Posted on 01/13/2017 11:50:26 AM PST by PROCON
I’ve done a fair amount of work with ATF agents over the years. Maybe I was just lucky, but the guys I worked with were as patriotic, gun loving, 2nd amendment loving folks, as anyone I’ve ever met. It was always their leadership, the appointed and ass-kissing, ones that were the main issues. Do they have some knuckleheads? YUP. No more than anyone else, though.
But, their usefulness and mandate has come to an end.
Lets just say that there are 100,000 FFLs in the country(for arguments sake) and 1% are crooked. 1000 are dirty. When they are caught, they will spend a very, very, very long time in prison. Ergo, pretty much all FFLs operate well above board because they don’t want to go to prison, are law abiding folks, love guns and are ardent supporters of the 2nd Amendment. ATF requires FFL dealers to maintain their records for a certain amount of years(maybe 5, not sure). Most FFL guys I’ve dealt with keep their paperwork, far longer in the even that an investigation or gun trace leads ATF to their door. So, they take the responsibility very seriously.
Once ATF is done with the small number of cases dealing with dirty FFLs, what do they do? IRS collects revenue on everything, so the job they used to perform, collecting taxes on liquor and tobacco, has been outsourced. Explosives aren’t all that common, yet.
What do they do? They start doing narcotics investigations, because all dope dealers have guns. That’s what the DEA is for. People think that there are thousand and thousands of these agents. What most fed agencies do, is form task forces with the locals and give them federal credentials for their assignments. There are only 3000+/- DEA agents. No way they could do all that work without local help. ATF is no different.
On top of all that, all the agencies refer back to the FBI for pretty much everything, as they have control/oversight over criminal histories, background checks, etc.
Why not reassess the whole NFA-Class 3 regulations to make it more streamlined and less time consuming and then detail some of them to a Firerarms division in the FBI and then send the rest of them after all the muslim, jihadi’s in this country.
I'm no expert, just a gun owner and enthusiast.
Forward your insight to the Trump team's forward guy on this, Congressman Sensenbrenner.
Please, do it and thanks again.
It sounds like something a drunken Kennedy would say!
I ha e one of those tee shirts that says “alcohol tobacco and firearms should be a convenience store not a government agency”.
I have one of those shirts.
This is suspicious.
McCain pulled a stunt like this to kill off one bill by sandbagging with another bill.
IOW the establishment “got mine” wants to keep the epa so they sandbag the issue by pushing in the abolish the atf.
The next four years will be politicians vs the voters.
I was watching NCIS LA last night. I found myself wanting to abolish the CIA, the DEA, the ATF, the FBI, and the LAPD.
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