Feb 14 2012
Rep. Darrell Issa’s letter to Eric Holder
This post is a summary of the Fast and Furious scandal. We now have this letter from Rep. Darrell Issa to Attorney General Eric Holder.
It’s very hard for me to see how the media can let this slide. Holder should resign. But the media is mostly looking the other way. Imagine if a parallel scandal in a Republican administration happened. The media feeding frenzy would be incredible.
The movie Media Malpractice told the story of how the media essentially acted as an arm of the Obama campaign in the 2008 election. It’s gearing up to do the same in 2012, it seems. Actually, I’m not sure it ever stopped.
In any case, pretending that Eric Holder is an honest man who deserves to stay in office is just par for the course.
Read the letter to Holder from Rep. Issa and draw your own conclusions. Holder is clearly stonewalling, hiding, and using every device of his consider power to keep the truth from coming to light. Will the media finally start giving this the coverage it deserves? Only if it’s embarrassed into it…. which has happened before, for example in the Bill Clinton/Monica Lewinsky scandal, and the case of Dan Rather and cronies reporting fake news about George Bush.
Feb 11 2012
Attorney General Eric Holder’s stonewalling on “Fast and Furious”
I posted this earlier, but it accidentally went to a PAGE instead of a POST. I’m fixing that now.
KUHNER: Obama’s Watergate – Washington Times
A year ago this week, U.S. Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry was murdered. He died protecting his country from brutal Mexican gangsters. Two AK-47 assault rifles were found at his death site. We now know the horrifying truth: Agent Terry was killed by weapons that were part of an illegal Obama administration operation to smuggle arms to the dangerous drug cartels. He was a victim of his own government. This is not only a major scandal; it is a high crime that potentially reaches all the way to the White House, implicating senior officials. It is President Obama’s Watergate.
Operation Fast and Furious was run by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) and overseen by the Justice Department. It started under the leadership of Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. Fast and Furious enabled straw gun purchases from licensed dealers in Arizona, in which more than 2,000 weapons were smuggled to Mexican drug kingpins. ATF claims it was seeking to track the weapons as part of a larger crackdown on the growing violence in the Southwest. Instead, ATF effectively has armed murderous gangs. About 300 Mexicans have been killed by Fast and Furious weapons. More than 1,400 guns remain lost. Agent Terry likely will not be the last U.S. casualty.
Mr. Holder insists he was unaware of what took place until after media reports of the scandal appeared in early 2011. This is false. Such a vast operation only could have occurred with the full knowledge and consent of senior administration officials. Massive gun-running and smuggling is not carried out by low-level ATF bureaucrats unless there is authorization from the top. There is a systematic cover-up.
Congressional Republicans, however, are beginning to shed light on the scandal. Led by Sen. Chuck Grassley of Iowa and Rep. Darrell Issa of California, a congressional probe is exposing the Justice Department‘s rampant criminality and deliberate stonewalling. Assistant Attorney General Lanny A. Breuer, who heads the department‘s criminal division, helped craft a February letter to Congress that denied ATF had ever walked guns into Mexico. Yet, under pressure from congressional investigators, the department later admitted that Mr. Breuer knew about ATF gun-smuggling as far back as April 2010. In other words, Mr. Breuer has been misleading Congress. He should resign – or be fired.
Instead, Mr. Holder tenaciously insists that Mr. Breuer will keep his job. He needs to keep his friends close and potential witnesses even closer. Another example is former acting ATF Director Kenneth Melson. Internal documents show Mr. Melson directly oversaw Fast and Furious, including monitoring numerous straw purchases of AK-47s. He has admitted to congressional investigators that he, along with high-ranking ATF leaders, reassigned every “manager involved in Fast and Furious” after the scandal surfaced on Capitol Hill and in the press. Mr. Melson said he was ordered by senior Justice officials to be silent regarding the reassignments. Hence, ATF managers who possess intimate and damaging information – especially on the role of the Justice Department – essentially have been promoted to cushy bureaucratic jobs. Their silence has been bought, their complicity swept under the rug. Mr. Melson has been transferred to Justice’s main office, where he serves as a “senior adviser” on forensic science in the department‘s Office of Legal Policy. Rather than being punished, Mr. Melson has been rewarded for his incompetence and criminal negligence.
Mr. Holder and his aides have given misleading, false and contradictory testimony on Capitol Hill. Perjury, obstruction of justice and abuse of power – these are high crimes and misdemeanors. Mr. Holder should be impeached. Like most liberals, he is playing the victim card, claiming Mr. Issa is a modern-day Joseph McCarthy conducting a judicial witch hunt. Regardless of this petty smear, Mr. Holder must be held responsible and accountable – not only for the botched operation, but for his flagrant attempts to deflect blame from the administration.
Mr. Holder is a shameless careerist and a ruthless Beltway operative. For years, his out-of-control Justice Department has violated the fundamental principle of our democracy, the rule of law. He has refused to prosecute members of the New Black Panthers for blatant voter intimidation that took place in the 2008 election. Career Justice lawyers have confessed publicly that Mr. Holder will not pursue cases in which the perpetrators are black and the victims white. States such as Arizona and Alabama are being sued for simply attempting to enforce federal immigration laws. Mr. Holder also opposes voter identification cards, thereby enabling fraud and vote-stealing at the ballot box. What else can we expect from one who, during the Clinton administration, helped pardon notorious tax cheat Marc Rich and Puerto Rican terrorists?
Mr. Holder clearly knew about Fast and Furious and did nothing to stop it. This is because the administration wanted to use the excuse of increased violence on the border and weapons-smuggling into Mexico to justify tighter gun-control legislation. Mr. Holder is fighting ferociously to prevent important internal Justice documents from falling into the hands of congressional investigators. If the full nature of his involvement is discovered, the Obama presidency will be in peril.
Fast and Furious is even worse than Watergate for one simple reason: No one died because of President Nixon’s political dirty tricks and abuse of government power. But Brian Terry is dead; and there are still 1,500 missing guns threatening still more lives.
What did Mr. Obama know? Massive gun-smuggling by the U.S. government into a foreign country does not happen without the explicit knowledge and approval of leading administration officials. It’s too big, too risky and too costly. Mr. Holder may not be protecting just himself and his cronies. Is he protecting the president?
Aug 24 2010
Russian roulette across the border
Drug war sends bullets whizzing across the border
The first bullets struck El Paso’s city hall at the end of a work day. The next ones hit a university building and closed a major highway. Shootouts in the drug war along the U.S.-Mexico border are sending bullets whizzing across the Rio Grande into one of the nation’s safest cities, where authorities worry it’s only a matter of time before someone gets hurt or killed.
Mr. President Obama, sir….. what do you think is your responsibility in this? Do we have to wait until an American citizen is actually killed by bullets coming across the border? Or might you find it in your imperial wisdom to consider doing something about it NOW, before lives are taken?
I wish I believed you took this seriously. But given your reluctance to do anything about it when Mexican nationals come into the USA and directly kill people after entering illegally, I don’t suppose you think think playing Russian roulette across the border is any big deal.
Jul 13 2010
Who is coming across our southern border?
You probably won’t see this on any network broadcast. It’s amazing a local TV station in Atlanta made the report.
But don’t worry. Obama has our borders under control.
Apr 05 2010
Mexico keeps on sinking
Mexico: Denying the Obvious Much more at the link.
Ask these questions. At what point do frequent and periodic border incursions constitute a violation of US sovereignty? At what point does the instability in Mexico become a direct threat against American citizens? How many Americans will have to die before our federal government takes serious action along the Texas-Mexico border? And finally, how long does the federal government delay before violence against American citizens on American soil constitute an act that prompts more proactive actions than stating that “it continues to support Mexico’s fight against ruthless gangs smuggling narcotics into the United States.”
Quite obviously, we are fighting a war against terrorists worldwide. Regardless of what you call it, al Qaeda’s form of terrorism is an aggressive force on multiple fronts around the globe. More recently, American citizens influenced or motivated by some “need” have become another focus of terrorism concern. Yet, while we are working, fighting and dying to establish security and stability in Iraq and Afghanistan, Mexican President Calderone’s policies to control and combat the narcotics violence on/near or across our border appear to be ineffective and as some people believe, failures. Ask when (not if), it will fall to the United States to defend itself from continued incursions by the criminal and violent elements in Mexico?
Earlier this week, Texas Governor Perry deployed Texas military helicopters to begin patrolling the border as part of his Spillover violence contingency plan in response to the latest incursion by Mexico in the United States.
“As violence escalates in Mexican border cities, it’s critically important for Texas, U.S. and Mexican law enforcement to communicate and appropriately coordinate our efforts to combat border crime and protect legitimate cross-border trade and travel…
[continued]
…”The helicopter incursion and uptick in violence in Mexican border communities underscore the urgent need for more U.S. law enforcement and surveillance along the Texas-Mexico border. I once again urge our federal government to add personnel and technology along the Texas-Mexico border to prevent spillover violence here and to combat drug cartels operating in the border region.”
It’s been pretty obvious for awhile that (you should pardon the expression) things are going south in Mexico. The problem on the USA side: it seems to be politically difficult for the state governments or federal government to do anything really effective.
But with the best will in the world, massive political courage, and brilliant, keen insight into the problems, it’s hard to know what the USA can do, short of invasion, to “fix” the problems in Mexico itself. (Please don’t leave comments that assume I’m serious about “invading.”) The point is that Mexico IS Mexican, and they will have to find their way. I suppose at some point a UN Peacekeeping force may be necessary, composed exclusively of troops from somewhere other than the USA, of course, to stifle cries of “invasion.”
I”m sure the Russians, Chinese, Cubans, Venezuelans and Iranians will all be willing to aid the UN in this noble effort.
It is evident that the Mexican government is completely out of control, and that corruption, bribery and influence peddling are going to keep it that way. Mexicans with some moral courage and no small determination will have to repair their own nation. That process, when/if it comes, will probably be pretty ugly, involve trampling normal “civil rights,” etc. I hope there are enough of them with the wherewithal to do it. It isn’t looking promising at the moment.
If I was going to guess, I’d speculate that the next government of Mexico will be a dictatorship. The only question is whether it will be a military dictatorship run by people who hate the drug lords, a military dictatorship of people in league with the drug kingpins, or a socialist/communist dictatorship of some kind, basically a transplant of Cuba or Venezuela. I’d like to believe that the Obama administration would not let this last option happen.
But on the evidence of their treatment of the due process of law in Honduras, I’m afraid that the next government in Mexico will be great friends with Castro.
May 18 2009
More signs of a failing Mexico
Suspected drug gang frees 53 from Mexico prison
Suspected members of a Mexican drug cartel disguised as federal police swept into a prison in the northern state of Zacatecas on Saturday and freed 53 inmates, police and army officials said.
The early-morning jailbreak, which took less than five minutes and involved no violence, was carried out by 20 heavily armed men who arrived in 10 vehicles and a helicopter, they said.
All of the escaped prisoners are believed to be members of the armed wing of Mexico’s Gulf Cartel, one of the country’s most powerful criminal organizations.
The men were allowed into the state prison after saying they were there for a prisoner transfer, officials said.
Some 40 guards and administrators who were on duty at the time are in custody, Zacatecas Governor Amalia Garcia told a news conference.
“There is evidence that the guards and prison authorities were accomplices,” he said.
Mexican President Felipe Calderon has staked his presidency on crushing drug gangs that killed 6,300 people last year across the nation. The United States is increasingly alarmed by the violence, fearing it could spill across the border.
Zacatecas has so far seen little of the drug-related violence that has rocked other northern states.
Garcia said state and federal police along with the army were searching for the prisoners. Earlier reports had said 59 inmates escaped.
This is simply unimaginable in any semi-intact nation. An ENTIRE prison staff appears to have been bribed to lay down for a jail break, warden, guards, the whole nine yards. And the bad guys arrived in 10 vehicles and a helicopter? This is a level of security that a head of state might get.
It’s getting harder and harder to pretend that Mexico is just another nation that happens to be on our border. Its government is failing in the most basic ways and at its most basic functions. What will the USA do as it becomes more and more obvious that Mexico is on the verge of becoming a North American Somalia, or Sudan? Oh, the local issues are different… and yet, they’re the same, with warlords, a vulnerable civilian populace, and a weak government with a corrupt military. Forget Somalia and Sudan; this is starting to sound like Pakistan. Fortunately, Mexico doesn’t have nukes that can fall into the hands of the warlords….
Apr 15 2009
Most weapons in Mexican drug wars are not from the USA
Golden Lies Too Good To Ignore
April 5, 2009: The mass media were embarrassed recently when someone did the math and revealed that the hot headline “90 Percent of Illegal Guns In Mexico Come From The U.S.” turned out to be false. However, the real story was not that the actual number was 17 percent. Nor was it that the “90 percent” number came from someone (accidentally or purposely) who misread the data (90 percent of the guns identified as of U.S. manufacture were, using their serial numbers, indeed traced back to the U.S., and not some other country they had legally been exported to.) The real story was that there were so many sources of illegal weapons in Mexico, with the U.S. being one of the more difficult places to get weapons from. It’s much easier to get a load of weapons in via ship, in a container labeled as something else. Port officials in Mexico are easier to bribe, than U.S. or Mexican border guards. South America is a magnet for international gun runners, many of them now swing by Mexico regularly, to take orders and make deliveries.
As usual, don’t believe ANYTHING the major media says about guns in the hands of US citizens. They simply have an agenda, and it is to cancel the 2nd Amendment, one way or another. And they count on the general ignorance of the non-gun owning populace to tell their lies.
Mar 23 2009
The Deteriorating State of Mexican National Security
In the last year, 150,000 men have deserted the Mexican military forces. Read that number again. What do you suppose they’re doing now? If even 10% are now using their military training for other purposes, we have a big problem, and indications are that the percentage is much higher. Mexico is in the midst of an insurgency, not just a crime wave. It’s safer in Baghdad right now. Is Mexico about to become the failed state on our border, our Pakistan-style “no go” area, providing a safe haven for gangs preying on the US population? Well, no, it’s not about to become that… it’s already happening.
Three sources underscore the severity of the situation in Mexico and its potential near term and far reaching effects to US National Security
As our operations wind down from the successes in Iraq, and the National Command Authority is ramping up our presence in Afghanistan with an additional 17000 combat forces, little has been addressed in the mainstream policy wonkery about Mexico’s instability and brush with Civil War between the brave, but by all measures ineffectual, Mexican security and law enforcement forces, and the ruthless, well funded, well equipped, and increasingly brash Drug Cartels. I have been monitoring this for several weeks, and there are those within the periphery of National Strategy and Policy that recognize this as a serious emerging problem, but is just now getting some greater play within the Mainstream Media. What coverage it does get focuses on the crime and corruption aspects and doesn’t link the severity and scope as a National Security issue for the US. I am more and more convinced that this is in fact a serious challenge to US national security, and three recent reports substantiate my position.
The first of these predictions that got considerable play back in January came from the outgoing Director of the CIA, Gen. Michael Hayden. He commented in numerous interviews that the CIA concluded that after a potential development of a nuclear weapon from Iran, the possibility and ramifications of Mexico failing as a state as a result of the inability of the Federal government quelling the violence perpetrated by the Cartels in their continued fight for smuggling routes and market share was the second most threatening issue to US National Security. With Al Qaeda lurking around, having found proof of their desire to weaponize a biological or chemical agent to unleash on innocent Americans, let alone a dirty bomb, that is quite a statement on Hayden’s part…and ominous.
The second such report was from the Department of Defense in the form of the 2008 Joint Operating Environment Report, or JOE. It concluded that a failed state in Pakistan, the chance of nuclear technology or weapons falling into the hands of terrorists, was most disconcerting. The JOE, however, listed Mexico as a failed state was also the number two threat to US National Security. (http://www.jfcom.mil/newslink/storyarchive/2008/JOE2008.pdf)
The third, and in my assessment, the most concise and telling (at least in an unclassified venue) was a recent trip to Mexico and a report conducted by retired Army General, Barry McCaffery in December 2008 while he attended the International Forum of Intelligence and Security Specialists which acts as an advisory board to the Mexican Federal Law Enforcement leadership. ( http://www.mccaffreyassociates.com/pdfs/Mexico_AAR_-_December_2008.pdf) Though McCaffery’s report goes beyond the standard USG reporting that is swaddled in a law enforcement perspective, it has some stark and convincing statistics and conclusions that highlight this issue, for me anyways, as a national Security challenge, and beyond the single scope approach as a law enforcement challenge specifically relating to the drug trade.
Much more at the link.
Mar 04 2009
USA Gunshops Arming Mexican Gangs?
U.S. Is Arms Bazaar for Mexican Cartels – NYTimes.com
The Mexican agents who moved in on a safe house full of drug dealers last May were not prepared for the fire power that greeted them.
When the shooting was over, eight agents were dead. Among the guns the police recovered was an assault rifle traced back across the border to a dingy gun store here called X-Caliber Guns.
Now, the owner, George Iknadosian, will go on trial on charges he sold hundreds of weapons, mostly AK-47 rifles, to smugglers, knowing they would send them to a drug cartel in the western state of Sinaloa. The guns helped fuel the gang warfare in which more than 6,000 Mexicans died last year.
Mexican authorities have long complained that American gun dealers are arming the cartels. This case is the most prominent prosecution of an American gun dealer since the United States promised Mexico two years ago it would clamp down on the smuggling of weapons across the border. It also offers a rare glimpse of how weapons delivered to American gun dealers are being moved into Mexico and wielded in horrific crimes.
Maybe some of this is true. But some fundamental facts:
1) It isn’t an “assault rifle” if it isn’t capable of fully-automatic fire. It doesn’t matter if it is a “military style” weapon, or “looks like” an assault rifle, if it only fires one round for each pull of the trigger.
2) No American gun store can legally sell fully-automatic weapons to anyone who has not cleared VERY high hurdles of authorization under existing federal law, as well as state law. No one can just walk into a gun shop and buy one after filling out some paperwork. Most gun shops don’t have ANY automatic weapons for sale, because their opportunity to sell them is so limited, and the process so cumbersome, that stocking any would just tie up cash in inventory that is almost never sold.
3) It appears that no new law is required, because the gun shops that are knowingly aiding “straw purchases” are already breaking federal and state laws.
4) No weapon that is really an “assault rifle” can be purchased easily, and the chances of a “straw purchase” of such a weapon are exceedingly slim, because by definition it is fully automatic and requires extreme levels of authorization and qualification.
5) Articles such as the one quoted above usually omit these facts, using the term “assault rifle” to mean anything that simply looks “military style” and is semi-automatic, like many modern hunting rifles. They also tend to tar an entire legal industry with the misdeeds of a few. On that grounds, of course, the New York Times should be closed, permanently, given the number of lies it tells, and laws it breaks (even when they cannot be prosecuted for political reasons).
6) If you hear of Mexican shootings involving “machine guns” (i.e., fully automatic weapons), those guns were not bought using “straw purchases” from American gun stores.
7) The level of corruption in the Mexican police and military is so huge that many automatic weapons that are used illegally probably came directly from military stores.
8) Mexico has an enormous coastline, mostly very lightly patrolled.
Does anyone have any doubt that large numbers of weapons enter Mexico that way, including fully automatic assault weapons? What would make a smuggler take the risks of bringing South American drugs into Mexico, and not the illegal weapons necessary to defend the trade?
So: while no doubt some USA weapons have made their way into Mexico and been used in crimes, this kind of report has only one clear aim, and it is to add to the drumbeat for yet more restrictive USA gun laws.
But what else would we expect from the New York Times?
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