Ken Berwitz

Did you know that the Operation Fast and Furious scandal - over 2,000 weapons sold by the Obama administration to Mexican drug cartels, which have used them to go on a crime/killing spree............is George Bush's fault? 

Yep.  Just ask the New York Times, and talkingpointsmemo.com, those two well known pillars of neutrality and honest reporting.

Here is today's New York Times editorial on this amazing revelation, in rust - with my comments in blue:

Gun Walking the Mexican Border

It turns out that Fast and Furious, the foolhardy government operation that allowed high-powered weapons to cross the border to Mexican drug cartels, was not a one-off. The Bush administration used the same improper tactic in Operation Wide Receiver in 2006-7.  Ok, that is a very, very serious charge.  If you’re right, then George Bush should be thoroughly condemned and made to explain why he would have overseen this absolutely catastrophic program.

 

The history of these risky “gun walking” operations — devised by the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives to try to track illicit gun-shop purchases in Arizona to the cartel bosses — was spelled out to Congress by Lanny Breuer, head of the Justice Department’s criminal division. Fast and Furious, in place from 2009 to early 2011, sent more than 2,000 assault weapons onto streets on both sides of the border. Some showed up at crime scenes, including a shootout where a Border Patrol agent was killed last December.  Wait a minute.  The sale of those 2,000-plus assault weapons – “from 2009 to early 2011” - occurred 100% during the Obama administration, not the Bush administration.  How in the world does this explain, or even co-exist with, your contention that Bush did the same thing.  Are you claiming that in 2006-7 Bush sent thousands of assault weapons over the border too?  If so, let’s see your evidence.

In denouncing the tactic as “unacceptable and misguided,” Mr. Breuer apologized for his own failure to respond aggressively when he learned about Operation Wide Receiver even as Fast and Furious was under way. He said that he did not alert Justice Department leaders when he found out about it in April 2010.  That’s nice.  I’m glad that Lanny Breuer is willing to fall on his sword for Obama & Co.  But WHERE IS THE EVIDENCE THAT BUSH HAD ANYTHING TO DO WITH THIS?

Congressional Republicans have rebuked the Obama administration for the Fast and Furious fiasco. That this tactic — which ranges so far from proper law enforcement — was used in the Bush years is equally disturbing. Congress should bring responsible officials to account, but it cannot duck the need for far stronger laws to control gun trafficking.  Well, well, well.  Another general reference to the Bush administration, with absolutely no evidence of any kind to support it.  Y’know, a cynical person – like me, for example – just might be getting the idea that you don’t have one effing thing to back up your claim.  But I’ll hold off making that conclusion because you have one more paragraph to go in the editorial.  Surely it must be there.

Mr. Breuer said in the past five years, 94,000 weapons have been recovered in Mexico and 64,000 were traced to American sources. “We need more tools,” he said. To which Senator Charles Grassley, Republican of Iowa, predictably responded, “The answer isn’t to clamp down on law abiding-citizens or gun dealers.” There is no problem with law-abiding citizens. It’s Congress’s failure to ban sales of assault weapons that is feeding the drug wars.  Uh…that’s the end of the editorial?  That’s all you have?  It’s over, without a single indication in any way, shape, manner or form of what George Bush had to do with Operation Fast and Furious?  How am I supposed to conclude anything other than you are a bunch of liars and frauds, trying to pin something on Mr. Bush without a scintilla of evidence, so that you can deflect the blame from Mr. Obama?   

As you can see, the New York Times editorial is a classic exercise in BS, written in a way that, apparently, is supposed to lead the more gullible of New York Times readers (and they are legion) to think that since Bush is mentioned twice – ooooohhh, not just once, but twice – he must be responsible.

By contrast, the editorial contains only one mention of the Obama administration – after which the Bush administration is immediately referenced, just in case readers might linger with the (accurate) idea that the Obama years are when this actually happened.

And there is no mention at all of either Attorney General eric holder, who lied to our faces about when he knew of Operation Fast and Furious, or the 35 (so far) house members demanding that holder resign because of it.

A thank-you to the editorial writers of the New York Times (sarcastic though it is), for this demonstration of just how desperate they are to protect their lord and master, Barack Obama.

One last thing:  At the beginning of this blog, I mentioned talkingpointsmemo.com’s (equally desperate) attempt to pin Operation Fast and Furious on the Bush administration.  If you want to read its “exposé”, you can do so by clicking here. 

What you will find is that, during the Bush years, a pilot program was implemented to explore the viability of walking guns into Mexico and tracking them.  A total of 43 such weapons were walked in, with what was supposed to be full cooperation on the part of Mexico.  There is no indication at all that President Bush or the then-Attorney General knew a thing about this start-up program.  When Mexico did not cooperate (i.e. its people - apparently fraudulently - claimed they didn’t see the weapons come in) the program was scrapped.

Let’s review: 

-During the Bush administration, a total of 43 weapons walked to Mexico under controlled circumstances, and the program was quickly shut-down when things didn’t work out;

 

-During the Obama administration, more than 2,000 weapons were sold to Mexican drug cartels over roughly two years' time, which apparently were used to, among other things, kill 2 US agents (Brian Terry and Jaime Zapata) along with a great many more people on the Mexican side of the border.   

Yep, I suppose in the eyes of folks at the New York Times and Talking Points Memo, those are pretty much the same………..