Fast And Furious

TODAY IS WEDNESDAY, JUNE 19, 2013

June 21, 2012 at 10:00 AM

Fast And Furious

The GOP’s gunnning for Attorney General Eric Holder. How you see the fury depends on where you stand.

Attorney General Eric Holder appears before the Senate Judiciary Committee on Capitol Hill in Washington, Tuesday, June 12, 2012. Holder is facing a contempt of Congress vote next week by the House Oversight Committee where he is accused of misleading the panel’s investigation of the controversial “Operation Fast and Furious” gunrunning program. (AP)

Talk about two Americas. In one, the uproar over the Justice Department’s botched “Fast and Furious” gun sting is a roaring blaze of fury itself. The Second Amendment, honesty, decency, life and limb, all under attack. A party-line GOP House committee vote yesterday to cite Attorney General Eric Holder with criminal contempt.

Turn the political corner and there’s a whole different view. A botched operation, yes. But it’s all political. Bush did it too. It’s election year grandstanding. Bring on the executive privilege.

This hour, On Point: guns, politics, and the fury over Fast and Furious.

-Tom Ashbrook

Guests

Chris Cillizza, writes “The Fix”, a politics blog for the Washington Post. He also covers the White House for the newspaper and website.

Rep. Jason Chaffetz, Republican Congressman representing Utah’s 3rd District. He sits on the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform.

Robert Raben, president and founder of the Raben Group, a D.C.-based lobbying and consulting firm.
He was Assistant Attorney General for Legislative Affairs in the Justice Department in the Clinton Administration.

From Tom’s Reading List

Washington Post “President Obama asserted executive privilege over documents related to the “Fast and Furious” operation Wednesday as a House panel moved to hold Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. in contempt after he failed to hand over documents related to a congressional inquiry into the scandal.”

Rolling Stone “Holder duly agreed to produce some of the documents, and Issa indicated a willingness to back down. But the situation is volatile, and a contempt hearing could still happen as early as Wednesday.”

CBS News “Documents obtained by CBS News show that the Bureau of Alcohol Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) discussed using their covert operation “Fast and Furious” to argue for controversial new rules about gun sales.”

New York Times “As a sign of the pride Representative Darrell Issa takes in annoying the Obama administration, consider his account of a recent exchange with Rahm Emanuel, a former congressman and now the White House chief of staff. In describing the episode — a chance encounter outside the House gym — Mr. Issa smirked and raised his middle finger. “

Michiganjf

I’m glad you’re finally covering this Republican stupidity, but you got the name wrong…

The title of this absurd Republican ring-toss should actually be “Vast and Spurious.”
- Drew (GA)
  
  Thanks for making me laugh! That was brilliant.
feettothefire

I can easily predict an almost absolute party line split in today’s comments. Democrats will support the dubious actions of Holder and the administration while conveniently choosing to ignore the outrage they felt over the whole Alberto Gonzalez imbroglio. Republicans will condemn Holder and the administration while ignoring the stolid support they gave to Gonzalez and the Bush administration for their equally dismal stewardship of the Justice Department. What a colossal waste of time. Why can’t any of you admit that nothing your side does is wrong, because it’s your side. And everything the other side does is wrong, because it’s the other side. It would save a lot of time and maybe we could all go for a nice walk instead. That would certainly be a lot more productive.
- Drew (GA)
  
  I’m so sick of this garbage. Not saying it shouldn’t be the soup of the day at OP tomorrow, just that I’m sick of the repetitive and non-productive coverage it continues to receive. Nice comment.
- Gregg
  
  Gonzales didn’t do anything approaching Holder’s actions. It’s not a partisan matter.
  - jefe68
    
    Are you kidding? Your entire comment is a partisan matter. Holder has turned over more than 7000 documents in this case. This was started by GW Bush under Michael Mukasey, and yet Issa has not even interviewed him nor has he been asked to appear in front of the Senate Judiciary Committee.
    
    Again, get your facts right.
    - Gregg
      
      Your analysis is the most shallow of fed talking points. It doesn’t hold water. You should be embarrassed. How curious are you for the truth?
      - Still Here
        
        The Democrat party fears the truth, especially this close to an election.
      - TFRX
        
        My “Jew lawyer” friend wants you to stop saying “Democrat party”.
      - http://twitter.com/weblizard weblizard
        
        Sadly, the conservative anti-education movement has left many unable to distinguish between adjectives and nouns…
      - Gregg
        
        I would use a different adjective to describe the Democrat Party.
  - feettothefire
    
    Wrong. Twelve comments in and it’s already a partisan matter, just as it will be for the next several hundred comments.
    - Gregg
      
      What you will see are ideological pawns reduced to making the childish argument, “well, so and so did it too”. You will see self-righteous claims of partisanship. You will see the names Bush, Mukasey, Gonzales, Cheney, Issa but you won’t see much mention of Holder.
      - feettothefire
        
        Absolutely. And you’ve just substantiated my claim. Democrats and liberals will spend this day vigilantly defending Holder and the Administration, while Republicans and conservatives will spend the day ripping them to pieces. In the case of Gonzales, the roles were reversed, precisely along party lines. That means most aren’t really concerned with wrongdoing in general, only the other sides wrongdoing. If you were to name, one by one, all the regular contributors to this page, including yourself, I’m quite sure I could predict with 95% accuracy where their sentiments will fall on this matter. And it will all be based on their political ideology rather than the facts. Otherwise, we’d see plenty of Democrats and liberals condemning Holders actions while many conservatives and Republicans would write supportive comments. We both know that’s not going to happen, just as it didn’t happen in the Gonzales case.
      - Gregg
        
        I reject that. There is a truth. Criticism can be legitimate.
      - feettothefire
        
        You may reject it, but so far I’m batting .1000. Take a look at today’s comments so far. Try to tell me you’re surprised by the comments of any of the regulars. Of course your not. Nor will you be. Think back to the election fiasco of 2000. Democrats across the land called Republicans cry-babies and scaredy-cats. Republicans across the land called democrats cry-babies and scaredy-cats. Each side claimed the moral high ground. Each accused the other of trying to “steal” the election. I remember very few Republicans saying the Gore camp might have a good point and that we should try for a fair solution. I remember very few Democrats calling for the same. No, it was a party line split, right down the middle. NOBODY gave a damn about discovering the “truth.” Any criticism was of a purely partisan nature. Criticism is valid only in the absence of ideological bias. There I go again, trying to get the big laugh.
      - Gregg
        
        I am not saying the partisans won’t attempt to make this a partisan issue. I’m saying it’s not one. Look again at the comments and see how little Holder’s name is even mentioned. The partisans are not talking about the issue.
      - Terry Tree Tree
        
        Good GRIEF! Holder’s name is the WHOLE segment! Everyone else has to mention it, to mention ANYTHING?
      - Drew (GA)
        
        That’s what you do when on a witch-hunt. You keep screaming “WITCH!” until the body is good and crispy.
      - http://twitter.com/weblizard weblizard
        
        Did I miss the news when Gonzales was held in contempt?
      - feettothefire
        
        Thanks for the help. It really wasn’t necessary, but I appreciate it anyway.
  - Terry Tree Tree
    
    My millitary training and experience tell me otherwise!
  - feettothefire
    
    By the way, when an Attorney General of The United States allows the Justice Department to become as blatantly politicized as Gonzales did, he’s done about as bad a thing as a government official can do. He was the countries Attorney General, not the Bush administrations man inside the Justice Department. Elsewhere today, that two-sentence-wonder STILL HERE mentions moral relativism. Reading the words of conservatives who are critical of Holder’s actions, and probably with just cause, while remembering the love affair conservatives had with Alberto Gonzales, despite his betrayal of law enforcement everywhere, makes moral relativism just fine in my book.
    - Gregg
      
      Conservatives hated Gonzales, he was a lightweight. They felt like he was put in to aid Bush with his horrible immigration policies. Conservatives hated that as well. Gonzales is not relevant to this discussion.
      - TFRX
        
        Your estimation of who really was a conservative during the GWB years is hilarious. It’s easy to say now because you didn’t exist in anything like the numbers you say you did.
        
        It’s like how in 1946 140% of Vichy France remembered they were in La Resistance during the war.
- AC
  
  i’m relieved to hear this, sometimes a person walking in looking for conversation and information gets confused and doesn’t know who to believe. i see most problems such as these as innate and repetitive, so nothing new here (well, diff/new players…)
  altho, i think the people enjoying this sidetracking the most are prob the drug/gun traffickers – they just eat this up and are tickled pink by our inside bickering, i’m sure, and continue on their merry way, knowing business as usual is garunteed….
  - Gregg
    
    AC, keep in mind the MSM has largely ignored this story. With executive privilege being invoked and the contempt of Congress charge it can no longer be ignored. Even On Point has relented. Obviously those ideologues who have not been informed will immediately try to shift blame, change the subject and cry partisanship. I know you won’t, look into it with your usual sober analysis and let the chips fall.
    - feettothefire
      
      Gregg, you can’t keep claiming the mainstream media is ignoring stories we’ve all been hearing about for months. That’s a favorite tack of yours I simply don’t understand. Is it because they’re not prioritizing their lead stories in the order you would like? As I’ve claimed before, my primary, almost exclusive, sources of news are The Boston Globe and NPR. I’d call that as MSM as you can get. But, somehow I remain informed about all the stories you claim they’re not telling me. This one, for instance. If my only source of information is big media, and I’m well informed, I must be getting my information from big media. Unless you think I’m poorly informed.
      - Gregg
        
        ABC led “World News Tonight” with the weather.
        
        I don’t want to get personal FTTF but IMO if you are not outraged then you are not informed on the matter. I could be wrong. Can you describe in detail the vast difference between “Fast and Furious” and Bush’s “Project Gunrunner”? The exist big time, anyone who leaps directly to “Bush started it” has to be uninformed or dishonest. It’s very easy to claim Alberto Gonzales was just as bad as Holder but it’s impossible to back up in any rational comparison. It does not take much effort to blow that one out of the water. If one relies, without skepticism or curiosity, on the MSM they easily make the shallow conclusions of the uninformed.
      - feettothefire
        
        Wrong again, Gregg. There hasn’t been a human born who is more outraged by the bad deeds of people in government than I am. It’s what my username stands for. And I certainly hope you’re not attributing that “Bush started it” tripe to me. As for my feelings about Gonzales, we’re back to my absolutism. The degree of fallout from ones wrongdoing is irrelevant. It’s the wrongdoing that matters. If you wish, see my comment just below to see how low my esteem for Roberto Gonzales is.
      - Gregg
        
        No, I do not attribute the “Bush started” tripe to you. Sorry if I implied so. It goes to my point about the MSM. The line has already been used here and is a common talking point.
        
        I’m not going to get distracted with Gonzales whom I did not like. Holder is the issue.
    - Terry Tree Tree
      
      Much Media is easily distracted. The O.J. Simpson ‘slow chase’, which should have taken less than 30 minutes to containment, and WOULD have, had it NOT been the darling of the LAPD, to the WHOLE trial, which showed the MANY ways the LAPD and cohorts helped O.J., distracted from how MUCH important news?
      The 9/11 Commission Report shows the MANY ways that the ‘W’ admin. ‘assisted’ the 9/11 ‘hijackers’, in ways that could NOT have been any more coincidental, than one person winning ALL the world’s lotteries, in the same week, while being ‘discovered’, and given STAR positions in movies, singing, and modelling! Just start with the ‘W’ admin. holding an ‘exercise’ of just the scenario that happened, on the MOST LIKELY day that it would be attempted?
- Terry Tree Tree
  
  I still hold Alberto Gonzales responsibility for the disgrace of Abu Ghrab, and Guantanomo, since he was over-all in charge, and the Colonel they ‘prosecuted’ gave several reasons that she, and her group, were jailers ONLY, and were given orders to let the ‘interrogators’ have their way.
     Gonzales was then moved to Attorney General, to get him away from the investigations of these crimes, and continued with wrongful things as Attorney General.
     ‘Fast and Furious’, as it has been reported, seems il-conceived, and not carried out in a proper manner.
     There has been MUCH speculation of Mexican Authorities assisting the Drug Cartels, in some form, so I can see a reason to want to leave them out. Evidently Drug Cartels own someone here too?
     How many high-level Drug Cartel members were arrested and convicted under the Bush Admin. program? If, as some say, it was so sucessful? Low-level arrests are easy, so just list the high-level ones, please.
  - Gregg
    
    “… hundreds of arrest and prosecutions”
    
    “One thing requires clarification however. The code names the government used can be confusing. Project Gunrunner was a BATF program begun under the Bush administration to arrest straw-purchasers and gun smugglers moving guns to Mexico. From 2005 through 2008, it was moderately successful and resulted in hundreds of arrests and prosecutions.
    
    Operation Fast and Furious is a separate program that began in 2009. The ATF launched this program using Project Gunrunner funding and reportedly moved the focus from the straw-buyer to “higher level” players. Their claim was that they were targeting those with the
    
    money to buy guns and move them to Mexico. It was under Operation Fast and Furious that ATF agents simply watched guns “walk” over the border into Mexico and lost track of them. At least until they turned up at a crime scene.”
    
    http://www.handgunclub.com/hca/wp-content/uploads/2011/07/Project-Gunrunner-timelines0715.pdf
    - Terry Tree Tree
      
      From your words, Operation Fast and Furious was FAR more important, and if done right, would have been far more effective than arresting ‘straw-purchasers? Arresting ‘thousands’ of people that were somehow persuaded to buy a gun for someone, actually wasn’t going to solve the REAL problem, as THOUSANDS of guns probably got through, and went to the Drug Cartels.
      I am NOT defending ‘Fast and Furious’, as I have said that, from the information I see about it, it was done in an ineffective manner.
      Project Gunrunner was evidently done like the War on Drugs, back when the emphasis was on busting pot users, and sending them to prison for decades, while the drug kingpins just sold to other users.
JGC

I am Curious about Fast and Furious.

But if information is to be divulged, I hope it goes back to the days of Operation Wide Receiver, around 2006 under the Bush II government.

As to President Obama, he does seem to show a hands-on interest in these sort of minute details for security.

As to Representative Issa, he has his own interesting history, including two arrests on illegal-weapons charges, and an incident in Michigan that led to a misdemeanor gun conviction.�
There were also initial charges of an alleged theft of a new Maserati from a local dealership, concerning him and a brother William. Maybe this is how he first conceived the idea of a steering wheel lock to secure a car, after having first hand experience on stealing them, and thereafter earning his first millions. Representative Issa has a lot of hands-on interest in transfer of gun ownership.

Rep. Issa calls these circa 1972 incidents “misdemeanor”, but don’t you wonder if a person of color was brought in under those circumstances today, that person would be spending decades in a privately-run jail, probably with Rep. Issa as an investor?
- William
  
  Holder has an interesting past too. He was the guy that engineered the Marc Rich pardon.
  - Gregg
    
    Not to mention the FALN terrorist.
    - Drew (GA)
      
      “President Bill Clinton was criticized for some of his pardons and acts of executive clemency.[1]
      While most presidents grant pardons on several days throughout their terms, Clinton chose to make most of them on January 20, 2001. Collectively, the controversy surrounding these actions has sometimes been called Pardongate in the press.[2] Federal prosecutor Mary Jo White was appointed to investigate the pardons. She was later replaced by James Comey, who found no wrongdoing on Clinton’s part.”
      
      http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_Clinton_pardon_controversy
      
      Just a side note and slightly off topic but statistically your chances of being killed by a terrorist attack are far lower than your chances of dying from accidents involving household furniture. I guess we need to get a war on Coffee Tables going.
      - Gregg
        
        No one said it was illegal. If a President wants to pardon terrorist, it’s his right.
      - Greyman
        
        Presidents seem able to declassify intelligence data as they see fit, too.
- Drew (GA)
  
  “I am Curious about Fast and Furious.”
  
  Poet and didn’t know it? lol
  
  I’m out, hope everyone has a great day.
Worried for the country(MA)

Why is Obama behaving like Nixon?

What is Holder hiding?

This shouldn’t be political. They could have handled this internally with an investigation, full report and then firing of those responsible.

Holder is responsible for delaying this until the election season.
- Still Here
  
  Exactly. They could have taken care of this a year plus ago.
  - Gregg
    
    Ironically, had they done so this would not be an election issue.
    - Still Here
      
      It won’t be if the MSM keeps giving Obama a pass.
    - TFRX
      
      Sod off.
      
      There is no such thing as any Democrat “taking care of” right wing media
      shitstorms and not having Fox News regurgitate them ad nauseum as long as loyal low-information hacks like you echo them here.
      - Gregg
        
        I certainly understand your reluctance to talk about Holder. Have a nice day.
      - TFRX
        
        I can’t have a grown-up conversation with an infant.
      - Gregg
        
        You have yet to add to the discussion. We already know you think I’m an idiot.
  - TFRX
    
    Sod off.
    
    There is no such thing as any Democrat “taking care of” right wing media shitstorms and not having Fox News regurgitate them ad nauseum.
- TFRX
  
  Holder sat down with Issa and wanted to talk man to man.
  
  Issa promised a new hearing every day after the midterm elections.
  
  Let’s just say one of them (Issa) didn’t man up, but just continued his witch hunt.
Gregg

Holder said Bush’s AG (Mukasey) knew about the gunwalking. He didn’t and Holder later had to retract. Can anyone in this administration refrain from blaming Bush for everything?
- jefe68
  
  Sorry Gregg Michael Mukasey started the thing.
  AG Holder shut it down. Get your facts right.
  It’s a mess, but the US government has a history of doing this kind of crap going back to the 60′s.
  
  Issa is a political hack.
  - Gregg
    
    Then why did Holder retract?
    
    http://dailycaller.com/2012/06/20/another-retraction-holder-withdraws-claim-that-bushs-attorney-general-knew-about-gunwalking/
    
    I’ve already seen below the claim that somehow Alberto Gonzales was as corrupt and incompetent as Holder but the case cannot be made. If it could, it would mean nothing. We have someone in the Executive branch being held in contempt of Congress and a President invoking executive privilege when the fifth amendment is the only thing that applies. That doesn’t happen every day. Hundreds are dead, don’t make silly excuses.
    - Still Here
      
      Moral relativism and excuse making are all these losers have.
    - Terry Tree Tree
      
      “If it could, it would mean nothing.”�
      How much more partisan can you get?
      Before you go off on me, read my comment about BOTH?
      - Gregg
        
        Gonzales is irrelevant. If he was the devil it still has nothing to do with Holder. Focus.
  - MadMarkTheCodeWarrior
    
    ATF’s Project Gun Runner started in ’05 and expanded to a national effort in ’06. Keep in mind that all we here about all the screw ups but none of the successes.
    
    If you want screw ups look at the NRA backed politicians’ initiatives that block further restrictions on gun trade and facilitate gun running… i.e. they don’t make it legal, but the make it easier.
    
    This is not about national interest. This is political circus.
    
    (Said by a gun owner, ex-NRA member)
    - Gregg
      
      It was night and day. Obama didn’t even work with Mexican authorities as Bush did. There are 1400 guns unaccounted for, not so under Bush. There were strict controls in place to prevent this sort of thing, they worked. Obama ignored them. Bush’s initiative was highly successful, people died under Obama’s folly. It was an effort to circumvent the 2nd amendment.
      - MadMarkTheCodeWarrior
        
        “It was an effort to circumvent the 2nd amendment.”
        
        Do you mean our God given right to engage in international arms trafficking?
        
        Dude, that’s a completely orthogonal to the issues here!
      - Gregg
        
        First things first, I learned a new word. Thanks.
        
        Yes, in April of 2009 Presidents Obama and Calderon held a press conference. They decried the lifting of the prohibition to sell assault weapons. The claim was that crime amongst cartels increased dramatically. IMHO Obama wanted mayhem in Mexico with American assault weapons to help him make the case for an assault weapons ban. I call that an effort to circumvent the 2nd Amendment.
      - Drew (GA)
        
        That was an awfully big word Mark. Nice comment though.
      - Still Here
        
        Americans died, first responders, people trying to protect the rest of us.
      - Victor Vito
        
        And the cartels would’nt have been able to find weapons otherwise…
- mary elizabeth
  
  Not true. The whole story is widely available,
- Still Here
  
  No, it’s their only excuse. So tiresome. But the Democrat party never takes responsibility for anything.
  - Drew (GA)
    
    The Democrat Party? I thought it was the Democratic Party. You know, the one that’s constantly engaged in fruitless conflict with the Republic Party. Err, I mean Republican Party.
    - Still Here
      
      Thank you grammar police! Slow day in GA.
      - TFRX
        
        Grammar police?
        
        I’ll have to ask my “Jew lawyer” about whether this is a symptom of grammar or latent dogwhistle to bigotry.
      - Drew (GA)
        
        On Point!
      - nj_v2
        
        The slowest day in Drew’s Georgia is an order of magnitude faster than the fastest day in Still a Troll’s head.
    - http://twitter.com/weblizard weblizard
      
      As I said elsewhere in the conversation,the conservative anti-education movement has sadly left many unable to distinguish between adjectives and nouns…
      - Drew (GA)
        
        The comment honestly had nothing to do with grammar. It did, however, carry the intention of getting the point across that TRFX so beautifully demonstrates in his reply.
  - Victor Vito
    
    Lame.
Gregg

Here’s Dr. Krauthammer’s take.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sZ8VMQGbizc&feature=player_embedded#!
http://neilblanchard.blogspot.com/ Neil Blanchard

If the Republicans were serious about stopping ALL the guns from being purchased here in the USA that are then used in the drug wars; then they would have some credibility. Ironically, we are buying the drugs that make the cartels rich, and we sell them the guns they use in all their crimes.

We need to ban all automatic and semiautomatic guns, and all magazines larger than 6 rounds. We need to ban all gun show sales. We need to have a long waiting period for thorough background checks, and we need initial and annual training and competency tests for all gun owners.

Ghost buyers should be prosecuted. All gun sales should be fully documented, and all guns should have microscopic serial numbers and have rFID chips and ballistic records kept by the seller.

Neil
- feettothefire
  
  But, how would keep all our neighborhood militias equipped with the arms required to repel the invading hordes?
  - http://neilblanchard.blogspot.com/ Neil Blanchard
    
    Yes.
  - http://twitter.com/weblizard weblizard
    
    or the zombie apocalypse?
- Roy-in-Boise
  
  If a domestic ban were to be instituted as suggested above there would be no America as we know it. We would have The Second American Civil war. As sincere as this suggestion is the result would be explosive.
  - http://neilblanchard.blogspot.com/ Neil Blanchard
    
    Would there be a legitimate reason for this? Are there any “well organized militias” who need guns *without* RFID right now?
    
    Should we continue to sell guns to the drug cartels? Hmmm, tough question…
    
    Neil
    - Gregg
      
      Holder let the guns walk across the boarder, I don’t think we sold them. America has indeed aided Mexico’s military with weapons. Obama counted those weapons to inflate the numbers of assault weapons used by cartels. It was dishonest from the get go.
      - Terry Tree Tree
        
        Interesting tidbit. Where did that come from, about inflating with weapons sold to Mexican Millitary?
    - Roy-in-Boise
      
      I am looking forward to the program today. W/O knowing much about the issue I suspect it was probably a bad idea. As a Citizen I never like Government sponsored stings and especially ones that go bad!
- SteveV
  
  Neil, If you are suggesting that these proposals will, in any way, slow the flow of guns to the cartels then I have to disagree with you. The world is awash in guns, primarily the automatic and semi automatic variety. These cartels purchase them from many sources, but primarily the US because of the ease of doing so. Make it more difficult (to purchase in the US) and they will buy from some other source. And as for making it more difficult for law abiding citizens to own guns, the criminals will simply develop a black market to import them, the same as they do with drugs.
- PaulD
  
  I’m sorry but this is ignorance. Let’s take a look at Rio and the drug wars down there.
  
  http://www.boston.com/bigpicture/2010/11/rios_drug_war.html
  
  Notice that the criminals and police are, in many cases, using the same exact guns. Further, in many cases these guns were not manufactured in the US. So, where do you think the criminals go them? Hint: there’s another strong similarity here. Another hint: Rio is pretty far geographically from the US.
  
  There is plenty of evidence that the drug cartels in Mexico control local police departments so once again, it’s not hard to figure out where a local source of guns would be.
  
  Finally, should the rights of US citizens be curtailed because a foreign government can’t control its own domestic problems?
Chris B

This promises to be productive. I’ll be listening to music this morning.
- feettothefire
  
  Since you won’t be here, I’ll encapsulate the entire show for you now, both the on air substance and the comment board entries. Republican/Conservatives: Everything Holder did is reprehensible. Democrat/liberals: Republicans are jerks. I hope you enjoy the music.
  - Terry Tree Tree
    
    What are the winning numbers for the next Powerball AND Mega-Millions? I don’t want to risk having to buy more than two tickets?
    - feettothefire
      
      Never bet on something with 170,000,000 to one odds.
      - Terry Tree Tree
        
        But, YOU have the ability to see the future, so it wouldn’t be betting, just collecting?
        This was an attempt at levity, by the way.
        I do, occassionally buy Lotto tickets, but NOT regularly, NOR religiously.
      - Gregg
        
        I’ve never bought one. $100 million is the last thing I want.
      - Terry Tree Tree
        
        I would buy a big farm, recruit older people that love children, then children that no one wants, and watch the magic happen.
        The children raised on this farm, would have a resume’ that would bowl over employers.
        I don’t LUST after power (of which money is just a form), for the sake of power. I WOULD like to be able to do more good, than I do.
      - Gregg
        
        So big money is a force for good. I’m glad you are coming around.
      - feettothefire
        
        TOUCHE’
      - Terry Tree Tree
        
        NOT really!
      - Terry Tree Tree
        
        Name ANYTHING that CANNOT be used for GOOD or EVIL?
        GREED to accumulate POWER, whether money, or other, is EVIL. Using money to do GOOD, is GOOD! That is why I rail against the GREEDY rich, NOT the rich!
      - feettothefire
        
        Based on the way the comments are flying today, I should get a fortune tellers tent with the carnival.
      - Terry Tree Tree
        
        My Lotto numbers, please?
      - feettothefire
        
        If you buy a lottery ticket, I predict you’ll lose. There I go again. It’s incredible.
      - Terry Tree Tree
        
        With that prediction, I didn’t buy one!
  - Victor Vito
    
    What if Republicans ar inherently wrong and mean spirited?
http://pulse.yahoo.com/_QME6C6XTBAYFEJP2GYDH3VQEMU Beat

iOnePoint:

Republicans are like wild mad hungry pack of wolves trying to devoir Holder. Then suddenly a prince came out of nowhere, grabbed Holder and holding onto him.

to be continued…
- Brandstad
  
  Holder is either a bad man or incompetient and I am amazed that Obama refuses to ask for his resignation!
  - http://pulse.yahoo.com/_QME6C6XTBAYFEJP2GYDH3VQEMU Beat
    
    Probably the color of his skin.
  - TFRX
    
    We survived John Yoo and John Ashcroft. Clap yer yap about who’s who if you’re going to just spew stuff crammed down your throat with the right wing pukefunnel.
http://pulse.yahoo.com/_QME6C6XTBAYFEJP2GYDH3VQEMU Beat

Holder is responsible so what else do they want from him.

Fire Him and Life Goes On!!!!

WASTE OF OUR MONEY AGAIN!!!!!
TIRED OF THIS POLITICAL DRAMA. THIS ISSUE WILL BE THE CENTER POINT OF ISSUE AND FORGET ABOUT THE REAL ISSUES!!!!

The economy and jobs. (sorry i was yelling at government)
- Gregg
  
  He should save us the trouble and resign.
  - Victor Vito
    
    Who?
  - TFRX
    
    Yes, when it’s a Democrat in office, just resign.
    
    I love how scared you are of Democrats not just going all Alan “Coma” Colmes on you.
    - http://pulse.yahoo.com/_QME6C6XTBAYFEJP2GYDH3VQEMU Beat
      
      it is not being Democrat it is being self respect. if he screwed up, he is responsible
      - TFRX
        
        Fine. Right after everyone baying for Holder’s head shows how they wanted AlGonzo and Yoo gone, on right-wing sites the last decade, and got threats and called “traitor” for it.
        
        With Gregg it’s not about doing the right thing. It’s about robotically spewing whatever Fox and Rush says is proper now with no sense of history. And I’m calling him on it.
        
        At some point people can have a grown up conversation about this. But not with people who can’t own their propaganda.
William

Another example of the failure of “big government” and nobody being held accountable for a failed program.
- Terry Tree Tree
  
  Sounds like ‘Big Church’, doesn’t it? ONLY VICTIMS, no criminals?
  - Terry Tree Tree
    
    NO responsiblity, NO accounting, NO lawful producing of ALL evidence held by the Catholic church, NO MORALS?
- AC
  
  more like a government w/o a strong, unified center, no?
  - Gregg
    
    I get your point but let me throw this out there. What if there is a “strong, unified center” to subvert the constitution and fundamentally transform America?
    - Drew (GA)
      
      Umm, you mean subversion of The Constitution by doing things like suspending Habeas corpus, eradicating Civil Liberties, destroying the Right To Privacy, and declaring Preemptive War? We’ve had that for a while now.
      - Gregg
        
        That’s funny! the suspension of Habeas Corpus did not happen to American’s. The Constitution does not apply to foreign unlawful combatants. Obama doesn’t mess with Habeas Corpus, trials or indefinite detention, he just assassinates them. Civil liberties were not eradicated under Bush. The right to privacy is inherent to specific interpretations, cool. Evidently Obama’s TSA disagrees. But find the words in the Constitution and get back. Ditto “preemptive war” The President has a duty to protect America.
        
        I was referring to the Obamacare mandate, the infringement on Catholic’s religious freedom and an effort to rile up fervor to ban assault weapons.
      - mary elizabeth
        
        You mean the Catholics totally hypocrital power play that even the church’s own nuns see through?
      - Drew (GA)
        
        Good ol’ Gregg. I really do like you (despite the fact I probably shouldn’t), it’s not easy sometimes though. I’m not being a smart a$$, I meant what I said.
        
        I’m glad that against my better judgement I decided to drop back in and see how the Battle Royale was going. Did I name any names or specify a time frame?
        
        “That’s funny! the suspension of Habeas Corpus did not happen to American’s. The Constitution does not apply to foreign unlawful combatants.”
        
        I’ll tell you what’s funny, it’s funny that your version of the Military Commissions Act of 2006 differs from the one that’s actually on record. The supposed protection for American Citizens was the definition of “alien”. It’s funny that many of a certain belligerent persuasion find applying this term to Humans amusing. We live in a Globalized world yet “There are aliens among us!”…And lions, and tigers, and bears, Oh My! The easiest way to get around the alien protection is to declare the citizen an Unlawful Enemy Combatant. Was not applied and are not applicable are two entirely different things. Of course I’m certain you’re better at deciphering Legalese than am I, when and where was it you passed the Bar again?
        
        Bush, Cheney, Obama ra-ra-ree, Bush, Cheney, Obama are all that we can see! As I said, I did not name names or specify time frames.
        
        As for the rest of your comment I’m not even going to waste my breath, it wouldn’t achieve a thing. I’m not trying to be antagonistic just stating my opinion. The justifications for The Military Commissions Act and Patriot Acts are like magic numbers, you can find them anywhere if you have the proper Rose-Colored spectacles on.
        
        Hope you have a great weekend man, see ya Monday.
      - Greyman
        
        Now don’t start talking about Abraham Lincoln here . . . .
      - Drew (GA)
        
        That was hilarious. Yes I’m being sarcastic. At least you didn’t assume my comment was directed solely at the Almighty W. You were trying to be insultingly amusing but you’re closer to what I meant than your buddy. See my reply to Gregg.
    - mary elizabeth
      
      The strong unified center is alive and well in the Repub Party and it’s utter glee in taking down a President is sickening and telling of what kind of a dark morass we have decended as a nation.
      Transform America into what? A country not in war, a country where all citizens have access to health care
      as all other civilized nations do, a country that is not near the top in child poverty and at the bottom in maternal health, a country that enables a strong middle class, a country that cares for the planet before the bulging wallets of big business? Just for starter
      The Repubs I know are licking their chops and doing high fives hoping to “finally” found a way to get rid of this President.
      I have come to feel sorry for them as their hatred eats them up.
      - Still Here
        
        Please, Obama is his own worst enemy. His failures, plentiful, are his own. His naivete is mostly responsible for his many shortcomings. His base has lost their enthusiasm and will likely stay home.
      - TFRX
        
        Yes, half the media is right wing propaganda, and most the rest can’t stop suckling Politico’s teat.
        
        And his base is being scrubbed from voting rolls in a way that’d make you shit yourself if it happened to middle-age white males (i.e. the people who run the media you swallow).
        
        But you keep flogging that stuff.
      - mary elizabeth
        
        90% of talk radio is right wing.
      - Terry Tree Tree
        
        With the other 10% watching for UFOs?
    - AC
      
      i dunno, then it wouldn’t be america, would it? it’d be lots of small, powerless autonomies…i guess i’d have to say to those people, be careful what you wish for….
    - TFRX
      
      I dunno. Where is Alberto Gonzales today?
- TFRX
  
  Funny how every right-winger who hated this stuff when Shrub did it can’t fill up one Greyhound bus, and are all on this board.
  - notafeminista
    
    Except these guys were marketed and sold as being better and smarter than “Shrub”. What happened?
    - TFRX
      
      Not sold as “perfect”, just smarter than the least-popular, lowest rated president in a century.
      
      And a witchhunt promised by Darrell “New Hearing A Day” Issa two years ago is coming to fruition.
      - notafeminista
        
        No one said “perfect”. Better. These guys were marketed and sold as being better and smarter than “Shrub”.
        
        What happened?
      - TFRX
        
        I’ll type slower so maybe you can understand:
        
        Issa promised a new hearing a day. He’s the gobstopper who shows us all what the GOP are capable of when they get to piss in the punchbowl and half the media bray their shit about how lousy the punch tastes.
      - Terry Tree Tree
        
        TFRX, I KNOW that you can express yourself with language that shows vocabulary AND creativity.
Terry Tree Tree

The comments are coming ‘Fast and Furious’, at least! Many are partisan, but many are not.
Doug in Virginia

This battle is nothing more than the next round in the game of political gotcha that is as old as our country. More recently, the Democrats criticized Bush for the multiple times he invoked executive privilege. Now that Obama exercises the privilege, it’s the Republicans criticizing the action.
- TFRX
  
  Less false equivalency would serve you well.
  
  Especially in a month when people like Alberto Gonazales and John Yoo are on my TV talking about the rule of law!
http://neilblanchard.blogspot.com/ Neil Blanchard

http://www.colbertnation.com/the-colbert-report-videos/415620/june-20-2012/unraveling-the–fast—furious–scandal
Brettearle

Witch hunt! Witch hunt! Witch hunt!

How many CIA, FBI, DEA, DIA and ATF operations and stings go awry–for many decades–that we never hear about?

And the ones that we don’t hear about (or even the ones that we do hear about it and don’t learn of the number of casualties)….how many have resulted in the loss of innocent lives?
- Gregg
  
  Well let’s see, there was Reno’s Wacko and Ruby Ridge. But what does that have to do with anything?
  - Victor Vito
    
    Lame.
    - Gregg
      
      I agree, past incompetence is irrelevant… as I said.
  - Ray in VT
    
    Waco was a real mess, that’s for sure. Combine some religious nuts with arms and bad things are bound to happen. Ruby Ridge, though, wasn’t on Reno’s watch. William P. Barr was the AG then. There was also the U.S.’s sending weapons to a known sponsor of terrorism in order to fund Central American paramilitaries. Those don’t really have anything to do with this topic either.
    
    Also, I saw your comments below stating your belief that Fast and Furious was a part of an effort to cause havoc in Mexico so that assault weapons could be banned here, and I think that that is nuts. I think that it is that sort of thinking that made it next to impossible to buy some calibers of bullets for months in 2009 because people were hoarding rounds because of a fear that Obama was gonna take our guns. I’m sure that it helped out the rounds manufacturers and the NRA’s bottom line, but I don’t think that it has a foundation in reality.
    
    I worked for a firearms importer and manufacturer when the ban was in effect, and it was still possible to get them, and we sold thousands, especially after 9/11. I was fine with the ban, and I did not want to see it go away, because even when it was in effect I was able to legally acquire a number of military grade rifles. Although some elements of the ban required that certain parts be American made, which drove up the cost a bit, but I was still able to buy an AK-47 for $120.
    - Gregg
      
      It was possible to still get the weapons and the prohibition was lifted because the issue is not as black and white as it is made out to be. The Constitution is hard to get around. Ditto public sentiment. If one wants to ban assault weapons then public outrage is key. It’s only my opinion.
wauch

Total witch hunt! Did we do this when Yoo, Addington, Fife et al ripped up the Consitution and the definition of the imperial presidency? No! Why? Because the Democrats have no b_lls whatsoever! It is pathetic how milquetoast the Dems are in the face of an opposition that doesn’t give a hoot about the constituion even though they claim to be proud followers of it word-for-word. A country divided? Yeah you could say that! A country splintering at the seems is more like it. We have a political and fiscal union unlike the EuroZone but neither works anymore. Might as well break up the Euro and break up the dollar. Rick Perry had one thing right secession in the face of stagnation and complete partisanship would be grand. The right-wing/hegemonic south no longer represents me or I them. That is fine but to pretend we can heal these wounds what is the point?
Victor Vito

Good lord conservatives, what do you want?

This is what administrations do!

Fast and furious, Wide receiver, Iran Contra, etc.

Do you want Obama and Holder thrown out of office? Imprisoned?

Do you want all future admins held to that standard?

Grow up, and start focusing on real policy issues in this country!
- TFRX
  
  No, they want their special Rules for Democrats. When a Republican wins, it’s signal to be as right-wing as possible. When a Democrat wins, “the center is the place to be”. (H/T Newsweek for giving away the game with that cover years ago.)
  
  And of course conservatives don’t want any other admins held to that standard unless that President has a (D) after their name.
Brandstad

Obama Lied and people died!

It is important to know who approved this program and who knew about it and when. There has been over 300 deaths due to this botched plan.
- Brettearle
  
  Smells like the ramblings of a DittoHead….
- Still Here
  
  So true, thanks for bringing that back!
- Terry Tree Tree
  
  NOT near as many that died, when ‘W’,and many members of his administration, lied! Starting with 2900 in the Twin Towers, AFTER ‘W’ made us ‘SAFER’?
- Robbie
  
  seems you were in a coma during the disastrous 8 years under Bush. I love the way right-wingnuts spew random blather and ignore the glass house they hide in.
Brothersower88

Just a though:

If I work for a company that has 3 divisions, the VP of my division tells me not to give any information to anyone. I agree and everything is fine. A few years later the VP of a different division ask for the confidential information my VP told me not to give anyone. Who should you listen to?

Not a perfect example, but it gets the idea across that being the AG in this situation is complicated. I am not informed enough about the particulars to defend “fast and furious” or congress.
http://twitter.com/Astraspider Astraspider

What’s worrisome is the level to which this is being driven by batty conspiracy theories. There are gun advocates on the fringe who proclaim this to be a sort of manufactured debacle so that the administration can take (future) steps to curtail the 2nd amendment. Fine. Fringe actors have rights to be stupid. But there are now Congressmen (Darrell Issa, Chuck Grassley, Tim Walberg to name a few) willing to actually wield that delusional rhetoric out in the public square.

http://littlegreenfootballs.com/article/40511_Video-_Rachel_Maddow_Deconstructs_the_Fast_and_Furious_Fake_Outrage
Brandstad

Why did NPR and all mainstream media spend so much time covering Bush’s firing of US Attorneys, which was not illegal, or unprecedented and now they dismiss and ignore Fast & Furious even though it most likely broke laws, caused 300+ deaths, and Government officials have lied repeatedly to cover up the facts behind the story!
- Gregg
  
  Ideology.
  - nj_v2
    
    Says the biggest ideologue on the forum.
    - Gregg
      
      I occasionally address the issue, you never do. Just hate.
      - mary elizabeth
        
        Sorry, you are the ideologue and the hater.
    - Drew (GA)
      
      Oh I don’t know, I think Braindead and Ed are even further off the dial. Gregg may not admit it openly but I think he truly gets the picture more often than he lets on. Unfortunately he’s got to keep that front up.
- Adks12020
  
  Ignore? It’s been all over the news. Are you living in a hole? I haven’t seen any news organization that has ignored it.
  - Aranphor
    
    He lives in a hole of convenience. It’s a way for him to make an argument out of one that doesn’t exist.
  - Brandstad
    
    If you add up the grand total number of times fast-and-furious was mentioned on the ABC, NBC, and CBS nightly news this year and last year, the grand total was 1 as of last week!
    
    Please prove me wrong with facts!
Brettearle

Valerie Plame, Abu Graib, Blackwater Security/Iraq, Pat Tillman’s Friendly Fire Death, Katrina, False WMD Intelligence…�
�
Why don’t we bring contempt of Congress charges against those responsible for the distortions and tragedies, related to these incidents?

Holder is a Right Wing scapegoat that reveals, yet again, how dysfunctionally partisan DC is….
- Gregg
  
  … he writes as he deflects blame and changes the subject.
Terry Tree Tree

I LOVE the introduction that Tom just did! He certainly gave a preview of the show, and the comments!
I hope he doesn’t cut off many relevant comments.
SteveV

Imagine, a government program that was ill conceived and failed. I’m shocked, shocked. We read to much (conspiracy) into this.
Still Here

The president’s claiming executive privilege so obviously he’s got something big and ugly to hide.
- Victor Vito
  
  Purely speculative… and LAME.
jim

the republican should not play politics… what did they do when Bush refused to turn over evidence of the Valerie Plame issue? i will tell you… a blind eye

it is disgusting… double standard

btw. the Valerie Plame case was an act of treason…
- Still Here
  
  Obama lied and people died!
  - jim
    
    as bush said… it is collateral damage, ok?
- Gregg
  
  Plame wasn’t even covert. Years and millions of dollars of investigations yielded zip. This is real. Quit trying to change the subject.
  - jim
    
    Plame is not a covert? you are condoning a government treason…
  - Terry Tree Tree
    
    ‘W’ admin admitted that Valerie Plame WAS COVERT! How many of her contacts, and innocent people that had contact with her, were killed, or ‘enhanced-interrogated’, because ‘W’ admin made out like it was common knowledge?
Greyman

“Politics is politics” vitiates much bellyaching. So now: Obama himself is now obliged to declared the grounds upon which he is exercising executive privilege, accord. to news reports I read yesterday. Is Obama under any time constraint to do so? Is he planning to do so today, tomorrow? or does he need to do so prior to the full House consideration of the Committee recommendation?
- Still Here
  
  Like his recession, he’ll drag this out as long as possible.
  - Ray in VT
    
    “His recession”? You mean that one that started under his predecessor (December 2007) and officially ended in mid to late 2009?
Robbie

This is just ridiculous! Fast and Furious was started in 2006 under GW Bush and ended in 2009 by the Obama Administration.
- Gregg
  
  “Project Gunrunner” was started under Bush. Obama ended it in 2009 and dramatically upped the ante with “Fast and Furious”.
  - Terry Tree Tree
    
    ‘Project Gunrunner’ was ineffectual, resulting in the low-level arrests of ‘strawman gun-purchasers’, and a few other low-level criminals?
    - Robbie
      
      this has all gotten out of hand. It was mishandled by both administrations. I just fail to understand why those Republicans in the House who have sat on their hands for so many years are now frothing at the mouth.
      - Drew (GA)
        
        “I just fail to understand why those Republicans in the House who have
        sat on their hands for so many years are now frothing at the mouth.”
        
        Really? I find it hard to believe that you fail to understand the motivations involved. You don’t seem that oblivious to me.
Worried for the country(MA)

Is Chris Cillazza defending the MSM for NOT covering this story?

Would he defend the MSM if they didn’t cover Watergate?
- Gregg
  
  Good question. Nobody died with Watergate.
  - TFRX
    
    Just treason and subversion of our democracy. Move along, nothing to see here.
    - Gregg
      
      It went right over your head.
      - TFRX
        
        Don’t worry, Gregg. Nothing you do could make me think less of you.
TFRX

Is Cillizza just here to uphold the reputation of “savvy insiders” as perpetrating the myth that the truth is halfway between a centrist Democrat ic president and a batshit crazy Republican in a safe district who promised to hold a new hearing every day after the midterms, that both sides have to compromise and neither has yet?

Less Beltway, please.
Still Here

This administration is criminal! Indictments should be flying! Special prosecutors everywhere! Sunlight is the answer.
- TFRX
  
  Were you all over Foxnation that last decade screaming for the same?
- http://pulse.yahoo.com/_QME6C6XTBAYFEJP2GYDH3VQEMU Beat
  
  that will cost us around 15 million. they should have prosecuted Bush for lying to the American people but it is too late Obama is now the patsy
- mary elizabeth
  
  All to you delight, though you ignore the utter depravity of the right wing agenda. Sorta like a big ol football game.
Mhen

Why is it that Congress is after the Attorney. Was this program started under the Bush admin. Why isn’t anyone from there in front of congress??????
http://pulse.yahoo.com/_QME6C6XTBAYFEJP2GYDH3VQEMU Beat

The 99% percent warned the American people of the student loan rate increase hundreds of students marched to protest the cost of education and interest rate but know one listened because the American people were to busy bashing the 99% calling us rapist, hippies or addicts.

Yes we failed because the American people failed.
Worried for the country(MA)

Will Tom play the clips of Senator Obama chastising the Bush administration for invoking executive privilege whenever “something a little shaky is taking place”?
- Still Here
  
  No, of course not. After avoiding the issue for 18+ months, Tom’s doing all he can to be as relativist as possible. He’ll do whatever he has to to protect his president. His bias flag is at full mast this morning.
- Gregg
  
  Probably not but I will:
  
  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bpwYh9TD6Nc
  - feettothefire
    
    I’m shocked, shocked, I say. Imagine, a politician engaging in political rhetoric. But, seriously folks, this is the cheapest, laziest form of commentary. We all know that we can very easily find video or audio recordings of every politician alive contradicting themselves ad infinitum. It’s what they do. Every damn one of them. I could post video links of every Republican primary candidate ripping Romney to shreds. Now he’s their boy, wonderfully suited to the presidency. That means they’re lying to us now, or were lying to us then. Democrats are just as guilty when they have large primary fields. Just Mitt Romney and John Kerry alone could provide enough flip-flopping to make our heads implode. How about all those Republican senators a few years back who wanted to abolish the filibuster? They told us it was an antiquated old relic that had long since lost its usefulness. It couldn’t possibly have been because they thought they had Karl Roves “permanent majority,” and it was too helpful to Democrats. No, they were certainly only interested in the good of the Senate and the countries political welfare. I haven’t checked lately, but are all those Republican senators still trying to abolish the filibuster? If not, why not? Just a rhetorical question. We all know why not. Because they’re all full of shit, just as Obama is in the video above. Big deal. Tell me something I haven’t already known my whole life.
- http://twitter.com/weblizard weblizard
  
  He did- this is NPR, not Fox…
J__o__h__n

There is no gun control agenda in the White House. Obama hasn’t raised this issue as he doesn’t want to risk the votes. He isn’t exactly a bold leader.
- Ray in VT
  
  That’s just what the White House wants you to believe, of course. Don’t you listen to Rush and Malkin?
Prairie_W

As for “partisan,” one reporter on the presidential campaigns had this analysis in The Hill this morning :

By asserting executive privilege over “Fast and Furious” documents sought by the House GOP, Obama inserted himself directly into the fight between Holder and Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.), the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee chairman. He also made it easier to run
against not only Mitt Romney, but a Republican House he hopes to portray as divisive and overly extreme.

The move enabled the White House to shift the story surrounding the controversial gun-tracking operation and to scold Republicans — under an increasingly bright public spotlight — for focusing on what the administration dubs a political witch hunt instead of passing federal transportation funding and extending low interest rates on federally backed student loans.

http://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/233995-obama-fits-fight-to-his-november-election-narrative
nj_v2

The mud has become so deep, OnPoint might have started out with a brief, dispassionate, just-the-facts, m’aam outline of the events that brought us to this point.
- mary elizabeth
  
  Yes, instead of the rants of Limbaugh who deserves no exposure for his warped world view.
  - TFRX
    
    I disagree.
    
    He should have exposure, but shouldn’t be taken seriously by NPR. He should be played only as an example of what crazee sounds like, in order to dissect how right-wing crazee is normalized and ends up as accepted background noise by Diane Sawyer and David Gregory.
    
    But with “public radio polite” in place, there’s no chance of that.
    - mary elizabeth
      
      The man is ill.
      - Terry Tree Tree
        
        That’s why he has gotten ‘rehab’, so MANY times, for committing FRAUD, to obtain SEVERAL TIMES the drugs that ANY sand physician would prescribe?
      - Drew (GA)
        
        But they were prescription drugs! lol Never-mind that they were obtained illegally. Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain.
        
        I’m being sarcastic, I know it’s difficult to tell with me sometimes.
- Terry Tree Tree
  
  Tom announced in the preview, that it would probably go this way?
Aranphor

It was stupid under Bush and stupid under Obama. BUT the Republicans are in the pocket of the NRA and this is nothing but an outside organization’s witch-hunt.
- Aranphor
  
  AND that’s pure BS it is a “gun control” conspiracy.
http://profile.yahoo.com/DT4POBY3DU2GYPE75TLMQQZMRY Anita

The media will pick this up so quick. Next thing you know they will be callling for President Obama’s impeachment. Despicable.
Kate Matison

I cannot believe you would not reply to Rush Limbaugh’s opinion on Fast and Furious. His conspiratorial rants are surely worth answering? Why hasn’t the GOP brought in the Bush-era people, who started all this into Congress to answer questions?
- Roy Mac
  
  Rush is not a credible political figure; he’s an entertainer whose job is to sell soap.
- Terry Tree Tree
  
  Rush’s rants are so obviously twisted, that just exposing them is comment enough, for logical people?
Guest

The easiest way to resolve this immediately is to simply turn over the documents to the committee.
- Still Here
  
  Very simple!
TFRX

Who gave a scintilla of credence to Fox news’ horsecrap about doing this to make more gun control laws?

Someone needs to stop picking over Fox News’ actual words and remember they’re in the bidness of keeping non-young white people scared of everything they don’t know.
- William
  
  As compared to “edit that tape MSNBC with Andrea Mitchell?”
  - Terry Tree Tree
    
    An ‘O’Keefe’ EDIT could have made it ANYTHING?
Phkd444

Tom, how about being a moderator of the conversation and NOT and apologist for Obama and Holder. this show is almost impossible to tolerate today.
- Still Here
  
  That’s Tom’s role, he’s not a moderator. His guest hosts usually are better.
- Aranphor
  
  Odd, I just heard Tom hold Robert Raben to task and you say he’s being an apologist?
  
  Log off and go tell your NRA cohorts your job is done.
mark del

The intent wasn’t to introduce guns to Mexico’s drug cartel but to track them from source to user and somehow it failed. However, other such tracking has probably failed also; like tracking drugs for distribution in the US, money being laundered, or even terrorist activities. I am sure there are as many successes too and Mr. Issa would seems reluctant to mention those.
Peggy

Is it true that the documents the Oversight Committee wants are Grand Jury transcripts that are forbidden by Federal Law to divulge?
- Adks12020
  
  Yes, it would be illegal to divulge some of the documents they are asking for. The republicans on the committee keep avoiding that question though. I watched some of the hearings yesterday and whenever one of the committee members brought that up they were basically cut off and followed by a raging rant from the member from South Carolina or Mr. Chaffetz would just keep saying “but they won’t give up the documents; we need to see the documents” completely ignoring the fact that some of them can’t be divulged.
  - Peggy
    
    Why doesn’t Tom Ashbrook ask this question?
J__o__h__n

Did the Bush administration fire anyone for 9/11?
- Terry Tree Tree
  
  Anyone significant, at least? Like the persons in the administration, that ok’ed having an ‘exercise’ of the scenario that happened 9/11, ON the date MOST PREDICTABLE for an attack?
T. L. Sherwood

Perhaps Obama evoked Executive Privilege so the Republican’s could get back to what’s important. I fail to see how this flap is creating one new job. If the Congressman wonders why Congress’s rating is so low, this brouhaha would be a good example.

I’m a little surprised at the Congressman’s outrage over the death of one border patrol agent when it sees no republican is upset about the thousands of men and woman who have died in the recent wars.
- RH
  
  On your point about jobs, the firearm industry is one of the few industries currently doing very well. If this was, in fact, an effort to instate new gun control measures it would be a significant blow to jobs in that particular industry.
  
  One thing that supports the ‘conspiracy’ theory of gun control coming from this operation is “ATF Demand Letter 3″. It was a reporting requirement instated after F&F turned out to be a boondoggle and it was found in the documents produced during the investigation.
Jim

This is simply partisan claptrap. Yes, it’s unfortunate that the border agent lost his life, but where was the outrage from the republican members of congress after the thousands (hundreds of thousands for the Iraqis) of deaths in Iraq were determined to be based on the fairy tale of yellow cake and WMD?

Ridiculous, hypocritical tempest in a teapot and I certainly have a lot of contempt for congress.
- nj_v2
  
  After eight years of being asleep at the switch during the continual abuses during the Shrub years, all of a sudden the Rethuglicons are now so concerned with “oversight.”
  
  The House Oversight Web site looks like a Fox So-called News alert site:
  
  http://oversight.house.gov/
  - http://twitter.com/weblizard weblizard
    
    **That’s** a federal web site? Egad. With all the links to Faux News video clips it might as well be a URL redirect…
Witterquick

I find congress contemptible. Pathetic buch of XXXX.
onpoint_oncape

I suspect that most ‘ordinary’ Americans (as in NOT members of Congress) would say that this is simply the latest in the shameful barrage of political posturing and ‘gotcha’ moments that are being foisted on the citizenry of the US by two very self-centered and clearly agenda-driven political parties. The repubs needed a way to deflect Obama’s immigration move and this is the quickest, easiest way to go at it. It would be so very refreshing to see both parties and their flunkies focusing with true bipartisanship on the very real economic, social and environmental issues that are going to steamroll this country.
Doug in Virginia

Congressman Chaffetz just showed displayed a classic indicator of deception. A person who aims to deceive eventually gets his lies confused. Here he got confused over over whether the guns getting lost intentionally or due to a screw-up.
Witterquick

Chris is the voice of reason in this discussion.
Greyman

Then quite simply, Mr. Raben: why do Holder and Obama not simply release the documents so they “return to the country’s business”?
- Worried for the country(MA)
  
  Raben’s defense is weak. He keeps going back to the Bush administration — clearly a deflection.
  
  Raben sounds like a political hack. He doesn’t add anything of substance. Not a good guest.
- Guest
  
  Why not assuage both sides and give all of the documents on both Wide Receiver and on Fast & Furious to the committee, and let the committee evaluate how the programs operated under both administrations.
  - TFRX
    
    You’re kidding about the GOP house giving a crap on Wide Receiver, right?
Scott B, Jamestown NY

Issa’s been on TV program after program saying that he wants to have as 3 to 5 investigative committees per week on virtually every program or idea coming from the White House. Why? Is everything the Obama admin does really deserving of that kind of scrutiny? For what reason, other than the Republicans have made it the first point of their agenda to make Obama a one term president? What Issa and the Right are doing is to effectively grind the Obama admin to a halt in their obstructionist ways.

There’s no amount or paperwork or cooperation that will appease Issa and the Republicans on this, or any, issue.
HeidiFox

Investigating Fast and Furious, leaks on national security operations would be admirable if it didn’t reek of political partisanship. I don’t want to doubt Rep. Chaffetz’s sincerity in wanting accountability and transparency, but there have been so many instances of selective investigation (from both sides) that it is difficult to know what to believe.
- Worried for the country(MA)
  
  But how does congress do it without seeming partisan?
  
  If you are paying attention, it is very clear that Holder is not cooperating and isn’t forthcoming with information. It really smells like he is trying to hide something.
  - HeidiFox
    
    Robert Raben just said what I believe. Neither political party has the monopoly on politically motivated investigations. In the 1970′s Republicans and Democrats worked together to investigate wrongdoing.
    
    The question is who are we as citizens paying attention to, and what are the facts? There is a lot of distortion of facts going on and the journalist’s job is not to be a talking head but to get to the facts.
    - Worried for the country(MA)
      
      I would be much happier IF the MSM were investigating.
      
      FnF was broken by a CBS reporter but there has been very little coverage after the initial reports.
  - Ray in VT
    
    I don’t know how. It would be theoretically possible if the President and the Congress were of the same party (think Nixon to China or Likud doing land for peace), but that’s not practically likely. There doesn’t seem to be any motivation for the parties to cooperate, even when one should know that covering up, or appearing to cover up, something will make things look far worse down the road.
    - Worried for the country(MA)
      
      I agree.
      
      There is something strange with the FnF case. Sure, it is an embarrassment for this administration. I would have expected an internal investigation and then some firings — with the usual scapegoating.
      
      This didn’t happen. It leads me to believe that there is something to hide.
      
      I’ve tried to imagine how I would feel if the same was occurring with a GOP administration. Honestly, I would believe that there were trying to cover something up and should be held accountable.
      
      In my view, Issa and the GOP have been very cautious and timid with the investigation. I’m sure they understand the perception of overreach.
      
      I am disappointed with the MSM with their lack of coverage. The Bush firings of AGs received far more coverage and it was much less controversial.
      - http://twitter.com/weblizard weblizard
        
        “Honestly, I would believe that there were trying to cover something up and should be held accountable.”You mean during the prior administration? They didn’t *do* accountable, from the firing of the AGs, to outing Plame, to all kinds of fiascoes regarding 9/11, to misleading us into 2 unnecessary wars, to obstructing research & publication about climate change… or were you being sarcastic, and I missed it?
      - Terry Tree Tree
        
        If you were more familiar with ‘Worried’, you’d KNOW he was NOT being sarcastic, just partisan.
Aranphor

Of course it’s political even if Jason Chaffetz wishes to mislead and pretend he’s above the fray.
- mary elizabeth
  
  Jason Chaffetz is ineffectual in every way, one dimensional and so, so beholden to TP, not an independant thinker.
Steve_T

Politics today: Never let the let the left hand know what the right hand is doing, and never tell the truth, regardless of what may happen.
Roy-in-Boise

Gun Control for the Democrats is the polarizing issue that they simply cannot resist. Equally, the Republicans seem to do the same thing on Abortion. Anyone who advocates Gun Control or the banning of Abortions is inciting a magnitude of civil strife and disobedience that is difficult to imagine.

This unfortunate issue represents “the politics of distraction” at it’s best.
- Terry Tree Tree
  
  HAVE SOME FUN!
  Ask anti-abortionists, ‘Pro-Lifers’, ‘conservatives’, and ‘Christians’, “How many seriously-handicapped, minority children, that are the results of RAPE, or guys’ lying, are YOU raising, with NO government assistance?”
  �
  WATCH THEM SQUIRM!
  - http://twitter.com/weblizard weblizard
    
    …and toss in the death penalty while you’re at it- I guess they think like fishermen, throwing them back when small, killing them when they are bigger…
- RH
  
  Agreed. It’s hard to fathom how people can pick and choose the civil rights they like, and attempt to curb the others.
feettothefire

It’s ten hours and 187 comments since my post predicting the almost total partisan nature of today’s comments, and with very few exceptions, I was right on target. With foresight like this, I’ve got to get back into the market. I’ll be rich.
- Ray in VT
  
  Sometimes you can just look at the hour’s topic and know that it’s going to get nasty quick.
  - feettothefire
    
    Neither incompetence, dishonesty, or plain old evil is embodied by a single political party. You just can’t tell that to Democrats or Republicans.
  - Gregg
    
    The nastiness in lieu of an honest discussion of the issue drives me nuts.
    - Ray in VT
      
      That can be said of any number of issues in America these days.
- nj_v2
  
  If Miss Cleo can do it…
- TFRX
  
  Eh, don’t buy your stocks yet.
  
  That the righties are partisan is a given. They’ve been that way ever since Bill Clinton beat George H.W. Bush, scion of a Beltway’s Beltway’s family, almost bred to be president. It’s something that our mainstream media have accepted so much that they don’t even care about it.
  
  That a message board like this would have left-wingers who actually don’t fight like Joe Lieberman or Harold Ford or Alan Colmes shouldn’t be much of a surprise either.
  - Terry Tree Tree
    
    ‘W’ was obviously bred , and groomed to occupy the White House, without ANY evident training of how to be President!
    His ‘puppet-ness was obvious to ANY that noticed his ‘speech making’! Cock head to right, spew a few words, wrecking phrases and cliches’, cock head right, REPEAT, REPEAT, REPEAT……
- Gregg
  
  Please find a comment that explains or excuses Holder’s actions.
  - feettothefire
    
    You’re missing my point. The fact that I will find few, if any, comments from democrats that are disdainful of Holder and this whole issue is pathetic. Everyone here who has an honest bone in his or her body knows that, had all of this occurred under a Republican administration, the Democrats and liberals here would be foaming at the mouth about the “criminal” actions of that administration and Republicans would be tap dancing all around the room trying to pretend it was perfectly reasonable stuff. Reverence for those stodgy old qualities we used to care about is dead. “Truth,” “fairness,” “Honesty,” as cornball as they sound today, used to mean something here. Those days are long over. All we care about today is being right, even when we’re wrong. Partisan hackery of the highest order has replaced real conversation and debate. Here’s a clue for all the partisans. EVERYONE was outraged by Watergate. Everyone! Because it was wrong. Imagine that. A political party criticizing it’s sitting president over wrongdoing. Ah, the good old days.
    - Gregg
      
      That’s pure speculation, the record is different. If Gonzales had had the support of Republicans he would not have resigned. Watergate pales in comparison to this.
      - feettothefire
        
        WATERGATE PALES????? The event that precipitated the only resignation of a U.S. president in its history PALES????? I don’t know how old you are, but I sat listening to the testimony on live t.v.. It was transfixing. If you truly believe what Richard Nixon did to the presidency PALES in comparison to this current issue, then you just did a fine job of supporting my daylong claim that rampant, partisanship is what fuels this countries politics today.
      - Gregg
        
        I watched it too. No one died.
        Richard Nixon was a much better President than Obama is. I feel sure history will reflect that. I’m not saying he was a good President, just that Obama is worse. It’s my opinion.
      - feettothefire
        
        O.K.
      - Gregg
        
        I appreciate that even if you meant it as snark (not saying you did). I really believe what I write as odd as it may seem to someone of a different mind. My outrage is genuine.
      - Terry Tree Tree
        
        IF you want to measure by deaths, SEVERAL past decisions and actions make F&F look puny!
        BOTH parties!
    - Ray in VT
      
      I think that you’re pretty right on there. Given the 24/7 campaign and the partisan nature of our poltics presently, there’s no incentive to back down or to give it to one of your own guys even when he’s in the wrong.
    - Terry Tree Tree
      
      I AGREE!
Still Here

To quote your president, “The president should just come clean on this.” I hope that doesn’t get my on one of his Enemy’s Lists. Look out for errant drones!
- Ray in VT
  
  Your president too. I suppose that you have some sort of evidence to support your idea that the President has a domestic enemies list that he is willing to use drones to silence.
mmg

I am sorry a ATF officer died but the Phoenix papers reported bullet so shattered a gun could not be identified. Gun Program started under Bush 10 cities and 5 States
- Worried for the country(MA)
  
  2 Fast and Furious guns were found at the crime scene.
  - Terry Tree Tree
    
    ‘Throw-down guns, like bad cops use, to point investigation at ‘Fast and Furious’, as a political maneuver? As a Drug Cartel ‘statement’? As one of hundreds of other possibilities?
    WHY would criminals, that use guns a lot, leave TWO guns at a scene?
Gregg

Reading the Lib’s comments I notice a conspicuous absence of the name Holder. I see Gonzales, Mukasey, Bush, Fox, Rush, Issa, Valerie Plame, Katrina, Blackwater, Pat Tillman, WMD and even 9/11. If Holder’s name is mentioned there is no attempt to address the issue. Is their no shame?
- Still Here
  
  Paid Democrat stooges. They’d rather live in 2008 and forget the disaster that have been these last four years. To some extent, I’m with ‘em!
  - Gregg
    
    Add Rove and Cheney to the list. Any bets on whether it will be called racist?
- Terry Tree Tree
  
  Isn’t Holder’s name ALREADY prominent in this discussion?
  Since I presented my problems with ‘Fast and Furious’ and Holder, you can no longer call me a ‘Lib’?
Still Here

I wouldn’t put anything past the criminals in this WH.
- curious
  
  Okay…what for instance?
Chuck Nef

Once again the far, far, far right wing Traitor in Congress have proven themselves to be driven by nothing but politics. Traitors all who should be treated as such.
Scott B, Jamestown NY

Beneath the radar gun control? Like the Obama admin allowing gun to be brought into national parks? Or that nothing was done to close the gun show loop hole, or the large capacity ammo clips, after the Gabby Giffords tragedy?

There’s more “mind reading” that Kreskin ever had going on when we see and hear Rush, Wayne La Pierre, and all of Fox News talk about how the “know” what Obama is thinking and planning.
J__o__h__n

Why are the Republicans against selling guns to Mexicans? These pharmaceutical job creators shouldn’t be restricted from owning guns.
Guest

This is funny. Not the subject but reading the crazy postings of “Still Here,” for example. Thanks for ranting and raving!

Enjoy your day!
- Still Here
  
  You can laugh at Obama’s lies while people die. How pathetic.
Scott B, Jamestown NY

Hypodritical? Congress? Noooo. As is the Republicans wouldn’t be flapping their arms and ranting about the need for secrecy.
Greyman

For Obama–clearly–there is “transparency” (sunshine laws for government proceedings), there is “transparency” (raw political opportunism), and there is transparent transparency (opportunistically concealing government proceedings for political ends). This may not distinguish Obama from any of his predecessors, but to attempt to argue that he fails to embody these views is laughable.
J__o__h__n

The NRA stooge ducked the gun show question.
Robbie

TYPICAL REPUBLICAN UNWILLING TO GIVE A STRAIGHT ANSWER TO A STRAIGHT QUESTION. LUDICROUS CLOWN.
Aranphor

IF YOU DON’T HAVE EVIDENCE THEN STOP THOSE WHO YOU KNOW SAYING IT’S A CONSPIRACY AND CORRECT THEM.
mmg

incident arose on Sept. 27, 2007 under AZ office of AG, This is what Holder not Gonzales investigation is for
Kathryn

Spare me, is the congressman as incensed about the lies that took us into Iraq?? Thousands more have died because of a repub admin lies.
- Still Here
  
  What lies? Name three. Cite the specific lying quote in context and then prove it’s a lie. I’ll wait Kathryn.
kj

I just want to say that i think the tone of this conversation is not befitting the seriousness of the subject matter and i wish that you would all step back and realize what you are doing, all of you, commentators, callers and host. these are serious allegations all and they need to be discusssed in a cool-headed way no matter what. no good can come from mere bickering and talking over one another, and frankly it doesnt make for good radio to have people try to drown one another out. i recognize that serious errors were made in this situation but regardless of all of that, you must admit that simple blind anger and vitriol will simply make addressing the real problems here impossible. please realize that you are all hurting out country and everyone in it by this behavior.
- Guest
  
  Where were you when Bush started this?
  - kj
    
    i was right here with you. we’re all in the same boat here whether bush started it or not. he was all of our president and we seem to have forgotten that. obama is our president now, the president of the nation and all its people. we need to not fight with each other in such a petty way but instead try to create a more mature and sophisticated discourse. i dont like how this turned out either, but nothing in this country will improve if we simply debate who to blame for our problems. this goes for every issue we have now, not just the controversy over the fast and furious program. we as the population create this dynamic by this sort of one-sided anger against the other party which this conversation has descended into. we must bury the hatchet or the country tear itself apart, that is all i seek to alert you to.
- Terry Tree Tree
  
  Could that be the objective?
  - kj
    
    does it matter? you control your own mind, and if you dont decide to partake in that sort of anger and verbal sparring, that is one less person who does. if enough people do that, the problem ends. that is the best you as an individual can do, and is indeed your civic responsibility.
Jaki Reis

Four or five times I have heard “I want to lock down the border” So is the uproar an attempt to build a bigger fence along the border?
mmg

2007 incident resulted guns slipping into Mexico by Newell the special agent in charge of the Phoenix office Bush and Obama
GMG

Thank you Republican propagandists, you have succeeded yet again in turning us into a nation of angry idiots, shaking our fists in rage in the service or your sponsors. No wonder we are totally unable to deal with the real problems facing our country.
- Terry Tree Tree
  
  Could that be the objective?
- Still Here
  
  You were already there, be honest.
  - Ray in VT
    
    You’re one to talk. Have you spotted any Obama drones following you?
    - TFRX
      
      He hasn’t, but more importantly he hasn’t NOT seen drones. That’s all the evidence the black helicopter drone crowd needs.
      
      And it’s nice to know we can tell people by their media habits.
http://twitter.com/weblizard weblizard

From what I understand, some of the documents the Republicans are demanding cannot legally be released- how is the DoJ supposed to comply with that?
And the conservative speaker doth protest too much- by these men’s standards, Rove, Cheney, and a whole pile of Bush administration figures should be held *under* the jail!
Daniel

Tom, Please, please, please ask Mr Chafez where he was on the assault rifle ban and on attempts to prevent gun sales to people on the terror watch list. The hypocrisy is mind-blowing!
Kbf4

COME ON! Can’t you see? The fallout from this ‘Fast and Furious’ operation is just another attack from the Koch Brothers regime to make sure President Obama isn’t elected for a second term! What about the Farm Bill that is being voted on today? No one is talking about where our food is coming from in this country today, are they? (If so, please let me know!). Instead the ‘media’ is spinning this ‘scandal’ on us.
Deerhunter7712

Holder needs to step down ! I cant beleave there are so many stupid people in this country meaning dems!
J__o__h__n

Losing guns to Mexican criminals to create awareness for the need for gun control makes as much sense as raising deficit awareness by passing huge tax cuts and starting two wars.
- Brandstad
  
  Providing guns to Mexican criminals to create awareness for the need for gun control makes as much sense as raising deficit awareness by not passing a budget for 3.5 years and spending $9 Billion in ‘Stimulus’ for Green Projects to created Just 910 Jobs!
  - Still Here
    
    Nice!
  - Roy Mac
    
    When did you get out of the max security lock-up?
http://www.facebook.com/dreamingmatthew Matthew Stephenson

All the NRA stuff is ancillary nonsense. There is no complicated plot to bring about gun control or to fight it. Congress is looking at a real mistake…that said the contempt charge is an overreach. Justice has given up everything asked for except for what they claim risk the lives of real undercover agents… Unless congress can prove that it is a pretext they should accept it and work with what they have. The evidence before them is more than enough to rake DOJ over the coals
- TFRX
  
  Of course it is ancillary nonsense.
  
  Now if we can just get public radio to not have to examine every little piece of pobble with their patented politeness.
  
  NRA’s mission is accomplished, as some rightwinger gets to say “Even NPR is talking about how this is a plot to advance gun control.”
mmg

Vote on Holder was not bipartisan all democrats voted NO
- Gregg
  
  Let’s see how the House vote goes. I predict many Democrats with affirm the contempt charge.
Susanjanebelton

So many more important things to be doing right now. These republican confressmen including the one on this dhiw are shiwing their hateful colors. A law enforcement tactic that was really badly done. But this blabber is doing nothing but feedire lies and anger from the right rather than think deeply and act wisely about a huge and complicated serios and deadly problem, the war in Mexico. This is a outrage. Reign in investment banks and stop bothering Holder amd speeing hate
circus maximus

This political circus just draws attention to how easy it is for Mexican gangs to buy their weapons here in the US.
1) There needs to be mental health certification for all gun owners.
2) Abolish sales at gun shows.
3) Impose a one year waiting period and criminal background check for purchase of weapons.
- Pagassae
  
  Abolish gun ownership along with the NRA.
  - Ray in VT
    
    I can’t agree with that. I don’t like the NRA, and I am very distrustful of them, but I do like my guns. The next time a bear raids my trash I want to have the ability to take it down if necessary.
    - RH
      
      Many, many gun owners dislike the NRA. They just happen to have much more clout than GoA, GOAL and the 2nd Amendment Foundation.
      - Pagassae
        
        Corrupting clout.
      - Ray in VT
        
        I’ve never cared for them, and I am a gun owner. I think that they take a more extreme position. I think that they focus very much on the second part of the Second Amendment while ignoring the first, and that first part seems to make it unclear as to the true meaning of the amendment. It is only within the past few years that the Supreme Court has ruled in favor of an individual right to own firearms.
      - RH
        
        Recent supreme court rulings such as McDonald and Heller made it abundantly clear that the first part you would like us to focus on is of little importance. It is covered in the militia letter, and if anything, congress would be able to legislate every able-bodied male should be forced to own a gun.
        
        All I want are the civil rights enumerated to me in the constitution. Why do you insist on trying to curtail the rights you do not personally agree with?
      - Ray in VT
        
        What gives me pause is that the most recent couple of rulings on this matter go against precedent from the 19th and early 20th century which ruled against the individual right to bear arms.
        
        Also, I do not believe that I am “trying to curtail the rights you (I) do not personally agree with”. I think that the wording and intent of the 2nd Amendment is a bit unclear, and I do not believe that placing limits on rounds per clip or restrictions on certain types of weapons is any more a violation of our civil rights than not being allowed to shout fire in a crowded theater.
      - Terry Tree Tree
        
        At the time the Second Amendment was written and passed, almost everyone, if not everyone had a gun, or more! They had them for hunting, and self-protection, at least. So they would consider guns as just another part of a spartan house-hold?
      - TFRX
        
        The GOA?
        
        Isn’t their slogan “For when the NRA is too wobbly about gun rights”?
      - RH
        
        You see a problem there, I take it? The second amendment is as important as any other of the original 10. Whether you feel safe or not is completely irrelevant.
      - TFRX
        
        A problem? Yes, in the way that the mainstream media is scared to say “boo” to the NRA owing its lobbying clout, and then if that’s not enough, a second bite at the apple with the GOA so the “debate” can be from the “moderates” at the NRA to the “real righties” at the GOA.
        
        Sorta like the same bit where the GOP got to respond to the State of the Union, and then the Tea Party was fluffed by CNN to have their own response.
        
        Sweet gig. Sweet, sweet gig.
    - Pagassae
      
      I cannot see killing animals who are trying to survive. They do not have the luxury of running to the grocery store. Would have expected a bit more compassion from ya.
      
      Also, I fail to see how increased gun ownership has done anything but bring chaos into society.
      - Ray in VT
        
        I don’t personally hunt, but I know many who do, and some really do do it to protect their crops and to eat. One of my co-workers said that back during the 1970s when times for him and his wife were lean, they got by by jacking deer.
        
        As for the bear, that’s a real story. I didn’t know what it was going to do, and I want the ability to defend my home and family. It could have been rabid. Why take the chance?
        
        I don’t like killing animals, but sometimes it needs to be done. My brother sometimes has to put a cow down, and a rampant deer population will crash in a very unpleasant way.
        
        I also don’t think that guns = less crime, but they can be useful. In rural areas I think that they’re less of a problem, while urban areas are a whole different situation. I don’t think that tripling the number of guns in major cities would reduce violence.
      - Gregg
        
        http://www.handgunsmag.com/2012/06/20/2011-fbi-violent-crime-stats-gun-ownership-upcrime-rates-drop/
      - Ray in VT
        
        Violent crime has been on the decline for a while, and I’m not sure that it’s linked to more guns. Vermont has tons of guns, but I don’t think our low crime is due to that. We’re rural, and people are spread out. I think that the proximity of people to each other has a lot to do with violent crime. That and poverty and drugs and lord knows what else.
        
        One can also look at other industrial nations where guns are not so prevalent and violent crime is much lower.
      - Gregg
        
        It could just be a correlation and not a causation, fair enough. The same is true about higher crime in places with stricter gun control. I tend to think it’s related.
      - PaulD
        
        Gun ownership has increased markedly since the 90s and concealed carry licensing has increased as well. During the same period, violent crime dropped year on year.
        
        Where’s your evidence that increased gun ownership has brought chaos?
  - Brandstad
    
    No one has promoted gun ownership more than the Obama administration. Everyone around me seems to be afraid of the government because of the Obama Administrations endless reaches into our lives.
  - Brandstad
    
    Gun ownership up, crime down
    
    FBI violent-crime rates show safer nation with more gun owners
    
    http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2012/jun/18/gun-ownership-up-crime-down/
- circus maximus
  
  Law-abiding citizens can still have their guns — there just need to be sensible restrictions on who gets them. Maybe a year’s wait is too long, but a month is not unreasonable.
  
  The mental health restriction desperately needs implementation — how many mass shootings and political assassination attempts will it take before we put up some barriers for mentally unstable people to acquire lethal weapons.
  
  There also need to be markers on guns and ammo that allow law enforcement agencies to pin down where guns involved in crimes were acquired.The really strange thing about this Republican witch-hunt is that all of the attention on Fast and Furious makes lots of people who never think about guns wonder why there is no effective regulation of them. They are accusing the Obama Justice Dept. of using the program to cryptically restrict gun rights, but all this publicity that they are generating is producing the strongest argument yet for new, across the board gun ownership restrictions.
  
  This contrived political circus on guns is backfiring.
http://twitter.com/weblizard weblizard

Isse has declared since the�
Republicans took over that there would be hearings upon hearings- and that is one promise he is keeping. But remember, folks, they were elected to help America create “Jobs, jobs, jobs!”�
How’s that working for you conservatives?
curious

Come on Tom. What do you expect from these elected officials? Fast and furious is a ruse to stymie any real legislation such a jobs, health, infrastructure.
The Republicans have said they would do all they could to not re-elect Obama, and this is a component of slow and tedious’ as it pertains to the citizen’s needs.�
The writing skills level of the congress is abut tenth-grade. Only a low persentage of the congress have a college degree. Most do’t seem to know about the constitution.
skeptic4321

They’re all corrupt and just trying to keep the spotlight off themselves because someone is always on the chopping block.
How did Issa make his money? Which of these “investigators” really cares about humanity and is also complaining about other things our government is doing like drone attacks?
Many of us think our government is corrupt and inept (along with many outside this country)- and they are right.
Jkriegel8

This republican Congressman from Utah sounds exactly like a partisan hack. I wonder if he has the same energy to investigate Bush and Co for the crimes committed in Iraq for a war that was based on lies and killed scores of serviceman. He and his fellows cannot be believed that they have true intentions when their only scope is to get Obama out regardless of what it does to the country. In addition Bush has invoked Executive Privilege many times more than Obama. Did they investigate if this was to cover up?
- Still Here
  
  Please, you’re the only partisan hack here!
  - Ray in VT
    
    Wrong. You forget to count yourself, along with many others, both left and right, who will only take one side of an issue here.
    - Pagassae
      
      Indeed. Unfortunately “Still Here” is still here…..
      - Ray in VT
        
        I find him irritating and generally not constructive to the discussion, but that’s what you get in a public forum.
      - Pagassae
        
        I agree with you completely.
      - Terry Tree Tree
        
        DITTO!
      - Still Here
        
        Because I’m not a sheep like you and these rejects below. You’re bought and paid for, we get it.
      - Ray in VT
        
        Oh, how greviously you have wounded me!
        
        Based upon some of your comments, I think that it’s pretty apparent that you’re one of the top rejects here. No one has bought me. They don’t have enough money. What’s your price? I’m sure that it’s negotiable.
      - mary elizabeth
        
        What a dumb remark.
      - mary elizabeth
        
        Not only irritating but deliberately so, the way some adolescents are.
- Pagassae
  
  Exactly on target. This Republican scam is another transparent lie and fraud the Republican party is trying to put over on the under informed American electorate.
Elle

This show just spent an hour arguing about Fast and Furious and didn’t even try to explain the substance of the dispute between House Republicans and AG Holder–what documents are being sought and what is being refused, and the specific reasons given. As so often, we just skip immediately to the politics, but don’t have the factual basis.
Raymond Hoffer

Kudos, Tom and your staff on a masterful job of asking the right questions and leading a discussion that is important for the people of this country to understand in ALL its nuances.
Ray in VT

Darn you fund drive!
Pagassae

The NRA is a criminal operation which has infiltratred the Congress.
- Gregg
  
  The NRA endorsed 14 Democrats over Republicans in 2010. There NRA has a gazillion Democrat members. They have a right to lobby.
  - Pagassae
    
    Lobbying is a cancer on the Nation. Any group which corrupts the Congress to the extent the NRA has is a criminal operation. Who is lobbying for the middle class?
    
    Your reply is that of another gun nut.
    - Gregg
      
      I don’t own a gun.
      - Ray in VT
        
        That surprises me, Gregg.
      - Pagassae
        
        Me too. Perhaps a closet gun lover?
      - Ray in VT
        
        I’m a closet gun lover. I love my closet full of guns.
      - Gregg
        
        I’m for gun control. Always use two hands.
      - Ray in VT
        
        I’ve heard that one, and I’ve never thought it to be very funny. I think that there is a good argument to be made for some types of gun control.
      - Pagassae
        
        Another empty Republican slogan…you folks sure love ‘em.
      - Gregg
        
        I’m not a Republican
      - Gregg
        
        I just don’t get this notion that ideology always trumps truth. It’s about lies under oath by the highest law enforcement officer of the land. It’s about a President claiming executive privilege when there is no conversation to protect. It’s about hundreds killed including an American. It’s about the incompetence of loosing track of 1400 guns… or was it on purpose? This was a travesty, plain and simple.
        
        Democrats are rightly outraged in the real world which is not represented here.
        
        http://dailycaller.com/2012/05/10/democrats-join-fast-and-furious-accountability-efforts/
      - Ray in VT
        
        Your post could be read that the real world is not represented at the daily caller. Obviously that’s not your intent, and I’m not going to argue it one way or another, but I just think that it’s funny.
      - Gregg
        
        Yea, that was funny. I do believe this blog doesn’t represent main stream Democrats. The radio show doesn’t either but it is far closer than this blog.
      - Terry Tree Tree
        
        1400 guns? Earlier, someone said 30,000?
      - MadMarkTheCodeWarrior
        
        I own three and am an ex-NRA member and the NRA does not represent the interests of gun owners in general or the public or law enforcement.
        
        It represents the interests of arms dealers and the fear mongers of the radical right that use this to scare people toward them.
      - Pagassae
        
        In reality its all about money!
- Still Here
  
  I think you mean unions.
  - Pagassae
    
    There you are again babbling from your delusional world again. 2+2 is 4, not the 16 you try to come up with.
    
    I am sure you are a gun loving nut and a full member of the NRA. How very predictable.
    - Flodur2
      
      Typical liberal reply. If you cannot win on fact or logic, ascribe stupidity.
- Brandstad
  
  What crime have they committed?
  - Pagassae
    
    If you are so out of touch, blind and gullible to ask such a question, then there is nothing that I can say which would enlighten your 18th century mind. And that is as polite as I can be.
Jean Smith

Did anyone note that the ATF is part of the Treasury Department? Call in Hilary.
- Flodur2
  
  Hillary is Sec. of State, not Treasury.
RH

Interesting that Mr. Raben dismissed the gun control theory of F&F, and in the next breath stated how he supported the assault weapons ban. He certainly did his point no justice.
- Still Here
  
  Beautiful!
- Ray in VT
  
  But I don’t think that he did his point a disservice either. He supported the ban, ok. But is there any evidence that F&F is some sort of back door attempt to regulate or ban guns? Also, I think that something like the assault weapons ban, which I think is legitimate and makes some sense, being equated to the government banning all guns is a ridiculous fantasy that gun nuts have successfully gotten out there.
  - RH
    
    Assault weapons as they were defined in the 1994 AWB banned guns based on their superficial characteristics such as a pistol grip, detachable magazine, flash hider etc… FBI and DoJ statistics indicate that over the past decade so called ‘assault weapons’ are used in the vast minority of crimes. This also skips over the point that the definition of assault weapon in this context is simply inflammatory language and not at all descriptive of what civilians actually own.
    
    It appears to me that the gun control issue is a diversion from the real issues at hand including socioeconomics, race relations and cultural differences. Poverty and race are highly correlated with gun violence whereas gun ownership is inversely correlated over the last decade.
    - Ray in VT
      
      I would agree that it is a diversion, and I think that it is being pushed by the NRA. Assault weapon can be a big vague, but certainly it covers, among other things, AK-47s, AR-15s and the like. I hear people arguing that they use these guns for sporting reasons, and that just seems ridiculous. I know a fool who pumped a dozen rounds into a deer, but he spoiled the meat.
      
      I would not be surprised to see relatively low usage in crimes for some of these guns. It’s a lot easier to conceal a handgun than an AR.
      - RH
        
        Then I ask, why attempt to prohibit if there is no problem?
      - Ray in VT
        
        I didn’t say that there wasn’t necessarily a problem. I am quite concerned with the widespread availability of firearms that allow one to throw so much lead into the air that quickly. I don’t think that there is a good case for usefullness either for hunting or home defense .
      - RH
        
        Neither of your uses of firearms was the intention of the 2nd amendment to the constitution.
      - Ray in VT
        
        Reading the first part would lead one to conclude that it’s purpose would be for arming the militia for threats either internal or external.
        
        I don’t think, though, that the Founding Fathers only envisioned that firearms would be used for only that purpose and in that role. Given the nature of late 18th century America, hunting was, for many a way of living, and life on the frontier required families and communities to be able to defend themselves in a way that the state of federal government could not.
      - RH
        
        So you would prefer to live under the protection of the state? You would rather have no recourse against a tyrannical government?
        
        The second amendment has absolutely nothing to do with hunting, sporting or personal protection from others.
        
        Again, the militia letters declare that all able bodied men are, in fact, the militia. Not the standing army of the country who works FOR the government.
  - RH
    
    Also forgot to mention that the current evidence for back door gun control can be found in the discovered documents of F&F under “ATF Demand Letter 3″
    - Ray in VT
      
      I don’t think that Demand Letter 3, which would appear to require that “some U.S. gun shops to report the sale of multiple
      rifles or “long guns.” Demand Letter 3 was so named because it would be
      the third ATF program demanding gun dealers report tracing information”, would constitute gun control.
      - RH
        
        I think we would disagree in that case.
      - Ray in VT
        
        I guess that we would. Something like that could certainly be of use when attempting to ascertain whether or not certain shops or individuals were being complicit in running guns.
Peter in NY

Funny how “guns don’t kill people” until they’re perceived to be Eric Holder’s guns. Of course the F&F tactic was ill-conceived but does anyone really believe that that federal agent wouldn’t have been killed if the tactic hadn’t existed?
- notafeminista
  
  Your implication being what precisely?
  - Ray in VT
    
    That if this had occurred under a Republican administration that Congressional Republicans would be singing a different tune, as would Congressional Democrats.
    - Gregg
      
      But it happened under this administration. If you can cite something excused by Republicans that rises to this level then please do.
      - Pagassae
        
        Can you say Iran/Contra?
      - Ray in VT
        
        I suppose it depends upon how you define “rises to this level”. The fact that deaths appear to have occurred because of it certainly adds greatly to the cost of this case.
        
        There was a lot of apologizing, poopooing and ignoring from the GOP during the war in Iraq regarding the issue of tens of millions of mis-spent or just plain lost, money, from no bid contracts to money paid out to people in country who were of dubious character. Patrick Leahy attempted to ban companies who could be proven to have defrauded the U.S. government from getting contracts, but he could not get GOP support.
        
        I think that that is certainly up there.
      - notafeminista
        
        Again, this administration was marketed and sold as being better and smarter than the previous. What happened?
      - notafeminista
        
        That’s the only argument you have? The other (dumber, slower, lying) guy did it? Really?
      - Ray in VT
        
        No. I’m not going to defend or attempt to crucify anyone on this issue, because I don’t think that there are enough facts currently available.
        
        From a partisan position, though, why would one throw one’s guy under the bus? I have no faith that the GOP would in a similar circumstance.
        
        Also, I do think that this administration is better and smarter than the previous one in many ways.
      - notafeminista
        
        You just did.
      - Ray in VT
        
        No, I didn’t.
      - Terry Tree Tree
        
        ‘W’ admin. ‘sold’ itself as going to make us SAFER, before 9/11?
        The self-proclaimed ‘DECIDER’, took OVER 15 minutes to ‘decide’ that his JOB might be a little more important than being read to in an elementary school?
        ‘W’ admin ‘sold’ itself as going to make the Budget Surplus BIGGER?
        A FEW of the EASY ones, to refresh your memory?
      - J__o__h__n
        
        Iran Contra was worse.
  - jimino
    
    I understand it to be that violent drug cartel members intent on killing law enforcement officers wouldn’t have any trouble getting the guns to do it, whether or not F&F ever existed.
    
    And I thought the NRA was all about everyone having the gun of their choice. So why isn’t putting MORE guns in circulation a good thing?
    - Pagassae
      
      Do you ever read the newspaper, watch TV? Murders by the dozen in virtually every large American city, every week. And virtually ALL by guns.
      - Still Here
        
        And the Democrats are giving them the guns!
      - Ray in VT
        
        So, are the Democrats just driving around tossing out guns? They’re probably arming the gangs to work in coordination with the drones.
      - Pagassae
        
        People with your mindset represent the fundamental decline of the Nation.
    - notafeminista
      
      Is that what he is implying?
- Roy-in-Boise
  
  yes-yes … Republican guns do not kill people only Democrat guns do.
  - Still Here
    
    Democrats have no regard for life so it makes sense.
    - Ray in VT
      
      Well, that’s a total load of b.s. I don’t hear too many conservatives fretting over the possibly up to 100,000 Iraqi deaths that W.’s war may have ultimately ended up ending.
Dee

More Sick Republican Hypocrisy….

Tom, once again I am sick to death hearing the Republican�
mud slingers on Public Radio accusing Eric Holder on drum-
med up charges by the Republican Oversight Committee and�
its political hacks on your show today…

Where was their outraged when Bush used illegal detentions
and torture against Muslims whose only crime in many cases was their religious affiliation? Not to mention the illegal war waged against Iraq when that leader had no ties to Al Quade�
or indeed no WMDs.

In, addition, to the firing of five US attorney generals by Gen-
eral Alberto Gonzales whom they saw as a threat to Bush’s illegal activities against Americans finding out that the Bush�
Camp and crime bursters in the CIA & FBI were tapping the phones of Americans and listening to their personal conver-sations and monitoring many others with invasive devices�
without a warrant .Just where were their voices of the GOP oversight committee members then?

Lastly, what about the GOP House and Senate allowing US shipments of arms to Israel in light of that country’s appalling human rights abuses against the Palestinian people in violation of US Federal Law– whose population members are over 50% percent under the age of 15 yrs.. Dee

P.S. Over 1,200 Gazan civilians were killed in that cruel and�
unjust war with US weapons –some 400 were children under the age of 15yrs..How hypocritical now to hear those GOP oversight members voice their outraged today against Eric Holder and Obama. Just where were their outraged voices�
on such appalling war crimes —during the Bush years.
- William
  
  Israel has killed very few civilians and the Obama administration has asked for help from them because they have killed so many innoncent civilians with drone strikes in Afghanistan. The Palestinian people continue to reap the rewards from the American taxpayers despite refusing to denounce terrorism and stop shooting rockets into Israel.
  - Terry Tree Tree
    
    How many Palestinians do you talk to regularly? If you get ONLY the Israli news, it would be like the Catholic news about their heinous crimes- distraction, obstruction, and hiding the criminals!
    - William
      
      The nightly news here, RT, always has a story about the failed Palestinian “state”. Despite the hundreds of millions of dollars we have given them they refuse to become more civilized and renouce terrorism.
Worried for the country(MA)

Interesting that Tom opted to not report the strong reaction to Eric Holder’s decision not to release the documents by Brian Terry’s parents.

Brian Terry’s family wants answers about their son’s death and none have been forthcoming.

Holder admitted ‘mistakes were made’; yet no one has been fired.
- http://pulse.yahoo.com/_QME6C6XTBAYFEJP2GYDH3VQEMU Beat
  
  Holder did not kill that Border patrol. Did they captured the person who killed Brian Terry or the Republicans are just assuming that the gun used was from the Fast and Furious supplies of arms.
  - Worried for the country(MA)
    
    2 FnF guns were found at the Brian Terry crime scene. There is no dispute of a linkage between FnF and Brian Terry’s murder.
    - http://pulse.yahoo.com/_QME6C6XTBAYFEJP2GYDH3VQEMU Beat
      
      Is that kind of Odd. leaving the murder weapon at the scene of the crime.
      
      I don’t want to sound like a conspiracy theorist but that kind mind boggling for a murdered to leave his weapon or intentionally leave the weapon.
      
      there hundreds of Mexicans crossing the border everyday. Don’t you think they grabbed one of those people and accused them of murder while the real murderer(s) is still out there.
  - Worried for the country(MA)
    
    Of course Holder didn’t kill the agent but there are questions that need to be answered:
    
    1) Who authorized FnF – Holder claims it was a ‘local’ operation but no details have been produced.
    2)Once you know who authorized the ‘botched’ operation then you can hold them accountable – Fire them. No one has been fired.
    3)Who is responsible for the cover up? Holder has already admitted to lying to congress 3 times — by retracting prior testimony. What happened to transparency?
    - http://pulse.yahoo.com/_QME6C6XTBAYFEJP2GYDH3VQEMU Beat
      
      Holder is in command he is responsible but why all these drama and a committee to investigate a murder or screw up.
      
      If they want to do something they should have ask Bush why he authorized Fast and Furious. It was not Obama’s administration who plan FanF but Bush.
      - Worried for the country(MA)
        
        Wrong.
        
        Operation Wide Receiver ended in 2007 and NO guns were lost.
        
        Where is the linkage between wide receiver and FnF? There is none.
        
        So Reagan authorized the bombing of Libya in 1986. So he is responsible for bombing Libya in 2011?
      - http://pulse.yahoo.com/_QME6C6XTBAYFEJP2GYDH3VQEMU Beat
        
        HA? Please and you want me to believe you. What are you? ORDINARY CITIZEN LIKE ME. blah!!!!
      - http://pulse.yahoo.com/_QME6C6XTBAYFEJP2GYDH3VQEMU Beat
        
        if you got sources and work for 60 minutes I will believe you but you are just another person who worried too much.
      - Terry Tree Tree
        
        Sounds like a precedent to me! Similiar actions often follow precedents, unless the precedent is condemned?
      - X-Ray
        
        But the Obama administration screwed it up.
      - http://pulse.yahoo.com/_QME6C6XTBAYFEJP2GYDH3VQEMU Beat
        
        Holder’s Men screwed it up
    - Terry Tree Tree
      
      WHY weren’t you ‘Worried’ about ALL the people that died, and were risked by the ‘W’ admin?
http://pulse.yahoo.com/_QME6C6XTBAYFEJP2GYDH3VQEMU Beat

Brian Terry was not the only border patrol that got killed in the line of duty but Republicans is using Brian for political motif to destroy the Obama administration.

Fire Holder and let stop this non sense. if they have the criminals in custody what else do they want.

I know Holden will leave his position soon by force or resignation but for now the Political drama continues.
Terry Tree Tree

Fast and Furious, comments at least!
If the documents are protected by a Grand Jury determination, WHY are Republicans castigating Holder, for following the decision of that Grand Jury?
I am in no way upholding ‘Fast and Furious’, as it has been related. Unless there is a LOT more to it, than we have been told, it was put together slip-shod, at best.
Gregg

Classified information is being leaked profusely by this administration. For some reason it is all favorable to Obama. Why is there stonewalling over this?
- Brandstad
  
  Because the media is owned by the left !
Worried for the country(MA)

The Jay Carney briefing with the MSM didn’t go very well today.

This is how Watergate started.

You have to go to UK MSM to get reporting:

http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/timstanley/100166854/the-fast-and-furious-scandal-is-turning-into-president-obamas-watergate/
http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=1421666010 Wilbur Blount

Has Rep. Chaffetz become a big boy yet and found himself an apartment or a room some place where he is paying rent or is he still sleeping in his office?
- Worried for the country(MA)
  
  Sounds like you resent representatives that are workaholics working for their constituents.
  - http://pulse.yahoo.com/_QME6C6XTBAYFEJP2GYDH3VQEMU Beat
    
    Workaholics don’t sleep in the office. if they do they are not working they are snoozing.
  - Pagassae
    
    You really believe your own BS, don’t you? Amazing.
http://pulse.yahoo.com/_QME6C6XTBAYFEJP2GYDH3VQEMU Beat

What is “Operation Wide Receiver” is this part of Fast and Furious or a different that started in 2006 with Bush – a name Attorney Alberto Gonzales why is he not being question

The biggest issue why is it everytime the plans of the Bush administration are screwed up. they blame the Obama administration?
- Worried for the country(MA)
  
  Why do you make stuff up? Wide receiver ended in 2007 with NO guns lost.
  
  There is zero linkage between the two programs.
  - http://pulse.yahoo.com/_QME6C6XTBAYFEJP2GYDH3VQEMU Beat
    
    What did I made up? The Operation Wide Receiver? please How do you know that nothing happened. Can you please stop being such a wanna be expert in government I feel like writing a song about you. for being a Wangsta
    - Worried for the country(MA)
      
      Excuse me but you are the one attempting to blame Bush for Obama’s screw ups. There are plenty of things to blame on Bush but this isn’t one of them.
      - http://pulse.yahoo.com/_QME6C6XTBAYFEJP2GYDH3VQEMU Beat
        
        LOL!!!! OMG
        
        Who planned Fast and Furious?
        Who was the man who signed the papers and order the Fast and Furious?
        
        I think it wasn’t Obama. it was your Bush.
        
        3 1/2 years had past and still the screw up of Bush is still affecting the entire United States.
        
        Obama is a patsy of the incompetence of the Republican party.
        
        Not only the American knows that but the entire world.
      - X-Ray
        
        Under whose watch were the guns lost? (Obama) Blame the person who was in charge. The buck stops at the Executive desk. Stop blaming the Bush Admninistration for Obama’s shortcomings.
      - http://pulse.yahoo.com/_QME6C6XTBAYFEJP2GYDH3VQEMU Beat
        
        Obama was not watchin aint his job. Holder was so blame him not the PRESIDENT OF AMERICA.
      - Gregg
        
        You’re funny. Where can I catch your act?
Brandstad

�
Please tell me the dates and networks that have featured the story on the nightly news? You can’t do this because it has only been mentioned once by one network and they made it sound like a partisan witch hunt, not an investigation into the death of an American boarder agent and hundreds of Mexicans!I thought the Dems were friends of the Mexican people until I saw their lack of interest in how so many were killed by their policies!
- http://pulse.yahoo.com/_QME6C6XTBAYFEJP2GYDH3VQEMU Beat
  
  Can you please stop lying United States is almost broke, no jobs and the economy is still hanging by a thread.
  
  It doesn’t help at all. Why are the Republicans are vigorously trying to destroy Obama and millions of Americans are still suffering.
  
  Are we supposed to help each than destroy each other.
  
  There is Chinese proverb:
  
  Even if it was just a little help from others, you should return the favor with all you can when others are in need.
  - http://pulse.yahoo.com/_QME6C6XTBAYFEJP2GYDH3VQEMU Beat
    
    Chinese help each other dreams that is why they succeeding in every corner of our world.
    
    While Americans are destroying each other in the name of Politics.
  - Gregg
    
    The suffering won’t end in earnest until Obama is replaced and if Obamacare is not repealed it won’t ever end. Hopefully Monday it will be struck down and the healing can begin.
    - Terry Tree Tree
      
      The U.S. has been paying FIVE times the per-capita cost to some of Developed Nations that have Universal Health-Care! 1/3 of our Citizens DON’T have health insurance, making it more like 8 times!�
      National Universal Health Care would be LESS expensive, with everyone covered, if run right!
      Make a CONTRACT, giving me HALF of the Salaries, Perqs, Benefits, and Stock, of the people that are supposed to ‘Manage’ our health-care NOW, and I’ll SHOW you the way to do it! THEY only want to ‘Manage’ money into their own pockets!
  - Brandstad
    
    What exactly have I lied about?
    �
    The Republicans are trying to stop Obama from acting in an unconstitutional manor and trying to change the US into a socialist utopia.
    �
    �
    If Obama didn’t do anything wrong, why is he trying so hard to prevent Americans from reading his own administrations documents. The documents are his, we would have to assume they are the closest thing to the truth and yet we can not see them? This is pretty obvious to any thinker that the documents must show someone acted against the wishes of the constitution, the US people, or people lied about what they knew and when they knew it!
Brandstad

Holder retracted his statement that the program started under the bush administration and admitted that this was started under Obama! Please watch the news!
- http://pulse.yahoo.com/_QME6C6XTBAYFEJP2GYDH3VQEMU Beat
  
  Branstad News Hour? no thank you I am watching Sesame Street.
Traveler

What’s really frustrating about all this is that the guns are used by people supplying a contraband product to millions of Americans. The “War on Drugs” has been a dismal failure. When will we as a nation realize that the real problem is the addiction of our own people? If we devoted as much time and effort to curing the addiction, there would be far less demand for drugs and far fewer deaths on both sides of the border. But wait, there would also be less demand for weapons, border guards and prisons and the money these generate for certain industries. Hmmm…
- http://pulse.yahoo.com/_QME6C6XTBAYFEJP2GYDH3VQEMU Beat
  
  Capitalism indeed.
  - X-Ray
    
    It has nothing to do with Capitalism. It has to do with an arrogant
    Administration.
    - http://pulse.yahoo.com/_QME6C6XTBAYFEJP2GYDH3VQEMU Beat
      
      Arrogant? Obama never flew a plane and landed on an aircraft carrier and proclaimed “Mission Accomplished”.
      - X-Ray
        
        Neither did Bush. The “Mission Accomplished” referred to the mission of the aircraft carrier. It wasn’t mentioned by the President. Inform yourself.
      - http://pulse.yahoo.com/_QME6C6XTBAYFEJP2GYDH3VQEMU Beat
        
        hehe I got you.
        
        who can win arguing with Republicans.
        They are rich and the powerful.
      - Terry Tree Tree
        
        The sign was made and flown out to the carrier, specifically for ‘W’s landing, to inferr that the crew made it!!
           THAT was finally admitted by ‘W’ admin., AFTER letting the country, and the world think the carrier crew made and posted the sign!
            Just like they made it sound like ‘W’ flew the plane out, and landed it on the carrier, UNTIL people that knew about carrier landings CALLED them on it!
            THEN they admitted that ‘W’ only handled the plane in straight and level flight, like a 3 year old could do!
    - Still Here
      
      And criminal.
      - jefe68
        
        Oh know not criminal…
        Heavens forbid.
  - http://pulse.yahoo.com/_QME6C6XTBAYFEJP2GYDH3VQEMU Beat
    
    Guns creates profit and War makes more profit.
- William
  
  The War on Poverty has failed too. It goes back to the basic problem government is inept and can’t realy do much right.
  - Ray in VT
    
    Except for winning World War II, putting satellites in space and on Mars, putting a man on the Moon, building the interstate highway system, bringing electricity to areas where “the market” wouldn’t go, helping to found the Internet, etc.
    
    I would agree with you that there are something that the government does not do well. The War on Poverty probably cannot be “won”. The poor probably will always be with us. The War on Drugs is another boondogle. To more broadly assert, though, that government is inept is not supported by facts.
    - http://pulse.yahoo.com/_QME6C6XTBAYFEJP2GYDH3VQEMU Beat
      
      Proverty can be won according to Harvard Study but a few power people will not make that happen.
      
      Just imagine all the resources that we can get from the sun,wind and ocean.
      and more
      
      We can eradicate poverty but how can Capitalism profit if we make everything for free.
      - Ray in VT
        
        I’m not sure that it can be, Beat, although I wish that it could be. I think that we can do a lot with things like wind and solar power, but the pieces have to come from somewhere, and that does cost, and our economy does depend upon low wage earners, both here and overseas.
        
        There does need to be a profit motive in order to make the private sector move, and capitalism, in a regulated form, is the worst sort of economy yet devised, except for all of the others.
        
        I also think that some people are content to be poor. Where my brother lives there are many people who live in dumps and spend all of their cash on beer and 4 wheelers, and they seem happy to live that way.
      - http://pulse.yahoo.com/_QME6C6XTBAYFEJP2GYDH3VQEMU Beat
        
        i am like those people I never ask for more. if there is more I give some to others.
        I want a simple life and family but happy.
        
        it is not diffecult to do that but our society makes it harder.
      - DIYinSTL
        
        In theory, there is no difference between practice and theory. In practice, there is.
        
        Unbridled capitalism has been shown on numerous occasions to be a bad idea. With proper constraints it brings prosperity and achievement.
      - Brandstad
        
        Please tell me what occasions have shown Unbridled capitalism to be a bad idea!
    - William
      
      A major reason for winning WW II was our industrial might which was displayed by unleashing the private sector and not government factories. Putting a man on the moon was funded by the government but the equipment was designed and built by the private sector. Internet was conceived by a scientist in the early 1960′s and the Autodin system was the first “internet” system which was designed and built by the private sector.
      The War on Poverty has been lost due to it being dreamed up and run by the government. Until we declare victory in this war it will continue to fail. The War on Drugs could be won by turning it over to the private sector and unleashing the success of we have seen displayed for generations in solving problems government has created or failed to solve.
      Government has a few successful programs but it’s success has not been across the board as we have seen with the War on Poverty, Drugs, the failed Dept. Of Education and Energy. At the end of the day, we would be better off with a much smaller and powerful government.
      - nj_v2
        
        It’s amusing to watch, day after day, the right-wing clown posse on the forum twist and pervert facts, or just outright lie, to try to make the world conform to their skewed, partisan perspective.
        
        Here Willie babbles, “ A major reason for winning WW II was our industrial might which was displayed by unleashing the private sector and not government factories.”
        
        “Unleashing,” my butt. In just the kind of government interference that right-wing hackers like Willie decry, private companies were ordered by the government to stop production of consumer goods, including automobiles, and instead switch production to war materials.
      - DIYinSTL
        
        Actually, the internet can be traced to the ALOHA network of the 50′s. Read Dixon Doll’s book for an accurate early history.
  - Warren
    
    Not if you’re part of the SOCIAL WORKERS INDUSTRIAL COMPLEX
    - Warren
      
      Sorry “Social Services Industrial Complex”.
  - JohnGraff
    
    “Although conservatives portray government as incompetent, public sector programs have actually amassed an admirable record of success in a wide variety of policy areas.”�
    http://www.governmentisgood.com/articles.php?aid=7
    
    As Thomas Hobbes observed without government the life of man would be “solitary, poore, nasty, brutish, and short.”
http://pulse.yahoo.com/_QME6C6XTBAYFEJP2GYDH3VQEMU Beat

GOP means to destroy the Obama Administration and forget about the American people.
- Still Here
  
  Except it’s the Obama Adminstration that is single-handedly destroying the American people and all they care about.
  - Ray in VT
    
    As I said regarding your earlier comment, what a load of b.s.
    - Pagassae
      
      typo, sorry. I meant my reply to go to “Still Here”.
    - Warren
      
      Who said”"We are Socialists,we are enemies of todays capitalistic system for the exploitation of the economic weak
      No it wasn’t a OWS kid,it was Hitler in 1927. By the way Zuccotti Park is privately owned by a Canadian company that got one of those $100 million loans for some Green Energy njonsense from Pres.Obama.
      - Ray in VT
        
        Who said that the Social Democratic Party, the main leftist/socialist party in Weimar Germany was a “pestilential whore” and that their ideology came from the Jews? Who banned that party, along with labor unions, after coming to power, while allowing industry and banking to remain in private hands? It was Hitler.
        
        Your dogged determination to hang onto positions which are entirely without historical and factual merit show to me a fundamental lack of understanding or a willful ignorance, but, then again, that is what I have come to expect from you.
  - Pagassae
    
    What crap. Have you been asleep since 1950??
    
    Another Republican nut with AMNESIA.
  - jefe68
    
    Who knew that President Obama was more diabolical than Lex Luthor.
- Drew (GA)
  
  Grand Ol’ Party full of Good Ol’ Boys out to get the Black Man? Say it ain’t so.
- Brandstad
  
  The GOP is looking out for the American people by trying to preserve their freedom, cheap energy, and good jobs while paying low taxes.
Worried for the country(MA)

Sad.

Jay Carney forgets the name of the slain border patrol agent. Jake Tapper of ABC bails him out.

Poor Jay. The mounting pressure is getting to him.
- http://pulse.yahoo.com/_QME6C6XTBAYFEJP2GYDH3VQEMU Beat
  
  What do you get from watching that BS on tv?
  
  Does it make you feel good to be Republican or Anti-Obama?
  
  To tell you frankly whatever happens with the fast and furious investigation the American people has already decided the next President and it’s not going to be Romney for sure.
  - Brandstad
    
    It makes me feel good to be pro-US Constitution, and pro-freedom! It is not my fault that Obama cant say the same.
Alohanuiloa

Has anybody thought of the fact, that President Obama used executive privlege because the documents that the committee is asking for contains the names of U.S. agents and that allowing the ‘loose lips’ representatives on the committee to obtain this information would ‘blow’ their covers and extremely endanger the lives of those agents. I for one think that the lives of agents like Mr. Terry are worth a whole lot more than some Republicans’ political prestige or reputation.

This whole ‘flap’ over FNF is just another Republican ploy to distract the American public from the real problems that are going on in our capitol. The fact that they are stalling every attempt of the President’s adminastration to pass legislation to get this country moving forward again, so they can do what they said before Obama took office. MAKE Obama A 1 TERM PRESIDENT. Obama has ‘bent over backwards’ in attempts to broker deals with the Republican party(to his detrement); but at every turn the Republians have yelled, “HELL, NO !” to compromise deals. Obama has even gone farther than half-way (which the left didn’t like) in trying to make deals with the Republicans and they still said, ‘NO DEAL !’ The Rebublican Party is the party of the rich for the rich, and the ‘BIG’ corporations who have ‘BOUGHT & PAID’ for them and their vote; why else would the majority of them belong to that group ‘ALEC’, that’s where major companies write so called ‘MODEL LEGISLATION’ to be pushed into law on the local, state, and national level. They have perfected the art of “Double Speak” (shades of 1984). Americans need to look for the “double meaning when ever a Republican opens their mouth.
- http://pulse.yahoo.com/_QME6C6XTBAYFEJP2GYDH3VQEMU Beat
  
  To tell you frankly even if you write 100 pages of positive explaination to the Republicans and Obama haters it will never work. sorry to say that to you.
  
  They won’t see that.
  - http://pulse.yahoo.com/_QME6C6XTBAYFEJP2GYDH3VQEMU Beat
    
    But I do.
- William
  
  Just “white out” the names of these so called “secret agents” in any documents that are turned over to the Congress. Of course the Republicans want Obama to be a one term President. It is no different from the mind set displayed by the Democrats when there is a Republican President is in office. Shall we forget Senator Reid calling President Bush a loser or saying the Iraq War was lost? President Obama said he was not interested in compromise during his first meeting with Republicans. His exact words were “I won”. He has not passed a budget in 3 years because it is not willing to compromise. If you are looking for an example of “double speak, how about Obama’s “evolving opinion on gay marriage?”. Or his failure to close Gitmo?
- DIYinSTL
  
  Names are easily redacted. It’s far more likely that the conspiracy theorists are correct: this was an attempt to raise the number of guns smuggled from the U.S. as an excuse to enact stricter gun control laws. As bad as you think the republicans are, the democrats are just as bad. Each party has their corresponding list of things to prohibit or promote that is an offense to the civil liberties of those with centrist views. The biggest difference between the two is that historically the dems are less organized.
Bruce

Just when I thought the GOP could not descend further by employing the institutional power of govt. in the service of perversely partisan ends (as they did with their posturing over the debt limit), Darrell Issa and his fellow NRA pawns on the House Oversight Committee have concocted yet another narrative to appeal to their paranoid, anti-government, conspiracy-theory base.Fast & Furious–an example of a flawed operation under the auspices of a flawed ATF, which was deprived of leadership by an unprecedented Republican’t obstructionism that has stymied Obama agency appointees from day one of his Administration, stonewalling or rejecting his nominees to agencies like the ATF even after they are reported out of Committee with bipartisan support.Who better to preside over what has aptly been described below as a circus than Darrell Issa—a uniquely qualified buffoon who has given us other spectacles like conducting hearings on the contraceptive mandate without allowing women (i.e. Sandra Fluke) to testify.Just google Chairman Issa to get a clearer idea of this wing-nut’s history and character. Sadly, you’ll find not only his affinity for Right Wing paranoia and self-aggrandizement, but also evidence of his commitment to concentrated power and wealth. Issa, I believe, remains the wealthiest currently serving member of Congress, which may explain his ascendancy in the current incarnation of the GOP.
Sy2502

And as always, the people on the losing end are going to be the family and friends of all the victims killed by this operation, who are going to see the death of their loved ones be used as political fodder.
nj_v2

Once again, Greggg makes shit up.
- Gregg
  
  There I am again, at the top of the page. I have no idea what you are talking about but I can assure you I don’t make things up. Did you ever get around to commenting on the subject or are you still just trolling hate? Try to get me out of your head, you’ll feel better.
- Warren
  
  temper temper
feettothefire

It’s seven o’clock on Thursday evening, exactly eighteen hours since I predicted that today’s board would be nothing more interesting than a bunch of “oh yeah, says you” tit for tat crap between inflexible liberals and equally obstinate Republicans. Sadly, I must rest my case. The evidence is in most of the 483 comments below. If what we see here is the best level of discourse we can aspire to, we’re doomed. And Romney thinks America’s best days lie ahead. If what we see here is any indication of what’s in store, he might want to re-think that one.
- Gregg
  
  As the only fair minded rational nonpartisan commenter on this blog, do you have a problem with Holder lying to Congress, hundreds of deaths and President Obama claiming Executive Privilege to protect conversations he was not a part of? Is criticism ever warranted or fair? If not here, where?
  - feettothefire
    
    Criticism is fair when it’s fair. I have no problem at all with peoples personal opinions on any given issue. It’s the hyperbolic insistence by Democrats that Republicans are the embodiment of evil on earth and similar claims that Democrats are not but looney nutjobs. It’s the inability by those on either side to admit to the failings of ‘”their” guys or the successes of the “other” guys. When Obama revealed his Afghanistan strategy at West Point in November of 2009, a strategy which involved a surge of twenty thousand more troops, I was bitterly disappointed with him. His prolific use of drones and targeted assassinations are equally disappointing, not to mention the collateral damage, otherwise known as dead innocent civilians. It’s not necessary to get into a deep discussion about Afghanistan strategy here. But, had these things been the policy of, oh, lets say the Bush administration, the liberal Democrats on this site would have been relentless in their criticism of his actions. But it wasn’t Bush. It was Obama. So, from the liberals we hear nary a peep of condemnation. A few stray voices in the wilderness, perhaps. Obama gets a pass, maybe an occasional verbal slap on the wrist from all the liberals for engaging in actions for which they would roundly condemn George Bush. Republicans are no better. Just as with Democrats, the examples are endless. Democrats love interfering in the economy. Democrats are socialists, intent on destroying our way of life. They make these claims while ignoring the fact that every Republican president since the “Reagan Revolution, including Reagan himself, has interfered in the economy. Regan had many tax increases and budget deficits, but according to many delusional conservatives here, Obama invented budget deficits. George H.W. Bush promised “No new taxes” before he raised taxes. That’s two Republican presidents in a row who raised taxes, despite their claims that only Democrats raise taxes. His tax cuts aside, most true, old-line conservatives couldn’t stand G.W.Bush. He was too much of a big government liberal for them, especially that Tarp thing. Even Nixon had wage and price controls, which certainly seems like interference to me. Despite all of this interference in economic matters from Republican administrations, the myth persists that it’s a “Democrat” thing. Finally (thank God) while you’ll consider it speculation, I know for a fact that if the events of F.F had occurred exactly as they did, but Holder worked for a Republican administration, most of the points of view stated below would have been exactly the opposite of those stated.
    - Gregg
      
      I speculatively disagree with your speculation but I sincerely get you point. I still have no idea of your thoughts about the subject at hand.
      - feettothefire
        
        That’s deliberate on my part. I saw this as a much better opportunity to address the plague of ideological, partisan foolishness. Since I knew at midnight yesterday exactly how this day would play out, I have found today to be one of the most boring days I’ve spent here. Predictability can have that effect. But, I have enjoyed our give and take. Contrary to popular opinion, civility works. Have a good night.
  - Guest
    
    If you think Yahoo represents the masses, then we are in a horrible state. I look to the WSJ, NYTimes, or go read Slate, etc. but Yahoo is just for FUN.
    I want to look at it that way, until I must admit that Americans are stupid. I’m almost there.
    - Gregg
      
      Yahoo?
Roy Mac

This guy Chaffetz is a real piece of work! No frigging wonder the approval of Congress is down in single digits, if there are people like him in congressional seats!! What a doofus!
Connie

Republican concerns about 1000 guns and 300 deaths seems ironic given the many thousands of guns and 50,000 deaths in Mexico that are facilitated by lax gun laws in the US–and Republican opposition to strengthening those laws. In fact, I could call it disingenuous.
- Pagassae
  
  Republicans being disingenuous? Indeed, a travesty. They conveniently have forgotten the 2 losing wars they got us into. Thousand of US dead, and tens of thousands of others. Trillions wasted, but now all forgotten and NEVER mentioned. How convenient.
  - Warren
    
    Democrat Albert Einstein gave us the A-Bomb,while Republican Thomas Edison said ,”Let there be Light”(bulbs).Those wars were sanction by Congress with every prominent Democrat signing on the dotted line.The Koch Brothers said don’t get involved with Iraq.Us Libertarians are impressive.Kochs are also for Gay Marriage,Stem Cell Research,etc,. Light”(bulbs).
    - Terry Tree Tree
      
      Since Edison was searching for the most efficient electric light, he would have endorsed Fluorescent, compact fluorescent, LED, and Inductive Lighting?
      Instead of having a ridiculous retrogressive obsession with ancient, inefficient technology?
- Warren
  
  Silly,silly girl.They are business men supplying the voracious appetites in the U.S.A…They are Al Capone
  - Terry Tree Tree
    
    From an avowed ‘chemical’ user, who probably gets his ‘chemicals’ from Mexican Drug Cartels, you give the ‘excuse’ Capone gave for his crimes?
- Travis
  
  The deaths aren’t attributable to the lax gun laws, they are attributable to our War on Drugs. Prohibition just creates a market for criminals, and with the profit incentive for them, it’s going to be impossible to stop them being involved in the drug trade. They only way to stem the bloodshed is remove their profit potential, aka end prohibition. You put the market in the hands of people that will resolve their disputes in a civilized manner, by going to court instead of chopping off the heads of their business rivals, then we can start to see this getting better. Until then, it will just be more of the same with different actors popping up after we arrest/kill current actors.
Maxime

Great show as always. With the current political divide in America, I would recommend to stop inviting active politicians. They, on either side, do not provide any valuable informations and/or thoughts to important questions.
- feettothefire
  
  That’s the most insightful comment of the day.
- Warren
  
  The Silly talk of a closed minded person.All input is valid,right,left,Martian!!!I live by this maxim.Read the Editorial Page of the NYT,then the WSJ,then decide
Connie

Tom Ashbrook–shame on you. Congressman Chaffetz talked for a good while, saying some pretty outrageous stuff without being interupted. Then you let him interupt the next speaker as he responded to what the Congressman said. Every one should get a chance to finish their thought.

Please don’t let your guests interrupt each other.
Kirtandj

Rep. Chaffetz is making a big issue of Homeland Security not detecting any of these guns leaving the country. Would you clarify whether exports come under homeland security? I thought it was their responsibility to control what and who comes into the country. I have never been checked by an American official leaving the country, only entering.
Sam Murray

Listening to this show a second time, I can’t believe no one has contested the “Mexico’s guns come from the US” demagoguery*.

In 2007-2008 the Mexican government recovered 29,000 guns at crime scenes. ATF Deputy Director William Hoover testified that about 10,000 came from the USA, less than a third. See http://www.factcheck.org/2009/04/counting-mexicos-guns/ for details.
- DIYinSTL
  
  The 90% number stems from the GAO-09-709 report claiming 87%. Using their numbers (3,480 traced out of 30,000 confiscated), it looks like the real number is less than 12%.
  - JohnGraff
    
    According to whom, FOX?
    
    “Given the lack of hard data from Mexico, we can’t calculate a precise figure for what portion of crime guns have been traced to the U.S. Based on the best evidence we can find so far, we conclude that the 90 percent claim made by the president and others in his administration lacks a basis in solid fact. But we also conclude that the number is at least double what Fox News has reported, based on its reporters’ mistaken interpretation of ATF testimony.Whether the number is 90 percent, or 36 percent, or something else, there’s no dispute that thousands of guns are being illegalIy transported into Mexico by way of the United States each year.”http://www.factcheck.org/2009/04/counting-mexicos-guns/
    - DIYinSTL
      
      No, not according to Fox. According to the cited GAO report. If you take the time to read it, especially the response by Homeland Security appended to the end, you will see that the number is only 12%. FactCheck.org has done a very lazy job by citing only “statements” and “transcripts” instead of going to the source of the misinformation (Jess Ford’s GAO-09-709 report.) Even 12% is surprising when you consider the cost to buy in the U.S. and smuggle across the border vs. what is available on the black market.
Ccmojr

congress tied ATF’s hands to monitor gun supplies to keep records. this is congresses fault for bending over to the nra. the congressman should be ashamed.
Warren

Mr.Holder says we could never show this info.Muy,muy,muy importante.Meanwhile Pat Cadell says Mr Donilon is the leak of the Double agent that got the underwear guy,Suxnet,Drone targeting.,arming Syrian Oppositioin.I am mortified that the hero, Dr.Afisti is doing 33 years in a Pakistani Prison because of leaks.
In Sangers book he says Gates charged into Donilons office aand said”Shut the Fu-K(I think that’s the quote)because their excessive self glorification was compromising operational details.Donilon is even collaborating on a Seal Team movie…..What’s next,”Action Toys”

I still have faith in America.The “Granny bus Monitor” that was tortured by the school kids got $400,000 in conttributions to retire on.Right On!!!
- Gregg
  
  I love the granny story!
public radio fan

This issue is being blown up as a diversion from the weak Republican candidate’s campaign and an attempt to pretend that Congress is getting something done. Republicans fail to enact any legislation that will help the economy because it might benefit President Obama in his re-election. The Republican party has been shanghaied by the right wing conservatives who will go to any lengths – including destroying the country – to win the presidency!
Ken

If the republican party was serious about this topic of military type weapons, they would not back the mfg & availablity of same. Semi-automatic weapons are easily converted to full auto. They, the republican offeice holders, are either sucking or have the nra dick up the assess. Most of them did not serve, nor do their children. Case in point Mitt Romney and his sons. He’s just other republican draft dodgers, like bush/cheney.
Ken
- Guest
  
  Ken, your argument on draft dodging is lame. We haven’t had a LEGAL WAR since WWII. Many of us dodged the Vietnam war by going to college. It was legal and smart!!
DIYinSTL

Tom,
In your (tape delayed in St. Louis) show today, you mentioned several times that the majority of guns in Mexico come from the U.S.. You probably get that information from the discredited GAO-09-709 report that claims the 3,480 guns traced to the U.S. out of the more than 30,000 confiscated by the Mexican government (11.6%) from 2004-2008 means that 87% of the guns come from the U.S.. Director Levine of Homeland Security was being kind when he called this deliberate error “misleading” (second paragraph of his response to Mr. Jess Ford of the GAO). More and more you see people responsible for disseminating the news just parroting information without checking if the facts are true. If nothing else, please cease in propagating this lie.
- JohnGraff
  
  “Given the lack of hard data from Mexico, we can’t calculate a precise figure for what portion of crime guns have been traced to the U.S. Based on the best evidence we can find so far, we conclude that the 90 percent claim made by the president and others in his administration lacks a basis in solid fact. But we also conclude that the number is at least double what Fox News has reported, based on its reporters’ mistaken interpretation of ATF testimony.Whether the number is 90 percent, or 36 percent, or something else, there’s no dispute that thousands of guns are being illegalIy transported into Mexico by way of the United States each year.”http://www.factcheck.org/2009/04/counting-mexicos-guns/
rosebud

the truth is that this 2010 congress and the NRA have been systematically targeting Holder as well as the president for some time now; and now they have their BIG STORY of a botched ATF operation. oh boy, this is so important as to set aside student loans, the transportation bill, the president’s job bill, and deride the new health care law providing coverage for THIRTY MILLION UNINSURED AMERICANS, something every modern society in the world has instituted, but hey, what about those “precious secret documents?”�
disgusting. unacceptable. a black man gets elected to high office and here’s where we are… maybe reverend wright wasn’t such a nut after all…
- DIYinSTL
  
  The NRA is (supposed to be) an organization focused on safety and the rights of gun owners (hunters, target shooters, collectors, police, and military) so they naturally will be against any politician whom they feel is against our 2nd amendment rights. The NRA does not have a position on jobs or health care. They have gone out of their way in recent years be inclusive of all people and have published several stories on how many gun laws were originally designed to disarm the black community. Furthermore, not all NRA members are republicans nor are they all of fair complexion. The Obama administration is not friendly to gun owners and that is what this is really all about. If nothing else, read the newslink above that goes to the CBS story about BATFE using F&F results to justify new regulations.
- Bmmcelreath
  
  I could care less about his color but do care about what this fraud is doing to the country. The healthcare bill is a loser, job killer, bank buster, just like Obama, and also unconstitutional, which obliviously means nothing to the Liar-n-chief. He lies like John Edwards lying to his first wife. BTW, under Bush the effort was a sting against cartel bad guys with tracking devices planted and with Mexican officials in the loop. Not so under Obarry, it was a sting against the 2nd amendment.
Shoirca

Pathetic that the Tiahrt Amendment, which hamstrings LEOs’ ability to
track straw purchases, was not mentioned. The NRA has fought tooth and
nail to preserve the Republican sponsored Amendment which, since 2003,
has prevented police from tracking straw purchasers, identifying shops
selling to criminals, and preventing the identification of guns that
“walk away” from gun shops.

If Congress is so concerned about
the safety of border patrol agents and police officers they would stand
up to the NRA and repeal the Tiahrt Amendment.
feettothefire

Today the House committee voted along party lines on the Holder contempt issue. Think about that. Party lines. Not truth. Not individual judgement. Not personal conviction. PARTY LINES!!! More and more, with every passing political controversy, we make ourselves look like some third world banana republic. Richard Nixon had more integrity than the politicians of today. That’s just pathetic.
- Kmacfarland
  
  I was just about to write a very similar comment; where is the journalistic search for truth and facts here? This debate is a perfect example of how partisan and politicized this country has become. As a somewhat independent liberal I say shame on all you liberals who have come to defend Obama’s right to executive privilege. The fact that he’s invoked it shows he’s hiding something; we should demand truth and transparency from our own party just as we demand it from the other. And to the idea that he somehow orchestrated this to encourage stronger gun control laws, ridiculous, better to have some evidence before making such a slanderous accusation.
  - Guest
    
    How many times did Bush exercise that same privilege? Many times.
    - Warren
      
      6 times
- Gregg
  
  I agree, the Democrats partisanship is embarrassing. However when the entire House votes, many Democrats will hold him in contempt. It’s awful.
- Greyman
  
  If you think this a noteworthy case, consider passage of the vaunted PPACA: all Democrats, in both Senate and House, passed the legislation with a handful of Democratic defections and zero support from Republicans. I would not go so far to say that “truth” has much to do with deliberations on either side of any issue, however, “truth” just happens to raise its head from time to time. Concerning Nixon, perhaps this can be said: Nixon was as CAPABLE of integrity as most human beings (Democratic and Republican politicians included) are CAPABLE of rationality.
SamEw

Obama has adopted Bush security policies in almost every way Republicans complain and Democrats justify this is somewhere between hilarious to tragic.
mikey

I find this entire thing amazing. ALL US Border patrol agents that are killed every year are by weapons purchased in the United States. If you look at a map of gun shops in the US you will see a large number are on the border area with Mexico. Everyone knows that the Cartels buy guns in the US because they are illegal in Mexico. Does anyone actually think the Cartel gun buyer would not have just bought another weapon if they didn’t buy the “fast and furious” gun? I’m sorry for the border agents family but I think this is ridiculous criticism. The Cartels are great customers for gun shop owners, the NRA, and everyone whose job depends on the US weapons industry. I’m not saying that sarcastically, It is just that no one in Washington wants these guns stopped. This entire operation was political cover for Dems and now it is a political asset to the Republicans. What a circus.
- mikey
  
  PLEASE REMOVE HOLDER! I would like to see him prosecuted for his zero prosecution policy for bankers. Humiliated, prosecute and get rid of Holder. He is a bank lobbyist not an attorney general. He will be an employee of Goldman Sachs or J.P. Morgan as soon as he is out of office.
  - Abbey
    
    I wouldn’t say humiliating him but I do agree that there should some serious house cleaning and more transparency. However, humiliation seems to harsh and given our country’s racial history choose your words wisely.
    - Warren
      
      500,000 died when the Republicans freed the Democrats slaves.My hands are clean
Bmmcelreath

Bush Ad. used tracking devices. Once cartels figured that out and begin dismantling devices it was shut down. Under Bush it was a sting operation to catch bad guys with Mexican Officials in the loop.

Under Obarryfraud there were not tracking devices, no criminals targeted, Mexican off. were not in the loop. This was done to gin up animosity against boarder states gun dealers and the 2nd amendment. Discussions to that effect are likely in the tapes. Obarryfraud and Holder’s actions likely facilitated crimes, murder of innocent boarder patrol agents and Mexican citizens.

What is Obarryfraud hiding??? I think I know
- Guest
  
  It’s BORDER and not boarder, like someone who rents a room. Please!
Phil Havens

Tom
I am big fan of show and host but I turned you off….first time. 1. You missed the fact that fast and furious began during Mulkasy term. This makes it clear that Issa on political hunt. 2 When Chris C said that R’s and D’s equally to blame you never said boo to him. You could ask him if he did not believe Orenstein who says clearly that R’s have created the mess. Or you could have asked about Obama’s offer during debt ceiling crisis which gave in a great deal. You are usually excellent at educating your listeners. You missed a great opportunity

Phil Havens
- Gregg
  
  That’s a talking point. Fast and Furious began under Obama. Wide Receiver and Gun runner were completely different.
http://pulse.yahoo.com/_6QS4SA55CSZTTPC2T5OWS5RUGM yahoo-6QS4SA55CSZTTPC2T5OWS5RUGM

Owens Previously Speculated That Fast And Furious Was “A PR Op For Gun Control.” From a June 20 Pajamas Media post by Owens, headlined “Mega-Scandal: Was ‘Gunwalker’ a PR op for Gun Control?”: “As there is a pattern of behavior to suggest that Gunwalker was not a botched law enforcement operation, but was instead an effort by U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder’s Justice Department to carry out a subversive anti-gun policy of the Obama administration, it is pertinent to examine Obama’s past associations with anti-gun groups.” [Pajamas Media,/20/11]

Owens Later Acknowledged He Lacked “Any Direct Evidence Of This Allegation.” From a June 22 post by Owens:

In an earlier post we made an explosive allegation. We asserted that this plot to arm Mexican narco-terrorists was issued from the very top of the executive branch, and that these federal agencies were attempting to fulfill Barack Obama’s goal of trying to enact gun control measures “under the radar,” as the president said to proponents of gun control earlier this year.
We admittedly do not have any direct evidence of this allegation, but the circumstantial case made has proven strong enough to have few detractors and raises questions that must be answered. At the very least, the president’s views toward guns was known throughout the executive branch. His administration has fostered an anti-gun atmosphere and created a hostile environment for gun owners and dealers. In that ugly petri dish, a program like Gunrunner could be born. [Pajamas Media, /22/11]
I wonder if Darrell Issa (R-Calif.), Chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee has any direct evidence that U.S. Attorney General Eric and/or the White House is directly involved with the Fast and Furious program -or- if he is just trying to make a circumstantial case strong enough to convince us, the people, that his allegations against Attorney General Eric Holder and/or the White House are true.
This is something we, the people, may never know, unless Issa pushes this issue and it ends up in the courts.
By the way Issa voted for Project Gunrunner, which was funded by government stimulus funds. However, I do not believe he was aware of the fact that the Fast and Furious program was actually a classified program established under Project Gunrunner and therefore, was also funded by government stimulus funds.
- Bmmcelreath
  
  The truth will come out in the pages being denied congress. The rats are filthy and the coverup is in the documents. It’s a joke to hear Carney and all the dems. repeat that Holder gave 7.200 pages, has been to congress 8 times. They forget he’s lied to congress and overlook the fact he hasn’t given the documents requested. What a joke and guess what, opened minded swing voters know a liar when they see one. Holder and Obama have lied more than John Edwards did lied to his widow.
Bmmcelreath

Do you remember the phrase “by any means necessary”? F & F was a way by which Gun Dealers could be vilified as criminals illegally selling firearms to people connected with cartels when it was actually a crime created by Obama Admin. to create anti-gun sentiment in a effort to ban certain or all firearms. Obama could care less if a few boarder agents or Mexican peasants get killed so long as he gets a gun ban, by any means necessary. This is what they are hiding.
Warren

Ms.Napolitano and Mr.Holders Dept.of Social Justice had the slain Agent armed with Bean Bag Gun
Warren

The most cherised right is Free Political Speech.The second is the right to bear arms incase a Tyranny denies this Right.Political Correctness is also used by the Left as a technique to limit said speech.
JP

Congressman Chaffetz has done his best to deflect that the level and intensity of this investigation is not entirely political. I am not convinced. If he wants to do his job as a member on the Committee of Reform then there are plenty of other things that our federal government can reform as a better use of time.

ONPOINT

TODAY

South Texas, The Border And Immigration Reform

Jun 19, 2013

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As the Senate debate over immigration heats up, we go to South Texas, the new front line in the battle over illegal border crossings.

Sir Ken Robinson: Discovering Your Passions

Jun 19, 2013

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Sir Ken Robinson, who gave the most watched TED Talk ever, tells us how to find what really makes us tick, and get the most out of life and work.

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