Orszag warned the CBO in a public letter that it risked feeding the perception that it was “exaggerating costs and underestimating savings.” Message: Leave the number-fudging to the boss. Capiche?

President Obama issued an even more explicit order to unleash the hounds on Blue Dog Democrats during his health care press conference. “Keep up the heat” translated into Organizing for America/Democrat National Committee attack ads on moderate Democrats who have revolted against Obamacare’s high costs and expansive government powers over medical decisions.

Looks like there won’t be a health care beer summit any time soon.

The CBO and the Blue Dogs got off easy compared to inspectors generals targeted by Team Obama goons. Gerald Walpin, the former Americorps inspector general was slimed as mentally incompetent (“confused” and “disoriented”) after blowing the whistle on several cases of community service tax fraud, including the case of Obama crony Kevin Johnson. As I’ve reported previously, Johnson’s the NBA star-turned-Sacramento Democrat mayor who ran a federally-funded non-profit group employing AmeriCorps volunteers that were exploited to perform campaign work for Johnson and provided personal services (car washes, errands) to Johnson and his staff.

Walpin filed suit last week to get his job back – and to defend the integrity and independence of inspector generals system-wide. But he faces hardball tactics from both the West Wing and the East Wing, where First Lady Michelle Obama has been intimately involved in personnel decisions at AmeriCorps, according to youth service program insiders.

At the Environmental Protection Agency, top Obama officials muzzled veteran researcher Alan Carlin, who dared to question the conventional wisdom on global warming. The economist with a physics degree was trashed as a non-scientist know-nothing.

Obama Treasury officials forced banks to take TARP bailout money they didn’t want and obstructed banks that wanted to pay back TARP money from doing so. The administration strong-armed Chrysler creditors and strong-armed Chrysler dealers using politicized tactics that united both House Democrats and Republicans, who passed an amendment last week reversing President Obama on the closure of nearly 800 Chrysler car dealerships and more than 2,000 GM dealerships.

At the Justice Department, Obama lawyers are now blocking a House inquiry into the suspicious decision to dismiss default judgments against radical New Black Panther Party activists who intimidated voters and poll workers on Election Day in Philadelphia. The DOJ is preventing Virginia Republican Rep. Frank Wolf from meeting with the trial team in the case. Rep. Wolf has been pressing for answers on what communications Attorney General Eric Holder and his deputies conducted with third-party interest groups and other political appointees about the case. So far: radio silence.

In the mafia culture, the bully boys depend on a code of silence and allegiance – omerta ­ not only among their brethren, but also from the victims. The victims of Obama thugocracy are no longer cooperating. Perhaps it won’t be long until some of the enforcers start to sing, too.

Michelle Malkin is author of the just-released Culture of Corruption: Obama and His Team of Tax Cheats, Crooks, and Cronies (Regnery).