The feds have indicted five individuals for their alleged roles in murdering U.S. border agent Brian Terry with assault weapons supplied to the Mexican drug cartels by the ATF pursuant to the gun walking operation known as Fast and Furious as reported by KPHO. Only one of the suspects is in custody, and the others are at large and believed to be in Mexico.
Last month the U.S. House held Attorney General Eric Holder in contempt for thwarting its investigation into the gun walking scheme which inexplicably had no controls in place by which to track the assault weapons sold to the drug cartels.
In responding to the indictment the family of Brian Terry announced the following in a statement
The Terry family once again asks that the Attorney General and the Department of Justice comply with the request for documents made by the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee so that all Americans can know who approved of the operation in order that those individuals can be held accountable for their decisions. Agent Terry died as a hero protecting this country; he and his family rightly deserved a full and thorough explanation of how Operation Fast and Furious came to be.
Barack Obama's administration supplied the Mexican drug cartels with thousands of high-powered assault weapons pursuant to an operation dubbed Fast and Furious which have killed over 200 people, including border patrol agent Brian Terry, and now in Nixonian-style all the President's men are engaged in a coverup campaign which includes outright lies and obstructionist schemes before the Congressional committee investigating the bloody mess.
Yesterday a clearly exasperated House Oversight Committee was left with no option but to hold Attorney General Eric Holder in contempt after he refused to produce relevant documents to investigators by relying upon the new-found claim of executive privilege.
Even though the Congressional inquiry was commenced more than a year ago on the immediate heels of Brian Terry's murder, the White House now cynically asserts that the search for truth is nothing more than election year politics. Have you no shame, Mr. President? A federal agent was murdered by mob thugs who were armed by your administration, and your only response to the inquiry is a feeble claim of political witchhunt? Of course, the White House never cared about Brian Terry's murder in the first instance so it simply cannot understand that others may be motivated by factors other than politics -- you know, things like justice for the fallen agent and compassion for his family.
Indeed, last November Holder admitted that he did not even bother to muster an apology to the Terry family for their loss, and arrogantly -- and wrongly -- told Congress that "it is not fair . . . to assume that the mistakes that happened in Fast & Furious directly led to the death of Agent Terry."
"Mistakes that happened?" From the start Fast and Furious at the very least was an idiotic operation if not a criminal scheme. Of course, there's always felony stupid which likely explains President Obama's sudden move to block the investigation by dubiously invoking executive privilege over the presumably damning documents.
No wonder the National Border Patrol Council which represents the nation's 17,000 border agents has called for the resignation of Attorney General Eric Holder as reported by Jerry Seper for The Washington Times: "Council President George E. McCubbin III, a 25-year Border Patrol veteran himself, described Mr. Holder's actions in the case as 'a slap in the face to all Border Patrol agents who serve this country,' adding that the attorney general has shown 'an utter failure of leadership at the highest levels of government.'"
When the top law enforcement officer in the country no longer has the confidence of the boots on the ground it's time for him to resign.
The savage violence among cartel rivals in Mexico and Central American countries for control over drug smuggling routes into the United States to supply degenerate addicts and party people is among the top ten underreported stories in 2011 as reported by Nate Rawlings for Time.
Of course, maybe the story is widely ignored because the media has swallowed the lies from the Obama administration that there is no evidence of any spillover violence into the United States, and as long as it's only people in other countries getting killed the self-absorbed hacks who otherwise call themselves journalists -- some of whom are probably cartel customers -- are content to ignore the carnage.
Ironically, more than 200 people on both sides of the border, including U.S. Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry, have been murdered by guns supplied to the Mexican drug cartels by the United States government pursuant to the Fast and Furious operation.
Meanwhile, on Monday morning "the police chief of Saltillo, the capital of the northern Mexican state of Coahuila, and his 11-year-old son were killed by gunmen while driving" in an apparent ambush by a drug cartel as reported by Fox News Latino. Although the weapons used to kill the chief and his boy were assault rifles no word yet on whether they were among the 2,000 weapons supplied by Team Obama.
The border state of Arizona has borne the brunt of the drug cartel spillover violence from Mexico, and now ten of its county sheriffs are calling for President Obama to appoint an independent counsel to investigate the U.S. gun running operation known as Fast and Furious which armed the narco thugs as reported by Dennis Wagner for USA Today:
At a Phoenix news conference, Pinal County Sheriff Paul Babeu said the sting operation, which allowed an estimated 2,000 firearms to reach narcotics cartels in Mexico, was a betrayal that should lead to the removal of Attorney General Eric Holder and possible criminal charges against those responsible. "I believe that this is a much larger scandal than what took place in Watergate," said Babeu, who is president of the Arizona Sheriff's Association.
More than 200 people, including U.S. Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry, have been murdered by guns supplied to the Mexican drug cartels by the United States government pursuant to the Fast and Furious operation.
UPDATE: The editorial page of the New York Post has joined the call for a special prosecutor to investigate the Fast & Furious operation: "Two things to know about Attorney General Eric Holder: He lied to the American people -- under oath, before Congress -- and thus is unfit to investigate allegations of criminal negligence in the Justice Department."
Meanwhile, forty high-powered assault weapons from the Fast & Furious operation recently were found in the home of a reputed enforcer for the Sinaloa cartel as reported by Richard A. Serrano for the Los Angeles Times: "'These Fast and Furious guns were going to Sinaloans, and they are killing everyone down there,' said one knowledgeable U.S. government source, who asked for anonymity because of the ongoing investigations."
This new disclosure is sure to fuel further speculation that the gun-running program was a CIA plot to arm the Sinaloa cartel in order to defeat the insurgency-minded Los Zetas in Mexico. After all, if the intent of Fast & Furious was to track guns as explained by the U.S. government then why weren't tracking devices installed on the guns? There simply was no means by which to trace the guns which purportedly was the entire point of the program, and their subsequent recovery often has been made only at crime scenes littered with corpses.
Bonanno family ex-boss and former beauty salon owner Vincent "Vinny Gorgeous" Basciano is going to be fabulously attired at taxpayers' expense for his upcoming racketeering trial involving the murder of Randolph Pizzolo due to an "unusual order" by a federal judge which directs "prison officials to make available to the mobster a selection of five coordinated business outfits each day" as reported by Mitchel Maddux for the New York Post: "'The court now orders that the [federal Manhattan detention center] accept up to five sets of clothing, including but not limited to undershirts, socks, shoes, dress shirts, suit pants and suit jackets, be made available to Basciano prior to each court date in this case,' Judge Nicholas Garaufis wrote."
Maddux aptly notes that "most defendants are lucky if they have a single suit arranged by their lawyers." But of course, some defendants -- such as mob bosses -- are more equal than others. After all, how many black defendants from street gangs are provided with a natty taxpayer-funded wardrobe for their trials?
Vinny Gorgeous already is serving a life sentence without parole in connection with the murder of Frank Santoro, and he faces the death penalty if convicted on the latest charges. Last May Judge Garaufis --former counsel to Queens Borough President Claire Shulman -- took the unusual move in asking the feds to reconsider their quest for ultimate justice citing concern for the public purse as then reported by John Marzulli for the Daily News: "'To date, Basciano's defense has required the expenditure of over $3 million of public funds for legal fees and ancillary expenses,' Garaufis wrote to U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder. 'The possibility of a death sentence ensures that these costs will grow substantially.'" However, Holder was not moved, and in October "ordered federal prosecutors to proceed full steam ahead for death by lethal injection" as then reported by John Marzulli for the Daily News.
Of course, as a native New Yorker, Holder knows the awful truth about the Mafia, and he understands that the only good mobster is a dead mobster. Earlier this month the U.S. Attorney General "ordered prosecutors to seek the death penalty against" reputed former Colombo boss Joel "Joe Waverly" Cacace for allegedly ordering the 1997 murder of NYPD officer Ralph Dols "after the cop married his ex-wife" as reported by John Marzulli for the Daily News.
Holder may be the greatest mob buster in the nation's top law enforcement position since Robert F. Kennedy.
