The thrusting and parrying between Obama administration officials, increasingly inquisitive journalists, and congressional investigators is evolving at a dizzying pace, as the Gunwalker conspiracy continues to unravel — to the horror of the executive branch. They have been reduced to screaming hysterics and Chip Dilleresque appeals to “calm down” by one of the most dramatic scandals in American political history.
An attempt by the Obama administration — funneled through the Associated Press — to claim equivalence between a Bush-era cartel weapons interdiction program and the current administration’s plot to arm cartel members was debunked earlier today in a PJMedia exclusive. The Bush-era operation had no intention of allowing guns to walk, whereas Operation Fast and Furious and other alleged gunwalking programs were intentionally designed criminal enterprises.
Several congressmen and senators have voiced their concerns over the unfolding scandal in the past 24 hours. Senator Charles Grassley and House Oversight Committee Chairman Darrell Issa released a statement via Grassley’s office this morning, excoriating Attorney General Eric Holder’s apparent perjury in his sworn testimony in front of the Oversight Committee earlier this year.
The statement says in part:
Senator Chuck Grassley and Congressman Darrell Issa today said that Attorney General Eric Holder received at least five weekly memos beginning in July 2010, including four weeks in a row, describing the ill-advised strategy known as Operation Fast and Furious. The memos were to Holder from Michael Walther, the director of the National Drug Intelligence Center.
The Attorney General told Issa during a House Judiciary Committee in May 2011 that he had just learned of Fast and Furious a few weeks before. Yet, on January 31, in a previously scheduled meeting, Grassley personally handed him two letters about Fast and Furious. Grassley and Issa said they find it very troubling that Holder actually knew of Operation Fast and Furious much earlier, and in greater detail than he ever let on.
The memos specifically said that the straw buyers were “responsible for the purchase of 1500 firearms that were then supplied to Mexican drug trafficking cartels.”
“With the fairly detailed information that the Attorney General read, it seems the logical question for the Attorney General after reading in the memo would be ‘why haven’t we stopped them?’” Grassley said. “And if he didn’t ask the questions, why didn’t he or somebody in his office?”
The Daily Caller goes into more detail, noting:
Holder received briefing memos from National Drug Intelligence Center Director Michael Walther on July 5, July 12, July 19, July 26, and August 9.
The damning confirmation that Holder received weekly updates about the gunwalking operation which specifically informed him that 1,500 guns had been delivered to the Sinaloa cartel by that time, builds a stronger case that the attorney general committed perjury. Arizona Rep. Paul Gosar went even further in a statement yesterday, asserting that the Obama administration was guilty of far more:
Republican Rep. Paul Gosar of Arizona told The Daily Caller on Wednesday that Obama administration officials responsible for Operation Fast and Furious might be accessories to murder.
“We’re talking about consequences of criminal activity, where we actually allowed guns to walk into the hands of criminals, where our livelihoods are at risk,” Gosar said in a phone interview. “When you facilitate that and a murder or a felony occurs, you’re called an accessory. That means that there’s criminal activity.”
Texas Senator John Cornyn was just as adamant in a series of interviews, revealing that Fast and Furious weapons are confirmed to have been recovered at 11 separate crime scenes within the United States so far. Cornyn bluntly accused Attorney General Holder of leading a Department of Justice cover-up, a charge which emerging evidence seems to support. Cornyn wants Holder back under oath testifying in front of the Senate Judiciary Committee:
“It’s looking more and more like the typical Washington scenario where people get caught doing bad things, but actually the cover-up ends up being worse than the original offense,” Cornyn, who sits on the Senate Judiciary Committee, said on a conference call with reporters.
Newspaper op-eds, such as this one from Investor’s Business Daily, are beginning to call for Eric Holder’s criminal indictment.
Amid the onslaught, the administration has offered nothing in the way of accountability and only a superficial offering of change by rearranging staff within the ATF. It seems that the administration, from the White House down through the Department of Justice into the ATF, thinks it can get away with little or no real consequences for a criminal conspiracy they orchestrated. They have been blamed for providing weapons that have killed 200 or more Mexican citizens, and that have been linked to the shootings of three federal law enforcement officers — two of whom were killed.
The New York Times, Washington Post, and Associated Press seem to be doing everything within their considerable power to minimize the crimes alleged against the administration, even as they overstate the rearranging of the deck chairs on Captain Obama’s sinking ship.
There may be ten or more gunwalking operations in five states, yet the part-time acting director of the ATF — who was also conspicuously the chairman of the Attorney General’s Advisory Committee and allegedly briefed on Operation Fast and Furious, according to documents obtained by Senator Grassley — can’t seem to find them.
Perhaps being a “part-time acting director” is a do-nothing job in which he has no power, influence, or interest. Or perhaps he’s covering his own hide, much like the acting DOJ inspector general who leaked information to the alleged co-conspirators she is supposed to be investigating.
If there are ten or more gunwalking operations just half the size of Operation Fast and Furious, then 12,000 weapons were supplied to criminals by our federal government — enough to arm three U.S. Army infantry brigades. If each operation was roughly as large as Fast and Furious, we’re looking at more than 20,000 weapons — enough to equip a U.S. infantry division.
The possibilities suggest that the Department of Justice, Department of Homeland Security, State Department, and White House committed felony crimes domestically and internationally on a nearly unimaginable scale.
The Obama administration is still defending Eric Holder:
White House press secretary Jay Carney said that Holder has been “consistent and truthful” about when he learned of the controversial tactics used in Operation Fast and Furious, which oversaw the sale of thousands of firearms to known and suspected straw buyers for Mexican drug cartels.
“The president believes he’s an excellent attorney general and has great confidence in him, and we absolutely know that the testimony he gave was consistent and truthful,” Carney told reporters at a press briefing.
What else can they say? An administration neck-deep in felony crimes isn’t going to turn on one of their co-conspirators without a solid exit plan.
Between possible charges of accessory to murder, violations of international terrorism laws, felony violations of arms export laws, and possible treason, Franklin’s advice to hang together to avoid hanging separately is far more literal than anyone would have ever dreamed just a week ago.
