[wooclosmercob]

I doubt it. Obama would have gotten rid of him by now if he was going to instead of asserting executive privilege.

[DarrenBent]

I thought this whole thing was bullshit; I mean, after all, isn't the takeaway basically that we should have stricter gun control or something?

No, the issue is that the ATF bungled a sting operation. Anything that makes the ATF look stupid or incompetent is a good thing, because they're a bunch of retrograde redcoat wannabes.

[secondmortgages]

I thought this whole thing was bullshit; I mean, after all, isn't the takeaway basically that we should have stricter gun control or something?

No.

A bunch of gunstores independently contacted the ATF over suspicious attempts to buy long guns, and the ATF told them to "go through with it". After the fact(when a ATF agent got killed) the ATF tried to force all gun stores in the SW to report all sales by default, which would be backdoor gun registration. IOW, they are saying that more registration is needed because gun store owners are acting irresponsibly even though the agency that regulates firearms told them to do so.

This is a bit different from the Bush Admin program because in that instance they stuck tackers in those guns so the ATF could find them again within a matter of days. Being incredibly stupid when you did it much smarter just a few years previously legitimately raises eyebrows, IMO.

[CathBraun]

Speculation time. Since the privilege applies to the President alone, how involved do you think the White House was in the operation?

Not much involvement at all, apparently. The WH can't even seem to recall the agent who died.

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/vid...-comments.html

[Abaanto]

So?

[bomondus]

Colbert's take on why this is all just stupid wing nuttery.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3036697/...hews/#47911469

[Bwvapays]

So is your argument this is not a big deal because Bush did it on a smaller scale?

It's also an especially stupid argument to make because Wide Reciever had trackers in the guns so the ATF could find them again pretty quickly. In Fast and Furious it was literally a local gunstore calling up the ATF and saying "Hey some guys want to buy several hundred longarms of the same type. I find this suspicious" and the ATF went "nah bro it's cool".

One operation was run much better than the other.

[Ad0i89Od]

Lies. Operation Wide Receiver lost the MAJORITY of the guns.



http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ATF_gunwalking_scandal
[/SUP]

Woof, doggy, carefully re-read my post.

The ATF took measures to make is easier to find the guns quickly for Wide Reciever. For Fast and Furious the ATF went from "taking some measures" to "taking none".

[trubreTab]

Woof, doggy, carefully re-read my post.

The ATF took measures to make is easier to find the guns quickly for Wide Reciever. For Fast and Furious the ATF went from "taking some measures" to "taking none".

When those supposed measures failed in "the vast majority" of cases why do you think they matter at all?

[nushentelve]

Yes, when those "precautions" almost universally fail and are worthless, as was the case in Operation Wide Receiver. No wonder they decided to ditch the expensive tracking systems which almost universally failed. Why waste public money on "precautions" which are both expensive and don't work?

I'd call not wasting public money on such boondoggles better management.

[singleGirl]

I'm still trying to understand why are we arming drug dealers? Have we been importing crack cocaine into this country the past 30 years, too?

[RIjdrVs3]

I'm still trying to understand why are we arming drug dealers? Have we been importing crack cocaine into this country the past 30 years, too?

It was an attempt to determine what the chain of custody the Cartels were using for weapons purchases was. Since we couldn't require that gunstores report all purchases, we tried to engineer it artifically.

[Appenianags]

I'm still trying to understand why are we arming drug dealers? Have we been importing crack cocaine into this country the past 30 years, too?

In all three cases (the two under Bush and the 1 under Obama) the goal was to catch higher up people in the cartel red handed with the guns. Sure, they could catch the low level mules but that doesn't really do anything to stop the cartels so the idea was to work with Mexican police to arrest them once the guns were delivered to cartel officials in Mexico (that way you have rock solid proof of a crime). The problem is the Mexican police were both incompetent and corrupt as they either failed to track the mules on their side of the border and in some cases even tipped off cartel members. The basic idea of catching the middle management guys instead of just the hired mules was nice but the big weak point in all three operations was the Mexican police not doing their jobs. Also these were local office operation in Arizona so it's hard to tie them to high level officials in either administration so, once again, we're back to nothing more than election year partisan BS.

[Arratherimi]

Won't someone please think of the poor victims families. I'm sure Terry Brian's family and that other family with the mexican sounding name (Zimmerman, Zapolo... whatever) are hungering for the answers.

[texprofi]

That's just crazy talk.

[RerRoktoido]

In all three cases (the two under Bush and the 1 under Obama) the goal was to catch higher up people in the cartel red handed with the guns. Sure, they could catch the low level mules but that doesn't really do anything to stop the cartels so the idea was to work with Mexican police to arrest them once the guns were delivered to cartel officials in Mexico (that way you have rock solid proof of a crime). The problem is the Mexican police were both incompetent and corrupt as they either failed to track the mules on their side of the border and in some cases even tipped off cartel members. The basic idea of catching the middle management guys instead of just the hired mules was nice but the big weak point in all three operations was the Mexican police not doing their jobs. Also these were local office operation in Arizona so it's hard to tie them to high level officials in either administration so, once again, we're back to nothing more than election year partisan BS.

Umm... The Mexican authorities were in the dark on this. Look it up.

The ATF's "gunwalking" operations were deliberately kept secret from the Mexican government, even after related firearms began to be found at violent crime scenes and in criminal arsenals in 2010 and 2011. When they were told in January 2011 that there was an undercover program in existence, they still were not given details.[79] Mexican politicians expressed widespread anger at the operations as information developed in 2011.[80] Mexican officials stated in September that the US government still had not briefed them on what went wrong nor had they apologized.[79] Attorney General of Mexico Marisela Morales, well-liked by US law enforcement, said, "At no time did we know or were we made aware that there might have been arms trafficking permitted. In no way would we have allowed it, because it is an attack on the safety of Mexicans." In addition, she expressed that allowing weapons to "walk" would represent a "betrayal" of Mexico.[79] Why are you ALWAYS wrong? What else are you wrong or lying about? Where do you get your information from?

[Cricequorie]

Also, it's not clear if it even can backfire horribly, because if Mexican drug lords can acquire guns from other sources then these killings may have happened anyway. In that case, it's better if you at least have some means of catching the criminals.

What conceivable mechanism for the Fast and Furious operation allowed for the criminals to be caught? Once the guns were purchased there was no ability to trace their current whereabouts.

[chppjdf]

Possibly because they had done it before without it backfiring horribly...?

Also, it's not clear if it even can backfire horribly, because if Mexican drug lords can acquire guns from other sources then these killings may have happened anyway. In that case, it's better if you at least have some means of catching the criminals.

The guns the drug lords would have acquired anyway would be the guns denied other criminals.

[IACJdKfU]

Are you serious man?

I find it astounding that you think there is no difference between the two. If you had a doctor that tried a treatment that had a 10% success rate, and a doctor that just shrugged his shoulders and went "whelp" which would you assume was the more professional of the two?

Not at all. One used expensive tracking systems which failed in "vast majority of the cases" so in the future operations the local ATF office in Arizona decided to skip wasting money on "precautions" which had repeatedly failed to work as advertised and instead decided to physically follow the gun mules both on the ground and in the air. That's not "welp let's do nothing" as you've been claiming.

I've posted links to both the wiki article and the ATF fact sheet.

[JennyStewarta]

Still waiting for Oerdin to acknowledge his mistakes.