Chapter Three: Origins of a Scandal

Note: 
Now, this little blog of mine is unlike to receive major circulation of any kind. It seems a little odd to work so hard creating posts for my own reading alone. I do enjoy thinking.. the process of churning over information in my mind to help sift the truth out from it somehow.

It seems, however, that mediating on disinformation is not really that worthwhile to me. I should probably makes some notes which should allow me to focus more neatly on the book. I have read the book through once and I'm going through it again. As a source of information, the book is seriously lacking owing to the entirely excessively biased reporting. It seems less a report on Fast and Furious than a pat little package of confirmation bias to be bought, absorbed, and believed to be true by people who are not interested in critically questioning the details.

This brings me to two possibilities.. examine and fact-check every chapter in detail or take a perspective more above the fray. I'm not really seeing any point in picking apart every detail. I will simply assume they are partisan and poorly reasoned. Perhaps I will touch ones that stand out from the crowd, but I'd really rather return this book to the library and be done with it.

I think, I shall press on more quickly...

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In the third chapter, "Origins of a Scandal" the author frames the discussion with the presumption that a scandal is being described. Now, put in historical perspective, the matter was a scandal of a sort. A manufactured scandal created by Republican to harass and hopefully embarrass the President during election campaigning. Though it was certainly an effort at manufacturing a scandal, it did  not eventually work out that way.

Project Gunrunner began during George W. Bush's term in 2005 and was intended to interdict straw purchasers. Operation Wide Receiver began in 2006. It was halted when guns were lost. Those guns apparently walked across the border and would have turned up in crime scenes. The Hernandez case happened in 2007 and the Medrano case in 2008. All occurred under former President George W. Bush. Operation Fast and Furious began in 2009 under President Obama, but it was merely a continuation of the same line of Project Gunrunner.[1] Flawed, yes, but a line of flawed thinking originating from a time and administration before Obama.

In other words, the "scandal" was one that started under Bush and the Republicans tried to pin it on Obama. Now, from what I know thus far of the Operation, I think the department's reasoning should be questioned. There are many factors involved, not the least of which is that these guns are being used by drug cartels in Mexico.

Our American laws and perceived rights are having an affect on people in another Country, Mexico. While the ATF had been criticized for going after relatively unimportant and immanently replaceable straw purchasers and letting the bigger fish swim freely, this line of flawed projects allowed guns to cross into Mexico. This needs to be taken very seriously.

The Scandal is on the NRA. In order for the government to control the export of such arms illegally, it needs some control. The NRA fights against the types of reasonable actions that might help without restricting the rights of gun owners to possess firearms legally. Now, if America were to pay the price for this irresponsibility, that would be somewhat tolerable. But to put in place policies which help arm the criminals of a neighboring country? Really?

But criminals in Mexico find the gun laws there too restrictive. They find it easier to come across the border into America, buy guns, and smuggle them back. They are increasingly armed because we are negligent in our efforts to control guns. We are negligent because the NRA is so strong and opposes the types of regulations we would need in order to control or combat this flow. People die because the NRA is too pig headed to see beyond their own love of firearms.

That is the Origin of this Scandal.