Patterico's Pontifications

6/16/2011

Gunrunner Investigation Heating Up

Filed under: General — Patterico @ 7:32 am



In case you don’t care that Anthony Weiner is resigning (see below), there is other news in the world: the investigation into Operation Gunrunner is heating up, with hearings and the release of e-mails:

“This guy comes in, buys 10, 15, 20 AKs or … a 22-year-old girl walks in and dumps $10,000 on … AK-47s in a day, when she is driving a beat up car that doesn’t have enough metal to hold hubcaps on it. They knew what was going on. The ‘may have facilitated’ to me is kind of erroneous. We did facilitate it. How are we not responsible for the ultimate outcome of these [g]uns?” Dodson said.

The agents said they complained vociferously about the operation to superiors. Eventually, a “schism” between team members developed over whether the tactics being used were wise or even legal.

….

David Voth, the team’s supervisor, sent a March 12, 2010 email to the team, saying the tactics of “Fast and Furious” were backed by “HQ.”

“Whether you care or not people of rank and authority at HQ are paying close attention to this case and they also believe we…are doing what they envisioned the Southwest Border Grouops doing. It may sound cheesy but we are ‘The tip of the ATF spear’ when it comes to Southwest Border Firearms Trafficking,” Voth wrote.

If the agents didn’t like it, “Maybe the Maricopa County Jail is hiring detention officers and you can get paid $30,000 (instead of $100,000) to serve lunch to inmates all day,” Voth wrote.

That particular e-mail has been out before, but there are new ones. Follow the link for more information and links.

15 Responses to “Gunrunner Investigation Heating Up”

  1. Just because “people of rank and authority…are paying close attention to yhis case….” does not mean that it is legal. For crying out loud, look at the laws Obummer and Holder have broken in the last two and a half years. A new US record.

    johnnycab23513 (c93afd)

  2. DOJ lied to Congress, no?

    JD (047d50)

  3. Well, this appears to fall into our current president’s idea of the difference between War-War and not really war (the idea that we can attack a foreign country and not be having a real war):

    Run that by me again?

    …So people who like to say that “if you aren’t part of the solution, you’re part of the problem” argue that blockading the enemy at sea, suppressing enemy air defenses, identifying targets to be bombed, refueling aircraft that drop the bombs, engaging in electronic warfare to aid the planes that drop the bombs, and supplying many of the actual bombs themselves don’t count as waging war because we are not actually dropping the bombs (well, other than from our unmanned drones) and because the enemy is unable to effectively shoot back?

    Well, the last part at least that fits with the old anti-war slogan that “it takes two sides to make war.” Although I suspect what they had in mind was that if we–and only we–stop fighting an enemy there would be no war–not that our shooting alone does not count as war.

    I find this fascinating.

    I do believe that under this logic, we could nuke somebody and not fall under the administration’s definition of war.

    If I where Mexico–I would be very worried that this is approaching an “insurgent action” being supported by the CinC.

    Elections have consequences.

    BfC (2ebea6)

  4. One can’t help but wonder whether Obama wanted this operation kept secret, but intended to use the plethora of US firearms streaming across the border as a sword to get stringent gun control laws through Congress?

    eaglewingz08 (74f660)

  5. Yet they never did anything with the cartels who purchased the guns. Why?

    What is the purpose–except to ban guns here–of this plan?

    Patricia (b717c7)

  6. This is absolutely incredible; Issa is holding hearings ans can’t get a straight answer as to who authorized this debacle? Or, a riff on the only academics would believe something this stupid, only leftist lawyers would believe you can let guns “walk” and no one will get hurt!

    Dave in OC (e6990e)

  7. Is it better if Holder and Obama didn’t even know this was going on? That opens up the possibility there are many similar programs across agencies. If these guys don’t want to do their jobs and take charge that this doesn’t happen, they should resign.

    Holder really should resign simply for the way he’s handled the investigation.

    And do I believe Holder wasn’t aware of a program with the implications of Gunrunner? Not on your life.

    Dustin (c16eca)

  8. AW, you say Weiner’s greatest sin “was promising to be faithful to his wife…”

    I agree that’s a serious sin but do we know if Weiner actually made that promise? It’s certainly traditional, but with Bill Clinton conducting the marriage ceremony, I confess, without a certified transcript I’m just not prepared to make such an assumption.

    First, who knew Bill Clinton was authorized to conduct marriage ceremonies if the first place? Or that a double talking weasel like Slick Willy could presume to extract such a promise without gagging on his own hypocrisy, or reducing the solemn occasion to comedy club slapstick?

    Plus, she’s Hillary’s employee and near constant companion, yet it’s Hillary’s famously philandering husband who officiates at the wedding. Talk out about starting out on the wrong foot, sheesh!

    Next, she’s Muslim and he’s Jewish. What’s up with that? Did their parents attend or give their blessing? How does their marriage square with their religious obligations?

    All this, and so much more. Are we looking at a sham marriage?

    ropelight (7a575c)

  9. Guns are evil.

    /Sarc

    DohBiden (15aa57)

  10. Issa and the Republicans need to show no mercy on this–Obama’s Justice Department adopted an insane policy that killed people, and tried to blame it on legitimate firearms owners when it blew up in their faces. The responsible parties need to be utterly destroyed politically and prosecuted if possible.

    MSE (15365c)

  11. “One can’t help but wonder whether Obama wanted this operation kept secret, but intended to use the plethora of US firearms streaming across the border as a sword to get stringent gun control laws through Congress?”

    Why is that ‘wondering’? We have actual evidence that the ATF hierarchy was pleased when the smuggled guns turned up at Mexican crime scenes. Nothing could be clearer than that the whole exercise was a setup to justify more gun regulation with lies.

    The ATF remains a very corrupt agency, and in the Obama administration, it finds itself matches with corrupt political appointees.

    SPQR (26be8b)

  12. The Hill has a piece on the release of an email showing that the ATF head was aware of the operation more than a year ago, despite denials by teh administration. Once again, the DOJ caught lying in this.

    SPQR (26be8b)

  13. Nothing could be clearer than that the whole exercise was a setup to justify more gun regulation with lies.

    Exactly. This is the fullest extent of politicizing law enforcement. They are producing crimes convenient to their political agenda, and no surprise that there was a body count.

    Dustin (c16eca)

  14. None of the reasons offered for this program make any sense so i suggest considering a money trail to the truth. Suppose a cartel kingpin wanted a lot of weapons and somebody in this administration wanted a lot of campaign cash and hispanic support at the polls and a deal was made. There has been comparisons drawn to the iran contra deal where apparently the law was broken for a good reason, could laws have been broken here just for cash?

    dunce (b89258)

  15. I’ve been following this investigation. Pretty crazy…

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