Posted on 12/13/2007 12:49:33 PM PST by neverdem
Associated Press
Idaho's senators are blocking President Bush's nominee to head the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, saying the agency has become overly aggressive in enforcing gun laws.
Republican Sens. Larry Craig and Mike Crapo placed separate holds on the nomination of federal prosecutor Michael Sullivan, the acting ATF director for more than a year.
Crapo's spokesman, Lindsay Nothern, said the senator's office has heard from a number of gun dealers, gun owners and others in Idaho who "have concerns about ATF policies regarding gun sales and even (gun) ownership. Maybe the federal government is getting a little too aggressive with people who haven't done anything wrong."
Sullivan, who also serves as U.S. attorney in Massachusetts, was nominated by Bush in March. The Senate Judiciary Committee approved his nomination last month.
Under Senate rules, a single senator, sometimes anonymously, can put a hold on legislative action for months.
The ATF had no immediate comment Wednesday.
Crapo met with Sullivan last week and "had some pointed questions," Nothern said. The senator is still waiting for answers, Nothern said.
Sidney Smith, a spokesman for Craig, said the Craig's intention "was not to throw up a permanent roadblock. We were hearing concerns from people in our state about how ATF was working with law-abiding gun dealers on compliance issues."
Craig also met with Sullivan and awaits answers to his questions, Smith said.
The action comes as an Idaho gun shop wages a high-profile battle with the ATF over its right to buy and trade guns.
The ATF stripped the license of Red's Trading Post, in Twin Falls, Idaho, in March after an audit found numerous record-keeping violations over a five-year period.
A federal judge later ruled the agency had exaggerated and omitted some of the findings it used to revoke the license. U.S. District Judge Edward Lodge allowed the gun shop to continue operating until he decides whether the license revocation was legal. The case is pending.
Sullivan, a former GOP state legislator, has been known for a tough stance on drug and gun cases in his tenure as U.S. attorney. One judge criticized him publicly for burdening the federal system with cases that could be handled by state prosecutors.
Associated Press writer Andrew Miga contributed to this report.
Maybe? Better to shut this out of control agency down than to argue over who heads it up
I know but it depends on who is talking to him I expect!
Keep your glasses clean.
Huh? Did you mean to post that to someone else? I'm sure you didn't mean it for me because I've been outspoken against this President when it wasn't so accepted here on FR. I've been a very vocal critic against GWB and his open borders policy, his liberal spending, his globalist agenda and have taken exception with his nominations and many issues over his first and second terms. I am one woman who speaks her mind, and have burned up the airways to DC, not just to him, but to ALL of my elected representatives in DC. So much so, that they all hate me now. LOL
I've had problems with elPresidente Boosh since the first trip he took to South America where he gave away millions of our tax dollars everywhere he went. I've been bitterly opposed to his shamnesty plans. You should know that because we've posted on illegal immigration threads in the past. I have also been very critical of him using US muscle against Israel to give the Palestinians land that was God given to Israel.
There is another FReeper with NRA in his nickname. Perhaps you meant him?
Nixon froze everything in the early 70s.
Cost me a bundle as well.
No, bribes weren’t part of it. Craig and Crapo finally listened to people like Ryan Horsley, Len Savage and others and they finally researched the documentation at places like www.nfaoa.org and www.jpfo.org.
If you go to the first web addy and check out the documentation, it’ll shock you what the BATFE has been trying to get away with.
Mike
That's all you need to know about his position on gun rights. King George II sucking up to his buddy Lord Teddy the Grossly Obese by appointing one of Teddy's anti-gun cronies. Where are the bushbots to tell us all how this is some sort of secret clever move by Bush to enhance gun owners rights?
“Idaho senators block Bush’s ATF pick” and “And my apologies for any redundant pings.”
Joe, good news can never be redundant. I heard this ATF guy is a real a$$clown.
Keep up the great work you do with the Bang list.
folks in Idaho still remember Ruby Ridge and view the ATF as a dangerous police state vehicle
Good that these Senators stepped up
Not real familiar w Sen Crapo....but sounds like I wouldnt mind trading Idaho my liberal anti-American FL senators for him (like Idaho would ever agree to such a deal)
Bush’s nomination sounds like more liberal globalist nonsense. Of course, Bush sounds like a gun-grabber....and you can bet his NAU plans will include gun-grabbing
>Perhaps you meant him?<
Very good possibility.
A good first start. But I'd say:
Nearly starved us. I attended AFROTC field training in the summer of '71. (6 week version for entry into the 2 year program). They paid us at the rate of an E-1, basic trainee. After paying for our own laundry, getting our 1505s and fatigues starched, and for our flight ball cap, and some other BS fees, we where left with very little pay. And being unavailable for 1/2 the summer meant I could not work my regular, reasonable well paying, summer job. I'd been married about a year when I finished that training. Fortunately, my wife graduated while I was learning to march and make my bed, and started teaching shortly after I returned. We not only didn't starve, we moved to a nice 2 BR apartment, instead of the converted first floor of a 50 y/o old house. (At least we had a real living room, dining room and kitchen, and the bedroom and bath was an "add on" rather than a conversion, so other than the neighborhood, it really wasn't all that bad).
I second that emotion. Thanks, Joe.
Are these the kinds of appointments that trancend administrations? Weren't a number of Clinton hold-overs running agencies during the Bush era? If that's the case, why do we even hold elections?
Craig’s on the NRA board. What’s happening at Red’s is a disgrace and ought to be even more public than it is. IMHO.
My opinion’s about the same as yours, I reckon... Dismantle the BATF and jail the BATFags... every one of them!
Bush a globalist traitor?
Naw, it is more simple than that.
Bush is owned by Mexico.
Clinton is owned by China.
I do not see how anyone who served as attorney general of Mass could possibly be relied on to obey gun laws and run the ATF. Mass has ignored the constitution, federal and stat, for years.
Damn, that is US attorney, not attorney general...the idea is the same. He was there to enforce federal law in Mass, something not done there for a very long time.
Actually, it is pronounced cray-po. And on this one I’ll call him that. But on his nonresponse on the issue of my nephew, Sgt. Evan Vela, we are going with crap-o. Have you heard about Evan Vela? FReepmail me if you are interested, so as not to bust in on this thread.
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