Gunwalker Update: Released Docs Tell Us What We Already Knew, NY Post Rediscovers Fast & Furious

From NYPost:

The deadly-but-forgotten government gun-running scandal known as “Fast and Furious” has lain dormant for years, thanks to White House stonewalling and media compliance. But newly uncovered e-mails have reopened the case, exposing the anatomy of a coverup by an administration that promised to be the most transparent in history.

Not forgotten at all.  Just depends where you live and depends if you have to deal with the armed cartels.  Also, those “newly uncovered emails” basically tell us things we already know.

A federal judge has forced the release of more than 20,000 pages of emails and memos previously locked up under President Obama’s phony executive-privilege claim. A preliminary review shows top Obama officials deliberately obstructing congressional probes into the border gun-running operation.

…internal documents later revealed the real goal was to gin up a crisis requiring a crackdown on guns in America. Fast and Furious was merely a pretext for imposing stricter gun laws.

Yup.

Only, the scheme backfired when Justice agents lost track of the nearly 2,000 guns sold through the program and they started turning up at murder scenes on both sides of the border — including one that claimed the life of US Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry.

The scheme didn’t backfire.  The operation failed, but the scheme still worked.  Southern border states now have mandatory reporting to the ATF on any purchases of more than one firearm.  Democrats got more gun control, and they got it even though Fast and Furious came to light.  They even got it by citing Fast and Furious as something that meant ATF needed more funding, more resources, and more gun laws – Democrats were saying these things during the hearings with whistleblowers.

Then Team Obama conspired to derail investigations into who was responsible by first withholding documents under subpoena — for which Holder earned a contempt-of-Congress citation — and later claiming executive privilege to keep evidence sealed.

Fascinating how that works.  Start a criminal conspiracy using government force against citizens of the US and citizens of Mexico, get caught, then claim that you’re doing an investigation and the investigation is ongoing so you can’t reveal anything about it, then claim executive privilege and you can magically never be held accountable for a conspiracy that has so far resulted in hundreds of murders.

Somewhere Warren G. Harding is upset he couldn’t think of this scam during Teapot Dome (which killed no one).

The degree of obstruction was “more than previously understood,” House Oversight and Government Reform Chairman Jason Chaffetz said in a recent memo to other members of his panel.

“The documents reveal how senior Justice Department officials — including Attorney General Holder — intensely followed and managed an effort to carefully limit and obstruct the information produced to Congress,” he asserted.

They also indict Holder deputy Lanny Breuer, an old Clinton hand, who had to step down in 2013 after falsely denying authorizing Fast and Furious.

Their efforts to impede investigations included:

-Devising strategies to redact or otherwise withhold relevant information;
-Manipulating media coverage to control fallout;
-Scapegoating the Bureau of Alcohol Tobacco and Firearms (ATF) for the scandal.

The last one is a bit interesting.  The ATF definitely deserves plenty of blame as they conducted the operation, but ultimately the story from the White House was that it was “a rogue operation conducted by a handful of agents at a field office”.

We know that’s BS based off the level the White House went to protect itself, we also know it’s BS based on the resources used – namely the FBI passing felons on background checks (there are later stories about that as well – I may go back and add more links).

Talking points drafted for Holder and other brass for congressional hearings made clear that Justice intended to make ousted ATF officials the fall guys for the scandal.

“These (personnel) changes will help us move past the controversy that has surrounded Fast and Furious,” Assistant Attorney General Ron Weich wrote in August 2011.

In an October 2011 e-mail to his chief of staff, moreover, Holder stated that he agreed with a strategy to first release documents to friendly media “with an explanation that takes the air out” of them, instead “of just handing them over” to Congress.

Thomas Sowell refers to this as “telling the truth slowly“.

Obama insists Fast and Furious is just another “phony” scandal whipped up by Republicans to dog his presidency.

“Phony”.

Gunwalker Update: Five Years On

From Katie Pavlich:

Five years ago today, Marine and Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry was killed in a firefight by Mexican bandits. The firearms used by the criminals who killed him were part of the Obama Justice Department’s Operation Fast and Furious. As a reminder, ATF agents allowed more than 2500 AK-47s and other firearms to be purchased and trafficked by known Mexican cartel members through Fast and Furious. Hundreds of people have been killed as a result of the program, which was secret until ATF whistleblower John Dodson exposed it after Terry’s death in 2010.

“Five years later. We have celebrated Brian so many times that it warms my heart. This is a little something of past friends and ones we met along the way at events held to honor Brian. I thank all of you with every ounce of my being! We will keep fighting. 11:08pm tonight is when a deadly gunfight happened and took Brian. Please also pray for his team that was there when he took his last breathe and The Border Patrol family,” Terry’s sister, Kelly Terry-Willis, posted to her Facebook page late yesterday.

Today, not a single ATF agent has been fired as a result of the operation.  Terry’s killers have been sentenced to life in prison after being found guilty on a variety of different charges, including first degree murder.

Holder nor Obama are in prison.  There’s a Border Patrol station named after Brian Terry.  Sharyl Atkisson left CBS.  Hundreds to thousands of Mexicans and Americans are now dead because of Obama/Holder’s ATF’s actions.  But aside from a lot of people who won’t forget the wrongs done by Obama/Holder’s DOJ and ATF, to most of the US, it’s almost like nothing ever happened.  The media succeeded in carrying the water for Obama to the point he can still make claims for the need for gun control after a terrorist attack and not get laughed out of office – despite having been responsible for arming narcoterrorist cartels.

Hell, assholes from the ATF are still called on by the media for gun control pieces as though they aren’t an agency composed of criminals and thugs that doesn’t care about either the rights or lives of Americans or our Mexican neighbors.

It’s a sad indicator of the times we’re living in.

Gunwalker Update: Eric Holder Quitting as Attorney General

Eric Holder’s calling it quits.

And congress is still proceeding with looking into Fast and Furious, now years later.

The contempt of Congress case against Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. — the first sitting Cabinet member ever to face such a congressional rebuke — will continue even after his resignation takes effect, but it’s unlikely he will ever face personal punishment, legal analysts said Thursday.

Mr. Holder, is expected to announce his resignation later Thursday, and Tom Fitton, president of Judicial Watch, said the timing is not accidental: A federal judge earlier this week ruled that the Justice Department will have to begin submitting documents next month related to the botched Fast and Furious gun operation in a case brought by Judicial Watch.

“I don’t think it’s any coincidence he’s resigning as the courts are ruling the Fast and Furious information has to be released,” Mr. Fitton told The Washington Times.

It’s not a coincidence.  He’s quitting so he can dodge criminal charges that would stick.

Last month’s news:

WASHINGTON –  A federal judge has ordered the Justice Department to provide Congress with a list of documents that are at the center of a long-running battle over a failed law enforcement program called Operation Fast and Furious.

In a court proceeding Wednesday, U.S. District Judge Amy Berman Jackson set an Oct. 1 deadline for producing the list to the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee.

He’s quitting so the Democrat-held senate can force a successor through, just in case the Democrats lose the senate in the mid-term elections.

He’s also quitting so that he won’t be in office and thus will be eligible for presidential pardons.

He stonewalled long enough to slither out of office, but no doubt his successor will be a miserable leftist as well and Holder will be back as a consultant or advisor or in some other role where he can continue his schemes.

Gunwalker Update: Eric Holder The Survivor

From Politico, a glowing retrospective on what a wonderful angel Eric Holder is and how everyone who questions his actions is racist.  Fast and Furious has been rendered a footnote to the left.

Holder, people close to him say, isn’t much hurt by the criticism over Wall Street, Gitmo, KSM or even the leaks; he remains confident that his decisions ultimately reflected the priorities of his boss. The same cannot be said for the 2012 vote by the GOP-controlled House to hold him in contempt of Congress for failing to turn over emails and documents linked to the Fast & Furious operation—a Justice-led gun sting that resulted in the death of a veteran Border Patrol agent in 2010. The vote was unenforceable. But no other sitting Cabinet member had ever faced a similar rebuke, and it remains the sorest of subjects with Holder.

Holder views the vote as emblematic of Republicans’ disrespect for Obama and himself, and he thinks that race is one, but not the only, factor in their attacks. Two people in his orbit told me he has described appearing before congressional committees as an experience akin to staring at a hostile “wall of Southern men.” (For the record: All of the 22 Republican members of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee are white, 21 are male and more than half are from Southern or border states).

“It was all about politics and had nothing to do with law enforcement,” insists former Holder spokesman Matt Miller. “They wanted to get his head.”

Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry, ICE Agent Jaime Zapata, and hundreds of Mexicans are dead because of Holder’s ATF.

No one has been held accountable for those hundreds of deaths since Holder simply chose to stonewall.  The left said nothing about Fast and Furious until Holder was held in contempt, and then started lying about it and protecting the Obama administration and the “survivor” Attorney General.

Holder is so disgusted with Rep. Darrell Issa, the aggressive California Republican who chairs House Oversight, that aides find it hard to keep Holder sitting still during the necessary prep sessions. Holder often commiserates about his grillings, via text messages and email, with a group of supportive African-American journalists and public figures, including Rev. Al Sharpton; Juan Williams, the NPR commentator turned Fox contributor; former CNN analyst Roland Martin; Eugene Robinson of the Washington Post; NPR’s Michele Norris; and her husband, Broderick Johnson, a White House aide—a cadre that often encourages Holder to push back harder than his more cautious in-house advisers.

Issa, in a 2012 letter to Holder, denied any other motives than “legitimate Congressional inquiry” and accused Holder of stonewalling to prevent a “co-equal branch of government” from performing its “Constitutional duty.” Members of Issa’s committee have shown no signs of backing off either.

This is what Holder sent to the Oversight & Reform committee:

Thousands of pages of redactions with no information.  Lies upon lies upon lies, and Holder is mad because someone dares to hold him accountable for the actions of his department and the coverup he has engaged in.  Holder, a racist, screams “white people!” if someone questions him.  Holder’s feelings are hurt because he was called out for the hundreds of dead Mexicans and two US agents killed by his operation.  Yet the left’s violent ideological blinders only allow them to see Holder’s hurt feelings in a vacuum, as though nothing has happened.

The entire Politico piece can be best summed up with: “Holder is good.  Republicans are racist and hate him for no reason.  Everything else is a lie.”

The facts of the past are entirely rewritten by the left.

“Smart” Guns Patent Includes Remote Shut-Off

Via Jawa Report, from TheTruthAboutGuns:

An alert reader emailed TTAG central with news that Armatix GmbH – makers of the iP1 “smart gun” – filed a patent application that included a remote kill switch for the firearm. Click here to view patent EP 1936572 A1, dated 2006. (Not a bug; a feature!) I’m not a patent attorney or an electrical engineer, but as far as I can tell this is the bit (translated from the original German) that indicates remote disabling . . .

Preferably, the inventive device is designed such that the device or the activated identification medium authenticated in response to a signal transmitted from a remote station to the device wake-up and request signal, whereupon the remote station a logical and / or physical access or access to one and allows or prevents a target device . . .

Preferably, the apparatus of the invention can be controlled remotely, for example via satellite and can send information to a satellite.

From looking at it in German (ich kann ein bisschen Deutsch), the translation looks pretty well correct.

Can’t say this is all that unexpected.  For a while now, we’ve been talking about the tech tricks of gun banners that aren’t there for safety, but for control; the creepy silicon vally company that wants to change the gun world to all “smart” guns; and Eric Holder spending millions on “smart” gun technology.

Of course a remote shut-off is the next step, along with so many regulations that ownership becomes either criminal or only a luxury for the super-rich, as things are in other progressive nations.  This is a long march through gun culture for them.  Fortunately it’s still a difficult one for the most part.

More Eric Holder Shenanigans

Via Breitbart, Eric Holder’s gunrunning ATF is planning to use drones:

Attorney General Eric Holder admitted Tuesday that the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives was in the process of looking at the use of domestic drones.  …

“Within the Department, the only component that uses these vehicles at this point is the FBI,” Holder explained. “The ATF in the process of working through to see if they want to make use of them.”

And via the Daily Caller, Eric Holder getting mad at being called out for being held in contempt.  Full video of the exchange between TX Rep Louie Gohmert and Mexican-cartel-arms-merchant General Eric “You Don’t Wanna Go There” Holder:

Gohmert is entirely too nice to Holder, and unfortunately seems to try to address a couple too many points as his time runs out.

Eric Holder and the Technological Tricks of Gun Banners

Via Washington Free Beacon:

Attorney General Eric Holder said on Friday that gun tracking bracelets are something the Justice Department (DOJ) wants to “explore” as part of its gun control efforts.

Technological tricks are par for the course for anti-rights gun banning autocrats.  Technology becomes a tool to ban things – just mandate a feature for “safety” (especially when it’s the antithesis of safe) and suddenly all the things they want to ban can be banned in the name of “safety”.  Then soon enough the last thing wasn’t “safe” enough, and it can be banned, too.

What’s perhaps even more disturbing is the amount of money going into this:

The Justice Department has requested $382.1 million in increased spending for its fiscal year 2014 budget for “gun safety.”

Included in the proposal is $2 million for “Gun Safety Technology” grants, which would award prizes for technologies that are “proven to be reliable and effective.”

President Barack Obama’s budget proposal also calls for $1.1 billion to “protect Americans from gun violence—including $182 million to support the president’s ‘Now is the Time’ gun safety initiative.”

The same Department of Justice that sent guns to Mexican narcoterrorist cartels now wants a third of a billion dollars to spend to target you and your rights.  Eric Holder brought plenty of “safety” to Mexico and the border, and then hushed it up afterwards.

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Suddenly a tech firm going after the American gun industry to consolidate it and control it and provide high-tech “safety” would be of even more interest to a government spending $382,100,000 on gun “safety”; with $2,000,000 for tech proof of concept.

There are numbers for different specifics within Holder’s PDF request, but considering the Holder DOJ’s established policy of lying, withholding information, and Holder currently still held in contempt of congress for stonewalling and lying, pardon me if I consider those numbers to be a huge pile of crap.

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Update: Katie Pavlich weighs in on the subject at Townhall, adding in an almost Colombo-esque “one more thing”:

As a reminder, Attorney General Eric Holder is sill in contempt of Congress for his stonewalling and failure to cooperate with the Oversight Committee Investigation into Operation Fast and Furious. Further, lets not forget Holder is also the guy who said we should “brainwash” people against guns.

She also notes Bob Owens breaks things down a bit more Barney-style, reminding folks that “gun tracking bracelets” really means “smart” gun technology like a radio-transponder bracelet-gun combo that is only activated when worn, but longtime readers probably remember this story where I broke it down here, and other folks probably already clicked on it above (the “technological tricks” link).  So it’s updated and noted now for folks who may be reading this on smartphones or devices where links are a PITA, rather than at a computer terminal.

HotAir has also picked up the story.

DOJ Prosecution For The Knockout Game

For those who’ve missed the news in the last few months, the knockout game is a “game” where urban kids punch unsuspecting people in the head and try to knock them out with one blow.  Or many.

You can peruse WorldStarHipHop for plenty of examples.

The perpetrators are almost exclusively of one ethnic background, while their victims are usually of a specific ethnic background, but they target a few different groups.

From the DOJ:

Conrad Alvin Barrett, 27, has been charged with a federal hate crime related to a racially-motivated assault of a 79-year-old African American man, announced   Acting Assistant Attorney General Jocelyn Samuels of the Civil Rights Division along with U.S. Attorney Kenneth Magidson of the Southern District of Texas and Special Agent in Charge Stephen L. Morris of the FBI.

See, if you’ve missed the discussions of it in the news for the last few months, the ethnic background of the punchers is almost exclusively black.  The ethnic background of the punched are typically white and/or Jewish, but have also included at least one noteworthy asian – a congresswoman.  Also, frequently the targets are women.

This worthless sack of garbage just did the reverse for attention:

According to the complaint, Barrett comments in a video that “the plan is to see if I were to hit a black person, would this be nationally televised?”   The complaint further alleges Barrett claims he would not hit “defenseless people” just moments before punching the elderly man in the face.   Barrett allegedly hit the man with such force that the man immediately fell to the ground.   Barrett then laughed and said “knockout,” as he ran to his vehicle and fled, according to allegations.   The complaint indicates the victim suffered two jaw fractures and was hospitalized for several days as a result of the attack.

This guy’s absolute garbage, but he’s also something else.  He’s in it for the attention, like spree killers going for news media coverage.

He wanted to see if it would be nationally televised, because his attack would be one of the incredibly rare examples where colors were reversed.

Anyone paying attention knows the DOJ is biased and that they will prosecute only when it’s in ideological agreement with their beliefs.  This dirtbag who punched a 79 year-old man did so because he figured he’d play on the DOJ for some fame.

It’s sickening on so many levels.  First that some people are more equal than others and that there are “hate crimes” where the color or orientation of the victim means more than the act itself – so there is no equal justice.   Second is that the Obama administration and Eric Holder’s DOJ is such a mockery of justice that they ignore waves of crimes and single another out.   Third is that their very ideology means they only engage in prosecution that agrees with their worldview and that means some dirtbag like this would see assaulting an innocent old man as his key to fame.  Fourth is that when that violence is ignored depending on who the perpetrators are and who the victims are it leaves both groups in turmoil and harms both communities – one community is victimized directly, the other is victimized by having criminals left unchecked in their midst.

The justice system is so screwed up under the social justice progressives that this slackjawed misanthrope knew everything he needed to do to make national news was to just commit a crime that gaves the racists at the DOJ something to hold up.

“It is unimaginable in this day and age that one could be drawn to violently attack another based on the color of their skin,” said Special Agent in Charge Morris.   “We remind all citizens that we are protected under the law from such racially motivated attacks, and encourage everyone to report such crimes to the FBI.”

What a load of crap.

Hey FBI – here’s one to investigate – the victims even managed to fight back and subdue the attacker:

And just so this is crystal clear, there are plenty of folks of all races who recognize this kind of violence for what it is.  There’s no shortage of good people out there saying what it is and calling for an end to it.

Just for two examples, the first is an impassioned, emotional call for an end to the knockout game, the second an assessment more on the practicality of it (with a bit of humor at the end).

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Update: I realized I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention again and elaborate that there is black-on-black knockout game crime, but it’s another type of crime that goes ignored as it has notably become a prominent black-on-someone-else crime in the last couple years.

For the big government progressive at the DOJ, black-on-black knockout game crime is no more a concern than murders in Chicago are.  Addressing crumbling families (like how Kentray Brown in the first video mentioned there must not be father figures to the kids going polar bear hunting or knocking out UPS drivers or teachers) would require addressing the progressive roots of the destruction of the black community through “help”, as well as the progressive cultural agenda that has utterly failed the black community (though progressives are happy with LBJ’s contemptuously racist promise he’d have black folks voting Democrat for 200 years).

Conservative types often don’t discuss it either because they don’t want to be perceived as racist or because it’s not going on in their neighborhood, or a combination of both.

As evidenced above, there are folks of all races who address that type of knockout game crime, but their voices may not be heard very loudly on a bigger stage.  Their voices are those within a community, though, not of some disconnected talking head in the media nor of some politician in government.

Gunwalker Update: Impeaching Holder and Tribulations of John Dodson

From Breitbart:

Rep. Ted Yoho (R-FL) told local supporters at a town hall in his northern Florida district Tuesday night that he and other Republicans are currently drafting a resolution seeking impeachment for Attorney General Eric Holder.

“It’s to get him out of office—impeachment,” Yoho said of the forthcoming resolution, according to the Ocala Star-Banner newspaper, adding, “it will probably be when we get back in (Washington). It will be before the end of the year. This will go to the speaker and the speaker will decide if it comes up or not.”

The local newspaper noted that Yoho and other House Republicans are planning to approach House Speaker John Boehner with the plan shortly.

I’ll believe it when I see it.  That said, like Mulder, I want to believe.

As usual, though, there’s a fundamental error with so many Republicans:

“Obviously there is a lot frustration with our attorney general. You can name the botched programs,” Cammack (ST: Cat Cammack, Yoho’s chief-of-staff) said. “Fast and Furious has been one of the No. 1 complaints we get in our office and why no one has been held accountable.”

Fast and Furious was not botched.  It did exactly what it set out to do.  The ATF sent guns to the cartels, knowingly.  They had the FBI violate the law so felons could pass NICS background checks, they told their own agents to stand off, and their supervisors were “giddy” when they found weapons at murder scenes in Mexico.  They were all about sending guns to the cartels.  It was used to push for more gun control, it was used to further the 90% lie, it was used to create an anti-gun narrative about an “iron river” of guns going south that just wasn’t so.

It was not botched, it was exposed.

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And as of last month in Arizona, whistleblower John Dodson has been kicked off his CBP liason job:

The federal agent who blew the whistle on the Fast and Furious scandal is suddenly unwelcome at the very Border Patrol agency he sought to protect.

For months, John Dodson, a special agent at the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, has been his agency’s liaison to U.S. Customs and Border Protection in a local office in Arizona.

He also had been widely saluted by border agents and their families for first revealing that weapons that ATF knowingly allowed to cross into Mexico were showing up at murder scenes on both sides of the border.

One of those scenes was the December 2010 fatal shooting of U.S. Border Patrol agent Brian Terry, whose family has publicly thanked Mr. Dodson for coming forward.

But Mr. Dodson was abruptly moved aside Tuesday from his CBP liaison role just hours after it was disclosed in The Washington Times that he had sought the help of the American Civil Liberties Union in his fight to publish a book on the Fast and Furious case.

I’d guess there’s more to this.  Also, CBP management and CBP employees are often of two very different minds.

The ACLU is a frequent legal nemesis of law enforcement, intervening in lawsuits over the privacy and rights of people under investigation. The ACLU has raised concerns about the militarization of police units funded by the Homeland Security Department, the parent agent for the Border Patrol.

“Going to the ACLU was seen as a real poke in the eye of law enforcement, along with wanting to do a tell-all book while still on the job. This was viewed by CBP as crossing the thin blue line,” one law enforcement official told The Times.

Again, this is a management decision, not a line agent decision.  I suspect there’s a lot more to this than meets the eye.

That said, the American Communist Lawyers Union is an organization that loathes the Second Amendment, supports the ATF’s mission of citizen disarmament, loves illegal aliens, and generally hates the Border Patrol more than the cartels do.

DOJ Kills Amber Alert

Heard it on the radio this morning.  Then saw it across the web today.  At Jawa Report & Gateway Pundit, they note that Amber Alert was down, but Michelle Obama’s website for kids eating is up.

I’m posting now at 1139 CST, and the DOJ’s Amber Alert is back up, only after scrutiny and pressure… and “bad press and confusion“.

After being taken down, officially because of the government shutdown, the federal website dealing with alerts about abducted children – AmberAlert.gov – was restored Monday morning.

Even lying Democrats can’t get away with saying they’re the party of compassion when Harry Reid justifies specifically denying kids medical treatment and Eric Holder’s DOJ kills the Amber Alert system for missing children out of spite.