“The Lives of Others,” a film documenting the workings of a surveillance state run by the Stasi, the secret domestic spymasters who kept the Soviet lid on in East Germany from the end of World War II until the wall came down, paints a grim picture of what happens when a government begins to […]
June 6, 2012. Four months after the post below went online, the MSM (NYT, CBS, New York Post, Fox) is reporting that Representative Darrelll Issa (R-CA), Chairman of the House Oversight Committee investigating DOJ’s gunrunning scheme, Fast and Furious, claims the wiretap applications submitted during the course of the operation prove that DOJ officials at the highest levels knew ATF agents were bending, ignoring, and violating US law to move more than 2000 combat-ready weapons across the US border into Mexico. None of the weapons carried tracing devices, and ATF whistleblowers who pressed superiors about the need to have some sort of interdiction strategy in place that would allow them to recover the weapons before they could be used to murder innocent people (Brian Terry) were told to stand down or find another job.
Whether Issa’s latest revelation will revive the official investigation into a government scheme to supply Mexican gangs with weapons that could be traced back to recent sales by US gundealers along the SW border, a move that even the most skeptical mind has trouble believing was designed to do anything but shore up the argument for stricter gun control in the US, is yet to be seen.
Attorney General Eric Holder has told the press that Issa’s Committee is on a ‘witch hunt’ meant to target high-ranking ‘African-Americans’ within the Administration, officials Holder identified more explicitly by adding ‘like me, and the President,’ and it is unlikely the GOP House Leader John Boehner is eager to divert pre-election media coverage from Romney’s singleminded focus on the economy–even though Fast and Furious, with its parallels to Iran-Contra, might well result in the prosecution of admininstration officials for contempt, obstruction of justice, perjury, and multiple violations of the Arms Export Control Act (AECA). Think Ollie North.
In case today’s (June 6th) reports about the importance of wiretap applications linked to Fast and Furious still leave you confused, there’s a repost of my earlier analysis below. Of special interest should be the photocopy of the memo requesting approval for a wiretap signed by Lanny Breuer in March 2010. A DOJ spokesperson says Breuer never scrutized the details, that they were never spelled out to the Head of DOJ’s Criminal Division.
Hmmm…..
Let’s talk wire taps, investigative tools popularized by every cop and criminal show that’s crossed our television screens.
Well, it turns out that ATF agents involved in the gun walking scheme known as Fast and Furious made numerous applications over a significant period of time for the issuance of court orders authorizing wire taps.
Bad news for top cops at DOJ. Like Willy Sutton, who said he robbed banks “because that’s where the money is,” members of the House Oversight Committee have told DOJ they want those wire tap applications because they know that’s where the evidence is–in detailed descriptions of investigative techniques and signatures they believe will point to the involvement of senior DOJ officials.
On Monday morning, Fox News ran a cover story— “ATF ‘Fast and Furious’ Claim SHOT FULL OF HOLES” (The caps belong to Fox). The visuals were pretty exciting, but the revelations in the article, hardly breaking news, were SHOT FULL OF SPIN. Listen. It’s time for the media and Congress, to get the story (the whole thing) right. We need more focus more on the criminality that may attend Fast and Furious and less discussion about the outrageous, but not illegal, aspects of the operation. More news and less
noise…
Let’s review.
Fox reporter William LaJeunesse (US Government Bought and Sold Weapons) tells us, first, that it was ‘taxpayer money’ (1.25 million—ok, sounds right) that paid for the military-grade weapons ATF sent across the US-Mexico border as part of Fast and Furious.
Where else would that money have come from? Do we think ATF agents in Phoenix passed the hat…
(4) Holder ‘Appoints’ Special Prosecutor to Review CIA Interrogations US Attorney General Eric Holder announced that he is expanding the mandate of Special Counsel John Durham to include a ‘preliminary review’ (not yet an investigation) into the legality of CIA interrogations of certain detainees. Durham was originally appointed in 2008 by then-Attorney General Michael Mukasey […]