Holder lied, people died...........

Gunrunner: Cash For Cartels

 Posted 09/27/2011 06:42 PM ET

Scandal: New documents reveal the Department of Justice lied to Congress and show how U.S. officials bought guns with tax dollars and then made sure no one stopped their transfer to Mexican drug cartels.
The funneling of thousands of American guns into the hands of Mexican drug cartels in the operation known as Fast and Furious was not a botched sting operation or the result of bureaucratic incompetence. It was not designed to interdict gun trafficking, but to facilitate it.
We now know that it involved not just the use of straw buyers, but also agents of the federal government purchasing weapons with taxpayer money, ordering the licensed dealers to conduct the sales off the books, then calling off surveillance of the gun traffickers and refusing to interdict the transfer of the weapon or arrest the people involved.
According to documents obtained by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF), agent John Dodson was ordered to buy semiautomatic Draco pistols and was provided a letter by ATF group supervisor David Voth authorizing FFLs (federal firearms licensees) to sell Dodson the guns without filling out the required form.
A copy of the letter obtained by David Codrea of the Gun Rights Examiner tells dealers to "accept this letter in lieu of completing an ATF Form 4473 for the purchase of four (4) CAI, Model Draco, 7.62X39 mm pistols, by Special Agent John Dodson" to be used "in the furtherance of the performance of his official duties."
Scribbled on the letter is this note: "Picked up guns 6/10/10. Paid cash."
According to Fox News, Dodson then sold the guns to known illegal buyers who took them to a stash house. Voth disapproved Dodson's request for 24-hour surveillance and ordered the surveillance team to return to the office.
Dodson stayed behind, against orders. A week later, when a vehicle showed up to transfer the weapons to their ultimate destination, he called for an interdiction team to move in, seize the weapons and arrest the traffickers. Voth refused, and the guns disappeared without surveillance.
Again, Fast and Furious was no botched sting operation. The ATF simply didn't "lose track" of thousands of weapons. We believe this was a planned and premeditated attempt to further the administration's gun-control agenda and its claim that violence in Mexico was our fault.
Voth was "jovial, if not giddy, but just delighted about" such guns showing up at crime scenes in Mexico, according to Dobson's testimony before Rep. Darrel Issa's House Oversight Committee.
"Allowing loads of weapons that we knew to be destined for criminals — this was the plan," Dodson testified to the panel. "It was so mandated."
Another ATF agent, Olindo James Casa, said that "on several occasions I personally requested to interdict or seize firearms, but I was always ordered to stand down and not to seize the firearms."
Fast and Furious let members of the Sinaloa Cartel buy in excess of 1,900 weapons over a one-year period starting in October 2009, according to a document dated last January. What information we have comes from ATF documents and agent testimony. The Justice Department has stonewalled Congress on this issue.
Guns linked to Fast and Furious were found at the scene where Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry was killed in December 2010 at the hands of an illegal immigrant working for the Sinaloa Cartel just 10 miles from the Mexican border near Nogales, Ariz.
Asked by Fox News' Greta Van Susteren about ATF's insistence that this was just a botched sting, Iowa Sen. Charles Grassley responded: "It's a lie — it's a lie — and just to make things clear for your listeners: The ATF ordered this ATF agent to purchase these guns and in turn sell them, and supposedly track them.
"But he was a lone wolf in the operation — they wouldn't give him any help for 24-hour surveillance.
"There's something sinister going on. They're doing everything they can to avoid the issue; they want to stonewall us and string us along," Grassley said of the Justice Department's statements and lack of promised cooperation.
Attorney General Eric Holder's "I know nothing" imitation of TV's Sgt. Schultz long ago evaporated with the discovery of a speech he gave to local authorities in Cuernavaca, Mexico, on April 2, 2009, giving credit for Gunrunner to himself and the Obama administration.
Holder told the audience: "Last week, our administration launched a major new effort to break the backs of the cartels. My department is committing 100 new ATF personnel to the Southwest border in the next 100 days to supplement our ongoing Project Gunrunner, DEA is adding 16 new positions on the border, as well as mobile enforcement teams, and the FBI is creating a new intelligence group focusing on kidnapping and extortion."
A two-year-old C-SPAN video shows Deputy Attorney General David Ogden, who would resign nine months later after less than a year's service, telling reporters at a Justice Department briefing of major policy initiatives to fight the Mexican drug cartels.
"The president has directed us to take action to fight these cartels," Ogden began, "and Attorney General Holder and I are taking several new and aggressive steps as part of the administration's comprehensive plan."
Ogden said the administration's plan, at the president's direction, included the ATF's "increasing its efforts by adding 37 new employees in three new offices, using $10 million in Recovery Act funds and redeploying 100 personnel to the Southwest border in the next 45 days to fortify its Project Gunrunner," of which Operation Fast and Furious would be a part.
The mainstream media have shown little interest in this matter, salivating instead over the recent execution of cop killer Troy Davis while ignoring the government-run operation that killed agent Brian Terry.
Fast and Furious should spark our pursuit of the truth, even if the trail leads to the Oval Office.

What do YOU think of this? Will the truth ever come out?  Why aren't sworn testimonies all over the media? (Ya, imagine ME asking THAT?)
z

Gun Ownership............saving lives

There's an article by Michael Reagan gun ownership and the Norwegian massacre and gun control in general which you might want to read.  Here's the first page from THIS ARTICLE...The second page is linked at the end.

Before you read the article, here are some pertinent stats every American should know if the media was honest:  As far as accidental deaths in 2007 , 39% from cars, 18% from poisoning, 16% from falls,….and only 0.6% from guns!   *** Even deaths from medical mistakes are three times higher than from gun accidents***.
Gun homicides decreased during the mid 90's and remained stable to date, in-spite of population growth, and a dramatic increase in gun ownership. Accidental guns deaths have decreased over 90% during the last 100 years. (Again, in the face of population growth and increase in gun ownership).

Here's the article:

How long would the Norway gunman have lasted in Texas or any state where concealed-carry laws are on the books? I ran a survey while on a cruise: in Texas, 3 minutes; in Montana, 7 to 8 minutes; in Arizona, 2 minutes; and in Nevada, 3 to 5 minutes.
Had Norway not surrendered to the anti-self-defense nuts, and allowed Norwegians to protect themselves by legally carrying guns, the massacre might well have been prevented. There's a lot of truth in the old adage that if guns are outlawed only outlaws will carry guns.
That was certainly true in Norway where Anders Breivik, a lone gunman, launched his assault on youth campers of Utoya Island. According to press reports he fully expected Norway's special forces to swoop down and stop him at any minute. It didn't happen. Faced with unarmed victims he was given plenty of time to kill 68 innocent people who could not defend themselves. Had just one of them been armed, Breivik could have been stopped dead and lives would have been spared.
Moreover, if anyone had paid attention to Breivik's rants they would not have been surprised when he acted on them, especially since Breivik had preceded his attack by setting off a car bomb in the heart of Oslo.
Tragically, Norway's anti-gun hysteria resulted in laws restricting gun ownership by law-abiding citizens, leaving them exposed to gun violence at the hands of criminals such as Breivik, who simply ignore anti-gun ownership laws. Despite the Second Amendment, which protects American citizens' rights to access to guns for self-protection, the Constitutional right of citizens to bear arms is under constant assault.
In his best-selling classic "More Guns, Less Crime," John R. Lott, Jr. has proven that guns make us safer. And in the book "The Bias against Guns," he shows how liberals bury pro-gun facts out of sheer bias against the truth.
With irrefutable evidence, Lott shot down gun critics and provided information we need to win arguments with those fanatics who want to ban gun ownership, leaving criminals who ignore anti-gun ownership laws armed.
History teaches us that governments faced with an armed citizenry are restrained from usurping the rights of individuals. It is thus no surprise that governments which seek to exercise dictatorial powers over their citizens inevitably seek to restrict of outlaw gun ownership by their citizenry. 
To read more, please click HERE.

Thanks for the article and the input, Impertinent.
z

Guns in Mexico.....the real story? Another Priscilla's Post

Operation Fast and Furious

If you were in  a position of power, and you wanted to have an aggressive approach towards gun control, how would you attempt to convince the public that, for the benefit of national security, it is essential to have more control over gun ownership?

It is highly probable you would have to have a crisis of weapons availability to foreign criminals who buy these weapons from citizen gun owners or gun shops, and gun shows. Several months ago, that is exactly what we were told by Hillary Clinton, Janet Napolitano and others within, and politicians outside of,  the administration. We were told American guns were finding their way into Mexico and into the hands of Mexican drug cartels and criminals. Something had to be done, given drug running, and increasing criminal gang activity by illegal aliens affects our national security. The “something” was stricter regulations on gun availability here at home.

Now, jump ahead to today. We’re hearing about "Operation Fast and Furious",  "Gunwalker", or "Operation Gunrunner". It has come out that over 1700 hundred weapons were sold by ATF agents to Mexican buyers called straw men, then they went on to drug cartel criminals in Mexico.

Acting ATF Director Melson has come under fire for this project and has testified that he was kept in the dark about the FBI and DEA involvement. It should be noted that Melson was pressured by the DOJ not to testify.

Here’s an excerpt from a letter to AG Eric Holder from Congressman Issa and Senator Grassley regarding an attempt by the DOJ to prohibit Director Melson's cooperation by giving testimony:

“Justice Department officials sought to limit and control his communications with Congress. This is yet another example of why direct communications with Congress are so important and are protected by law as follows; “Specifically, no officer or employee may attempt to prohibit or prevent any other officer or employee of the Federal Government from having direct oral or written communication or contact with any Member, committee, or subcommittee of the Congress”.

In the past, a program like Project Gunrunner required surveillance of said buyers, tracking of these weapons, and resulted in interdiction and retrieval of the weapons. It was a smaller operation, as well. But not this time.

This time, agents were told to, “let them go”. Agents were stunned and some went to their superiors,  with  complaints reporting this should not be done now and had not been done in the past. Essentially, they were told to be quiet and do what they were told.
Melson said ATF agents had witnessed the transfer of weapons from straw purchasers to others "without following the guns any further," contradicting statements by the Justice Department.  The link below is for the Issa, Grassley staff report on Operation Fast and Furious regarding the operation and testimony of ATF agents:

http://www.latimes.com/media/acrobat/2011-06/62372429.pdf   

Ultimately, a border patrol agent was murdered with one of these weapons, as was an ICE special agent. This, I believe, began the unraveling of the project. It ultimately provided the necessity for the DOJ and ATF to indict what is called the “straw” buyers who it turned out were paid informants for the FBI and DEA and had been monitored for months. After agents later testified to Congress, the DOJ issued a directive that prohibited Gunwalking.

What in the past was procedure to interdict the transfer of weapons was given a blind eye, and agents were told not to do that but to let them go. One has to wonder why.  Interestingly, $10,000,000 for ATF Project Gunrunner, was in the stimulus package. One can only wonder what else was funded through the stimulus.

Now we have to ask ourselves why this was done. Why were weapons allowed to remain with Mexican criminals? I believe the administration wanted the weapons sales to be believed as US citizens engaging in illegal gunrunning and that this was a national security issue. This would be presented as a crisis, and "the availability of guns to American citizens must be curtailed".  I’m sure we will hear more of this scandal before it’s over; how high up did this plan and cover-up go?
By Priscilla

Z: Thanks to Pris for this succinct overview of a complicated situation and to Mr. Pris Jr. for his contribution of information.  GeeeZ and its readers really appreciate this.

I want to add here that I saw Leftwinger Bob Beckel on FOX today trying to evade this discussion and he did so with "Why would you ever believe Darryl Issa?"   This was a total ad hominem that makes no sense and has no grounds but got him out of answering a pertinent question that could have damned his hero Obama.   This is what we can expect regarding any subject that exposes Mr. Obama's dealings like the one above;  "kill the messenger, protect THE ONE".    Please, everybody, we may never get this whole story from America's media of today, but ask yourself why when we don't.

Z

"Gun enthusiast" kills............really?

HERE is a very tragic story about a maniac who killed 12 people, wounded 25, and then took his own life in Cumbria, England. This is the paragraph that caught my eye:

"Multiple shootings in Britain are rare. In 1987, gun enthusiast Michael Ryan killed 16 people in the English town of Hungerford. In 1996, Thomas Hamilton killed 16 children and a teacher at a kindergarten in Dublane, Scotland."

I don't know, but I'm pretty sure you don't have to be an "enthusiast" to do something as hideous as kill a bunch of innocent people? Seems to me a 'gun enthusiast' would have guns and either hunt or do shooting practice because he enjoys it........why mention that a cold blooded murderer is a 'gun enthusiast', unless.............think there's any agenda there by the author of the story? GeeeeZ
z

Don't you just love a good HYPOCRITE?

No HYPOCRISY HERE, right? :-)

I can protect MY HOME, but you can't protect YOUR HOME......because YOU shouldn't have a GUN. Leftwing Senators can handle them, but don't let ordinary Americans protect THEIR property!
Most of the accounts of this story say that this guy's name is R.C. Soles and he's a Senator from North Carolina..........but, they don't say "Democratic Senator from North Carolina, R.C. Soles shot and hurt an intruder today....."

Well...I'm sure that, had it been a Republican, they'd not identify his party in the early parts of the article, either (ya, right)
By the way...my gun friends tell me ammunition's hard to get and prices have gone sky high. I guess that this gov't might not be able to get us unarmed but they SURE can get us un-ammo'd, huh?