Posted on 08/04/2011 6:36:23 AM PDT by marktwain
Most of the larger national media outlets are doing their best to ignore the Gunwalker scandal, but the word is dribbling out despite the best efforts of the Obama Administration and their lackeys in the mainstream press. Those who know about the outrageous project should be demanding answers and accountability.
The recent hearings in the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, chaired by Rep. Darrel Issa (R-CA), showed clearly that agents of the ATF and other agencies, working with the approval from the highest levels of the Department of Justice – no more than one desk below Attorney General Erik Holder, if not Holder himself – actively conspired and facilitated the sale of some 2000 or more rifles to suspected illegal firearms traffickers and then intentionally allowed those guns to continue in illicit channels with no attempt to track, interdict, or disable them. ATF field agents who objected to the program were threatened and rebuked. On one occasion an agent pointed out that people were being killed with guns supplied by the ATF and his manager responded with the callous cliché that if you want to make an omelet, you have to break a few eggs.
Mexican authorities report that some 300 Mexican nationals have been killed with these guns along with at least one and possibly two US law enforcement officers. Those are some pretty costly eggs.
The President of the United States has told a Mexican journalist that he did not authorize the program and that Erik Holder didn’t either.
ATF and DOJ have claimed that the objective was to track guns up to Mexican “drug lords” and possibly topple a Mexican drug cartel, but the whole program was kept a secret from Mexican authorities and agents were ordered to make no effort to track the guns beyond the original purchaser. Agents watched as suspected firearms traffickers purchased dozens of AK-style firearms. They trailed the suspects, and guns, to a rendezvous where the guns were transferred to another vehicle, and then, in accordance with strict orders, they allowed the other vehicle, and the guns, to drive away without even an effort to identify the person or track or interdict the guns.
Meanwhile the ATF and DOJ have continued to promulgate inaccurate and deceptive statistics regarding firearms trafficking and the involvement of illegally trafficked firearms in crime in Mexico – statistics that are falsely inflated by the Gunwalker project itself. They have also continued with attempts to change congressionally mandated regulations to include the reporting and tracking of purchasers of more than one rifle in a given week.
While such reporting and tracking might seem reasonable on the surface, even to some firearm owners, the actual utility of the reporting program is questionable, and is a major usurpation of power by ATF. The Bureau is specifically forbidden from collecting such information – in the same statute which authorizes such reporting for multiple handguns. What’s more, ATF is notorious for failing to delete information gathered in this manner as required by law, thus building a de facto registration system.
The evidence does not support the existence of any large-scale gun trafficking rings. The largest and most successful gun trafficking rings uncovered so far were those endorsed and supported by the ATF in Project Gunwalker, aka “Operation Fast and Furious.” Without ATF assistance forcing gun dealers to cooperate, these dealers would never have taken the chance of repeatedly selling large quantities of guns to suspicious-looking cash customers. And even then, ATF ignored the structure of these organizations. They were only interested in the straw buyers, not any of their immediate associates, and, as I mentioned above, ATF specifically forbade any disclosure of the Gunwalker program to anyone within the government of Mexico.
All that ATF seemed interested in was who bought the guns, how many they bought, and where the guns turned up in crimes. The fact that the guns did turn up at crime scenes – murders, maimings, and massacres, including of Mexican police officers or government officials – seems to have been of little concern to ATF and DOJ officials.
This limited interest suggests only two possible motivations: to build stronger, more incriminating cases against straw purchasers – the guys ATF has consistently insisted are the bottom of the food chain – or to generate statistical and emotional support for their requested increases in authority. Perhaps one was just a “happy side effect” of the other. In either case, the strategy was seriously flawed and hundreds of people lost their lives.
Your senators and congressmen will be home for the summer recess. Tell them that you want funding and authority to ATF curtailed until more safeguards against usurpation of rights can be established. This is your government. It’s up to you to hold them accountable.
Permission to reprint or post this article in its entirety is hereby granted provided this credit and link is included. Text is available at www.FirearmsCoalition.org. To receive The Firearms Coalition’s bi-monthly newsletter, The Knox Hard Corps Report, write to PO Box 3313, Manassas, VA 20108.
Copyright © 2010 Neal Knox Associates – The most trusted name in the rights movement.
The money quote.
Gunwalker ping.
Is there an online petition we can sign to demand accountability?
Is there an online petition where the Administration will laugh right in your face, ignore every legal demand, and push for gun control ANYWAYS?
The real reason for Gunwalker was to create a pretext for banning so-called assault rifles here in the U.S. The Left fears that armed citizens may someday use such weapons to take back our country. They want their fascist LEOs to be the only ones having access to guns.
Someone help me out. All this testimony to Issa and Grassley, clearly showing how inept, incompetent, malicious, selfish and just plain stupid this administration and its justice department is. What’s next? What’s the next step? None of this will matter, until there are criminal charges brought against someone. When that happens and people start accepting pleas or are convicted, then all the stonewalling and corruption will collapse. Toss in there, the Mexican government asking to extradite a few folks and then people will be running to Issa, et al, to work a deal. This debacle could be categorized as state sponsored terrorism as these cartels have been dubbed “Narco Terrorists”. So again, what’s the next step?
Now that the NRA has taken notice that the batmen are documenting sales of two or more rifles, I am hopeful that this draws attention from the media to report ALL the shenanigans going on including those of Gunwalker and FFGate. Best we can hope is that the citizenry contact their representatives, Issa, and Grassley and put the word out that this whole coverup needs to be fully investigated and that an independent prosecutor be appointed. The fox guarding the hen house is a conflict of interest.
Let them laugh....now. I’ll go on the record ANYWAY!
;-)
If I were Issa, I would want this case to keep building and getting coverage until at least March of 2012. I think the next step would be to send investigators to Tampa, Houston, and Dallas to interview people to see if there were "gunwalking" from those locations. This would give a national context to the gunwalker scandal so that it could not be explained as a single ATF operation gone wild.
I would be actively looking for FBI, DEA, and other agency members to "come in out of the cold" to be protected by whistle-blower status.
I would be organizing more congressional hearings to get answers on record to questions that I already have documentary proof of.
About March, I would organize hearings highlighting victims of the bloody gunwalker scheme involving tearful family members from the U.S. and Mexico.
Is there an online petition where the Administration will laugh right in your face, ignore every legal demand, and push for gun control ANYWAYS.
............................................................
Hey they are already doing that.
They refuse requests for papers on it, they are stone walling, and the arrogant Obama has already put in new regulations.
Special Prosecutor would be nice.
That is an utter, complete, total lie. If the incompetent, evil bastards couldn't "topple" a drug cartel on its basic product, drugs, they have no chance in hell of "toppling" it on ancillary charges.
When Clinton left the white house it need to be fumigated. When obama leaves it will need to be exorcised.
Bush did not undo Clinton’s damage. This is why president “anyone but Obama” RINO is unacceptable.
Gunwalker is this regime’s Reichstag fire, and that operation was quite successful.
Absolutely correct.
Don’t forget about Agent Terry’s family’s intent to file a lawsuit against the DOJ for discovery in their son’s death. They want to know exactly what happened and who was involved and responsible as well.
Ya think?
but until someone is looking at a prison sentence, none of this matters. Again, my hats off to Rep. Issa and Sen. Grassley, but until someone is looking at some time behind bars, it isn’t worth the paper its written on. I was in law enforcement and had the opportunity to work with the Feds occasionally. When they had you, and they normally took their time to make sure they did have you, they gave you one chance to make a deal. The term they used was, “you got one chance to get on the bus”. If the person in question didn’t get on the bus, then see ya’. Only then, will this amount to anything.
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