Thread: ATF GUN PROBE: Behind the fall of Operation Fast and Furious

LETTERS: NCT, Nov. 28, 2011


A bungled conspiracy to grab our guns?

The mainstream media has been silent about Project Gunrunner, aka Operation Fast and Furious, except for broadcasting the propaganda that 90 percent of the guns originated in the U.S. Nor did they report that funding for Project Gunrunner was hidden within President Obama's multibillion-dollar stimulus bill for shovel-ready jobs, providing $10 million for the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives to supply approximately 2,000 fully automatic weapons to the Mexican drug cartels.

The alleged goal was to provide firearms to the cartels as a "sting operation" and to find out where the guns were going so that criminals could be identified, but it was bungled. So why would U.S. authorities encourage the ATF to arm dangerous gangs with guns that we believe have killed at least one American border patrol agent and possibly thousands of Mexicans? And what is U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder hiding, who bragged about Project Gunrunner in 2009, but now claims he only learned of it recently?

Congressman Darrell Issa is presently investigating this impeachable scandal with inside information from whistle-blowers and has found that Holder is stonewalling. Why shouldn't we suspect this is a conspiracy to grab our guns by discovering evidence planted by our government, and why isn't Holder fired?

Darrell B

Ramona

http://www.nctimes.com/news/opinion/let ... 4148f.html

Moving to News

Key question in scandal: Why?

Nov. 28, 2011 05:54 PM
The Arizona Republic

Confusion surrounds the murderously destructive Operation Fast and Furious gun-running scandal mostly for one very big reason:

None of the Washington, D.C., planners of the federal plan to trace weapons purchased in Arizona to the drug cartels of Mexico have articulated how they expected to accomplish that feat. It is the great, enduring mystery of Fast and Furious.

An epic analysis on Sunday by Republic reporter Dennis Wagner brought into striking focus most of what we know now about the operation and the politics of this scandal. It is a compelling backstory that fills in nearly every blank space about Fast and Furious, save one: Why?

Why run the guns into Mexico if they knew they couldn't trace them past the border?

Why ignore the urgent reports of frustrated federal field agents that they were losing track of the weapons?

And, most perplexing of all: Why in the world allow hundreds of high-powered weapons into Mexico without alerting the Mexicans?

From early 2009 until December 2010, agents of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives permitted so-called straw buyers in Arizona to purchase more than 2,000 weapons, including high-caliber and assault-style rifles.

From there, ATF agents allowed about two-thirds of the weapons to be smuggled across the border into Mexico, where virtually all of them disappeared.

That is, they disappeared until they started turning up at murder scenes in Mexico and, in December, at the scene of a shootout near Rio Rico in Arizona, where Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry was killed. Two Fast and Furious weapons were found near the scene.

Despite an early, intense effort by administration officials to stonewall responsibility, details of Fast and Furious began filtering out. But what has filtered out, at the bottom line, makes no sense:

It is not that Fast and Furious went awry. It was not botched. It appears to have gone according to plan, which was to allow weapons to cross the Mexican border and fall into the hands of the cartels. But exactly how such a plan would culminate in the arrest of "big fish" gun runners and cartel kingpins ... no one can say.

The lack of coordination with Mexican authorities is the most baffling aspect of the operation, as well as one of its most embarrassing.

For years, Mexican authorities have begged Washington for help at staunching the flow of guns to the drug cartels. One such response conducted by the George W. Bush-era ATF appears similar to Fast and Furious, but with one seemingly important distinction: The ATF coordinated with Mexican authorities so they could track about a dozen weapons being "walked" south of the border.

Ominously, it appears that Operation Wide Receiver in 2007 was botched, and the weapons trove disappeared as it crossed into Mexico.

So, why resurrect a botched operation that produced no good results, with the added complexity that our Mexican allies are left in the dark? As noted, it is the enduring mystery of this bizarre Washington-centric scandal.

From the evidence at hand, the deadly, reckless operation known as Fast and Furious also seriously complicates this country's relationship with Mexico, which our federal government appears to have treated callously.

http://www.azcentral.com/arizonarepubli ... z1f4GPPQc0

Holder lashes out at The Daily Caller while refusing to address growing calls for his resignation


Published: 4:56 PM 11/29/2011 | Updated: 9:56 PM 11/29/2011




Embattled Attorney General Eric Holder today demanded The Daily Caller stop publishing articles about the growing calls in Congress for his resignation because of the failed Operation Fast and Furious gun-walking program.

As Holder’s aide was escorting the attorney general offstage following his remarks Tuesday afternoon at the White House, a Daily Caller reporter introduced himself and shook Holder’s hand. The reporter asked him for a response to the growing chorus of federal legislators demanding his resignation.

Holder stepped towards the exit, then turned around, stepped back toward the reporter, and sternly said, “You guys need to — you need to stop this. It’s not an organic thing that’s just happening. You guys are behind it.â€

Added the previous article to the Homepage with an amended title:
http://www.alipac.us/article-6813--0-0.html

Holder blames Americans for gun-running

November 30, 2011

By Neil Munro

Caller’s reporting on the Fast and Furious gun-running scandal shortly after government officials and reporters heard him admonish Americans for funding gun-runners.

Holder appeared Tuesday at a White House event to showcase a new media campaign that is intended to stigmatize the selling and buying of knock-off videos and counterfeit fashion products.

Holder recorded one critical radio ad, which is titled “You can help.â€

Holder must resign now. And remember friends, we have to vote Obama out in 2012. We are sick and tired of Obama and the dems.

We should start calling him Charlie Brown:

Charlie Brown, Charlie Brown
He's a clown, that Charlie Brown
He's gonna get caught
Just you wait and see

Why's everybody always pickin' on me?

RELATED

OPERATION GUNRUNNER Information Collection Point
http://www.alipac.us/ftopic-233906-0-da ... rasc-.html

'Fast and Furious' Whistleblowers
Struggle Six Months After Testifying Against ATF Program

By William Lajeunesse

Published November 30, 2011 FoxNews.com

Six months ago, several agents with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives stood before Congress to testify about the details of a U.S. government program that armed Mexico's largest drug cartel with thousands of assault rifles.

The administration denied it at the time and questioned the agents' integrity. The men were nervous and scared. They said they feared for their careers, their reputation and their families.

"Any attempt to retaliate against them for their testimony today would be unfair, unwise and unlawful," Sen. Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, warned the Department of Justice.

He and Rep. Darrell Issa, R-Calif., began an investigation to determine who authorized "Operation Fast and Furious" and aimed to hold accountable those responsible for a plan that helped known criminals run guns across the border in violation of U.S. and international law.

And while President Obama has said the operation was a mistake and that "people who screwed up will be held accountable," the record so far does not bear that out. Those in charge of the botched operation have been reassigned or promoted, their pensions intact. But many of those who blew the whistle face isolation, retaliation and transfer.

Here's what has happened to the managers of the operation:

[color=darkred][b]-- Acting ATF Chief Ken Melson, who oversaw the operation, is now an adviser in the Office of Legal Affairs. He remains in ATF's Washington, D.C., headquarters.

-- Acting Deputy Director Billy Hoover, who knew his agency was walking guns and demanded an "exit strategy" just five months into the program, is now the special agent in charge of the D.C. office. He, too, did not have to relocate.

-- Deputy Director for Field Operations William McMahon received detailed briefings about the illegal operation and later admitted he shares "responsibility for mistakes that were made.â€