Project Gunrunner/Operation Fast and Furious update

.

Just getting caught up on some Fast and Furious news from over the past week or so.



First off, confirmed: Joe Lieberman is a racist.

Connecticut independent Sen. Joe Lieberman has directed the staff of the Senate Homeland Security and Government Affairs Committee, which he chairs, to examine miscommunication between law enforcement agencies related to the Justice Department’s Operation Fast and Furious.

A spokesperson told The Daily Caller Wednesday that Lieberman “believe[s] that the lack of interagency coordination along the border merits further examination, and as Chairman of the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, he has directed his staff to follow up with the relevant federal agencies on that topic.”

Fast and Furious was a program of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, overseen by Holder’s DOJ. It sent thousands of weapons to Mexican drug cartels via straw purchasers — people who legally purchase guns in the United States with the known intention of illegally trafficking them somewhere else.

At least 300 people in Mexico were killed with Fast and Furious weapons, as was Border Patrol agent Brian Terry. The identities of the Mexican victims are unknown.

(italics, ours)


That's an interesting choice of terms as it very much appears to be quite excellent communications amongst the agencies under the DOJ umbrella that allowed those thousands of guns to be smuggled across the border and placed into the hands of violent Mexican drug cartels. Lieberman's efforts do, however, remove whatever heft of the partisanship and, umm, bigotry charges that have been levied at the House and Senate committees investigating this.

.



And what has that miserable hack that runs the Justice Department been up to lately? Campaigning against illegal firearms, of course?

The number of officers killed in the line of duty jumped 13 percent in 2011 compared with the year before — and U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder condemned the increase as “a devastating and unacceptable trend” that he blamed on illegal firearms.

The number of law enforcement officers killed in the line of duty rose to 173 this year, from 153 in 2010, the National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial Fund announced Wednesday. This year’s figure is 23 percent higher than 122 killed in the line of duty in 2009.

Holder said “too many guns have fallen into the hands of those who are not legally permitted to possess them,” in explaining the increase.

...

“This is a devastating and unacceptable trend. Each of these deaths is a tragic reminder of the threats that law enforcement officers face each day,” Holder in a statement. “I want to assure the family members and loved ones who have mourned the loss of these heroes that we are responding to this year’s increased violence with renewed vigilance and will do everything within our power — and use every tool at our disposal — to keep our police officers safe.”

For much of the past year, one fatality in particular has weighed heavily on Holder’s mind, that of U.S. Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry, whose December 2010 murder sparked interest and public investigations into the Justice Department’s botched Fast and Furious gun-walking program.

(italics, ours)

Again, how it is the miserable hack gets around Washington lugging those basketball-sized stones is a minor miracle in itself.

But we suppose that Holder can play it straight here as the guns ran into Mexico can hardly be considered illegal as Fast and Furious was executed under the full faith and credit of the miserable hack's own department. The DOJ and ATF are here to protect us, right?

And about the death of Agent Brian Terry: obviously not weighing heavily enough as the hack has repeatedly stonewalled and/or otherwise obfuscated and bobbed and weaved through sworn testimony against efforts to get to the bottom of this botched wildly successful American law enforcement gun-running operation.

Holder is doing everything possible to make this a campaign issue for his boss in the coming year.