A Cliff Notes Guide to Fast and Furious

Over at the American Thinker today, Russ Vaughn has the Cliff Notes version of the Fast and Furious scandal, entitled Fast and Furious Falling Apart. On the other hand, for a more encyclopedic treatment, you can read Katie Pavlich's new book Fast and Furious: Barack Obama's Bloodiest Scandal and the Shameless Cover-up. I have not gotten around yet to reading the book length version. Indeed, if it tells the fascinating story of how Mike Vanderboegh and David Codrea caught the scent of the ATF whistle blowers, and hooked them up with Representative Darrell Issa and Senator Chuck Grassley, it should be a good read.  There were times when I thought my fellow bloggers were conducting a cloak and dagger operation.

Vaughn's piece is also a good read, and I highly recommend it to you, gentle reader. Vaughn has produced a number of memorable lines, such as this:

For those who keep a constant wary eye on the left's never-ending war on our 2nd-Amendment right to keep and bear arms, the increasingly fishy smell emanating from Washington led to connecting the dots back to the year-earlier revelations in the liberal media that weapons being used in Mexican crimes were traceable back to American sources more than 90% of the time. That false meme had spread quickly through the major liberal media, along with calls for stricter gun control laws in this country by...guess who! How about our president, our secretary of state, our attorney general, and other notable Democrats, for starters?

The emphasis above is mine. Vaughn continues:

It doesn't require much in the way of deductive powers to conclude that the fish-wrap smell seeping out of Washington probably had to do with Eric Holder's Department of Justice being used to tightly wrap something rotting from the head down. And what could that be? Early proponents of the theory suggesting that if the DoJ's rationale smelled fishy, then perhaps the true reason for F&F was to create justification for more gun control legislation here in this country were looked at as crackpot conspiracists. Even now, most of those Republican members of Congress pursuing this scandal refuse to cite the true purpose of F&F, still referring to it as a bungled federal program. There are exceptions: Florida congressman John Mica speaking on one of the Sunday talk shows this weekend, made clear his opinion that F&F was a sinister and cynical attempt by the Obama administration to undermine the 2nd Amendment. I watched him say it, but Google has no link. Imagine that.

Imagine indeed.

Fast and Furious has been the worst case so far of illegal acts by this administration, though certainly not the only ones. To summarize, a law enforcement unit of the Federal government turned a blind eye to illegal gun sales, and even encouraged them. They failed to interdict these guns, though in many cases they could have done just that. The FBI, who runs the NICS, had to have been at least informed, and may have in some cases allowed a known felon to buy these guns. (Indeed, finding out how far this operation spreads to other agencies besides Justice is a goal of Issa's committee.)  They then conducted an act of war against another sovereign nation which resulted in the deaths of 200 Mexican citizens, at least one Federal agent, and an untold number of people on this side of the border.  When it was discovered that they had done these things, they attempted to cover it up.  Thus, Federal officials are guilty of accessory to murder, at the very least.

Why?  Why would our government break its own laws, and international laws, and risk killing of innocent people?  The goal sought must be a very high priority, something so important that it is worth the peoples' very lives to achieve.  A General officer in the military always has an estimate of casualties any given operation will cost.  He weighs the cost in mens' lives against the tactical or strategic goals to be achieved.  Our General always wants to minimize the loss of men's lives, while achieving the strategic goals, and this will drive the methods used.  Of course, the General is dealing in the lives of men and women who at least recognize that their lives are expendable in a war operation.  But the Obama administration risked the lives of unknowing civilians who had not been informed that their lives were expendable.  So, what was so important?  Personally, my opinion matches that of the Florida congressman John Mica, that the purpose was a "sinister and cynical attempt to undermine the 2nd Amendment."

Vaughn notes that Obama has shown time and again that he is a politician from the "Chicago school"  and that he does things the "Chicago way."  Perhaps.  Certainly, Chicago is starting to look like the murder capitol of the United States, with a murder rate nearly double that of American soldiers stationed in Afganistan.  But that's just fine with Chicago politicians, as long as they get police protection, they don't seem to care about criminals preying on their constituents.

Never lose sight of the real reason why liberals want to confiscate your guns. Liberals assert that government is the protector of all our freedoms, and therefore we need not be concerned with protecting ourselves and our loved ones. The folly of that assertion can be refuted with one word: Chicago. But the true reason for wanting an unarmed public is because such a citizenry is powerless in the face of armed government and therefore compliant. Liberals and Democrats know full well that the key to unrestrained governing is to first disarm the citizenry.