Project Gunrunner

I find the answers to questions 28 & 31 pretty interesting, even though I don't put much faith in this poll altogether.

 

People just want answers.

 

Still not able to muster a cogent argument?

 

I don't need to.

 

From C-SPAN.org --

Once again, I find myself reminded of Ronald Reagan's famous quote - "The nine most terrifying words in the English language are, 'I'm from the government and I'm here to help.'"

 

They certainly have some splainin' to do.

 

Yes, this mind-set comes across loud and clear. It's a pity that your biases have so clouded your thinking.

 

Official Corruption in the Obama Administration About to Take Center Stage:

A story that Gun Owners of America has been following over the past several months is ready to explode next week in the news.

If you have been reading our newsletter, The Gun Owners, or watching our videos on the GOA website, you know what Project Gunrunner is all about. It refers to an operation where the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearm and Explosives (ATF) was working with gun shops, approving firearms purchases to buyers who were suspected smugglers.

While this scandalous activity remained hidden for some time, it really went viral in the news media after one of the guns sold to a smuggler was later used to murder Border Patrol agent Brian Terry in December.

Since then, GOA has been lobbying the Congress to hold Congressional hearings to investigate the corruption in the Obama administration, specifically in relation to Project Gunrunner. GOA has corresponded with President Obama on this issue and has asked it members several times to urge their legislators to call for hearings themselves.

Well, there is good news to report. Beginning next week, the House of Representatives is set to commence hearings into Project Gunrunner -- which also goes by the names of Project Gunwalker or Fast and Furious.

Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA) is the point man leading the investigation on the House side. His hearings are sure to reveal much new information, but even so, he has already discovered quite a bit.

Project Gunrunner “was authorized at the highest level,” Issa told a radio audience this past Tuesday. “This decision was made at least by people in the Office of Attorney General Holder.”

This underscores the tremendous hypocrisy and antagonism against gun owners on part of the Obama Administration. After all, officials (like the President) were blaming American gun stores for letting firearms slip into gun smugglers’ hands and, thus, fueling much of Mexico’s violence.

But all the while, the administration was quietly approving the sales of those firearms to those very same gun smugglers.

“[The ATF] apparently did this,” said GOA Executive Director Larry Pratt in his letter to the President, “in part, so it could push gun control in Congress by demonstrating that guns used in Mexican violence came from the United States.”

ACTION: Please urge your Representative to closely follow the upcoming hearings into Project Gunrunner. Tell them that it is unconscionable for Congress to be funding a program that allows the Obama Administration:

1. To put guns into the hands of suspected gun smugglers; and then,

2. To turn around and blame law-abiding gun owners for the problem!

Project Gunrunner needs to be defunded IMMEDIATELY!

Click Here to send your Representative a prewritten email.

 

Interesting CBS video: Click here.

Makes me wonder if the Obama Administration allowed this to continue in order to falsely bolster their gun control agenda on the backs of America's gun dealers.

 

I don't know that I'd consider it to be part of the "vast left-wing conspiracy", but it's not right to allow gun smugglers to purchase firearms in the United States, then turn around and blame gun shows for the problem.

The uncanny ability to take a bad situation and make it worse - God bless the Federal government!

 

This is from Sen. Chuck Grassley's opening statement --

It seems that some of the numbers we've been reading about the flow of guns from the United States to Mexico have been artifically inflated.

 

You may know this information already, but it is worth the eye-candy factor..

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Hearing On “Fast And Furious” Uncovers Serious Failure At BATFE:

Friday, June 17, 2011

The congressional hearings held this week by the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform revealed that the gun smuggling investigation known as “Fast and Furious” that was implemented out of the Phoenix Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (BATFE) office was conducted in a reckless manner that led to the illegal sale of thousands of firearms. Many of those firearms ended up in the hands of Mexican drug cartels and other criminals, and may have contributed to the death of Border Patrol agent Brian Terry.

Some of the most important findings of the hearing and the investigative report compiled by the Committee staff include:

BATFE knowingly allowed as many as 2,500 firearms to be sold illegally to known or suspected straw purchasers. One of those purchasers accounted for over 700 illegal guns.

BATFE ordered its agents working the program not to arrest illegal gun buyers or to interdict thousands of guns that were allowed to “walk” into criminal hands.

Senior BATFE officials in Washington were regularly briefed on the operation and approved of the tactics employed.
BATFE agents who opposed the operation and who raised objections were told to “get with the program” and threatened with job retaliation if they continued their opposition.

A number of BATFE agents who were assigned to “Fast and Furious” testified about the operation.

Special Agent John Dodson, in his prepared testimony, stated: “Simply put, during this operation known as Fast and Furious, we, ATF, failed to fulfill one of our most fundamental obligations, to caretake the public trust; in part, to keep guns out of the hands of criminals.”

Dodson, along with Special Agents Olindo James Casa and Peter Forcelli each voiced strong opposition to the tactics employed that allowed so many firearms to be sold illegally. In each case, their objections were repeatedly dismissed by BATFE superiors.

In fact, Special Agent Casa testified that BATFE officials sent out an e-mail rebuking those who opposed the plan with thinly veiled threats of professional retaliation. “Based on my eighteen years of experience with ATF,” testified Casa, “I did not think the e-mail was an empty threat and took it very serious. It has become common practice for ATF Supervisors to retaliate against employees that do not blindly toe the company line, no matter what the consequences.”

Agent Casa stated that agents were ordered not to take action against illegal gun buyers or to seize the firearms. Instead, surveillance was regularly terminated without further action.

Agent Casa went on to describe the operation as recklessly planned and implemented with the purpose of allowing firearms to be illegally trafficked.

Other testimony contradicted the long held position of anti-gun politicians that U.S. gun stores are part of criminal gun trafficking. In truth, gun dealers regularly cooperate with law enforcement and are a crucial ally in fighting gun traffickers.

As Agent Forcelli put it: “The gun dealers were our friends. They helped us make a lot of these cases. … But the problem is then, by getting them mixed up in this thing and encouraging to sell -- encouraging them to sell guns when they decided to stop did not help our reputation with the gun industry.”

In total, the witness statements and the findings of the staff report paint a shocking picture of an operation that intentionally allowed thousands of guns to end up in the hands of some of the most violent criminals in North America. It also showed that senior officials of the BATFE, and not just regional or field supervisors, approved of the operation and received regular reports on its progress.

The failure of the BATFE to conduct its law enforcement duties in a responsible manner and the failure of senior leadership to heed the warnings and objections of field agents directly increased the level of violence in the southwest border region and increased the threat by ruthless drug cartels to law enforcement officers and private citizens, both in the U.S. and in Mexico.

The hearings and report also show two additional serious problems.

First, since the story of this reckless operation became known, the Department of Justice has refused to fully respond to congressional inquiries. Both Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.), chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee and Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), ranking member of the Senate Judiciary Committee have repeatedly requested full disclosure and been rebuffed. After nearly six months, DOJ continues to stonewall. Chairman Issa pointed out that even the information that was provided to the committee was heavily redacted, with most of the key information blacked out.

This exchange between Rep. Issa and Assistant Attorney General Ronald Weich clearly shows the ongoing refusal of the DOJ to cooperate:

Chairman Issa: "Who authorized this program that got people killed? Who here in Washington authorized it?"

Weich: "We don't know."

“We don’t know” is also the answer Attorney General Eric Holder provided to that same question when asked a few weeks ago. But after six months of scandal and scrutiny, it seems hard to believe the Attorney General still cannot answer this simple question. Or is it that he will not?

The hearings also revealed just how far the anti-gun apologists for the Obama administration will go to change the subject and try to use any crisis to advance their anti-gun agenda.

Rep. Elijah Cummings (D-Md.), the ranking member of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, attempted to turn the hearings into a discussion of our gun laws. He announced that the Democrats on the committee will hold their own hearings to bring in witnesses that will argue for more gun laws.

Even in the face of overwhelming evidence of the reckless misuse of law enforcement authority by the BATFE and the agency’s intentional failure to stop the illegal sale of firearms to criminals, Rep. Cummings and other anti-gun politicians still believe that more gun laws are needed. In fact, the investigation of this scandal proves that federal and state law enforcement, including BATFE, have all the tools they need, except the leadership needed to conduct criminal investigations in a responsible manner. Clearly, in the case of operation “Fast and Furious” that leadership failed spectacularly.

Source: http://www.nraila.org/Legislation/Federal/Read.aspx?id=6927

 

Any poster on this forum/board who voted or will vote Democrat undermines 2A.

 

It would appear that the NRA has found another gullible and willing follower.

 

I'm not an NRA member (But I have 3 AKMs & 3 AR pattern Rifles & other various firearms including 1911A1 , 12 Ga. Riot Shotgun , SKS, & various other Handguns & Rifles ) and I believe in the Second Amendment .

 

It doesn't take an NRA member to appreciate our Constitutional rights.

 

Operation Fast and Furious should end Holder tenure:

Watergate cliches though they are, two questions beg to be asked about the exploding Fast and Furious scandal at the U.S. Department of Justice: What did Attorney General Eric Holder know and when did he know it concerning the underlying concept, operational protocols and legal status of the Operation Fast and Furious program in the Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms bureau?
Those questions gained special relevance Wednesday when four ATF agents testified before the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee and squarely contradicted a Feb. 4, 2011, claim by a department spokesman that DOJ did not approve of the program that sanctioned the illegal sale here in America by legitimate gun dealers of assault weapons to representatives of Mexican drug cartels. The idea behind the program was that the hundreds of firearms thus sold would then be traced from specific crimes, thus enabling prosecutions of the individuals involved.

The agents testified that Assistant U.S. Attorney Emory Hurley, a Phoenix-based appointee of President Obama, "orchestrated" Operation Fast and Furious. ATF Phoenix field office supervisor Peter Forcelli, for example, told the committee: "I have read documents that indicate that his boss, U.S. Attorney Dennis Burke, also agreed with the direction of the case." That direction was established sometime after Obama was inaugurated in 2009 when Phoenix ATF agents, breaking with long-established agency practice, were ordered to monitor, but not stop, gun sales to suspected gun traffickers. The agents testified that Phoenix ATF supervisor David Voth "was jovial, if not, not giddy, but just delighted" when Fast and Furious guns were subsequently recovered at multiple Mexican drug busts. And emails released Thursday by Rep. Darrell Issa,R-Calif., revealed that acting director Kenneth Melson even arranged to watch live feeds from ATF cameras in gun stores being used by the program while sitting at his desk.

But delight turned to devastation on Dec. 14, 2010 when two Fast and Furious rifles were found at the scene of Border Agent Brian Terry's murder approximately 18 miles inside the U.S. border with Mexico in the Arizona desert. The program ended the next day. Special Agent Larry Alt told the committee that Terry's death was the entirely foreseeable result of Operation Fast and Furious: "You can't allow thousands of guns to go south of the border without an expectation that they are going to be recovered eventually in crimes and people are going to die." There had also been panic among ATF officials when news first broke that Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, D-Ariz., had been shot because they feared the weapon used might be one of those sold via Operation Fast and Furious.

Documents released by the Issa panel make it clear that Operation Fast and Furious was well-known and enthusiastically supported at the highest leveIs of ATF. That means the program had to have been supported elsewhere within the Justice Department. Thus, it is inconceivable that Holder did not know about Operation Fast and Furious. But even if he didn't know, he clearly should have. Either way, Wednesday's hearing provided the latest evidence that it's past time for Holder to go.

Source: http://washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/2011/06/operation-fast-and-furious-should-end-holder-tenure

 

Ohmigawd! Talk about the fecal matter impacting the air circulation device! If Rep. Giffords had been shot with a weapon that the ATF let get across the border, there would have been heads a-rollin!

 

This is obvious. Thank you for saying it.

 

But it takes an Elected Democrat to Undermine & work against it ...

 

Acting ATF Director to Resign Over Gun-Buying Sting:

Kenneth Melson, the acting director of the Bureau of Tobacco, Alcohol and Firearms (ATF), is expected to step down in the wake of the “Fast and Furious” gun-running scheme in which weapons were sold to Mexico’s drug cartels.

Melson, who has been acting director since April 2009, is likely to resign within the next couple of days, says CNN.

Attorney General Eric Holder is to meet with Andrew Traver, head of the ATF field office in Chicago on Tuesday, about replacing Melson, the network says.

Under Operation Fast and Furious and its sister program Project Gunrunner, about 2,000 weapons were sold to so-called straw buyers, who in turn sold them to the cartels. The idea was that it would allow the ATF to trace the weapons and discover who was selling them down the line.

But the plan went disastrously wrong and the weapons have been used in at least 150 shootings. The ATF now admits it lost track of two-thirds of the guns.

The controversy came to a head in December when Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry was murdered in Arizona and two weapons discovered at the scene were found to have been part of Project Gunrunner.

President Barack Obama has acknowledged that the plan was flawed. “There may be a situation here in which a serious mistake was made. If that's the case then we'll find out and we'll hold somebody accountable,” he said in March. Obama said he had no prior knowledge of the operation.

Last week, Iowa Republican Sen. Charles Grassley called for an independent investigation into the operation and called for heads to roll.

Rep. Darrell Issa, R-Calif., said the operation “looks an awful lot like Iran-Contra,” the scandal that put a shadow over Ronald Reagan’s presidency, during congressional hearings he chaired.

During those hearings, John Casa, an agent at the ATF’s Phoenix Field office called the program “a colossal failure of leadership.” He said every time there was a shooting in Arizona, including the one that killed six and seriously injured Democratic U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, agents worried that guns from the operations could have been involved.

“This happened time and time again,” he testified.

Another agent, John Dodson, told lawmakers, "I cannot begin to think of how the risk of letting guns fall into the hands of known criminals could possibly advance any legitimate law enforcement interest. I hope the committee will receive a better explanation than I."

Source: http://www.newsmax.com/Newsfront/ATF-director-resign/2011/06/20/id/400665?s=al&promo_code=C789-1

 

Oh, good point. I'm sure that Democrats are purposefully working against the Constitution while the Republicans are defending it. Good conspiracy theory there 'Gator',....if only it were true.

 

IMHO Gunrunner was devised to provide Anti-2A ammo for
Left & Zero Administration.

 

Then, until you can come up with something more concrete than your "opinion", I'll have to dismiss your conspiracy theory as just that; a conspiracy theory. I'm not big on those, personally.

 

Ayuh,... At the begining of this thread, You didn't believe This either,...

So, you were Wrong then, 'n yer Still WRONG...