38 Comments

1. Grifter  •  Jun 27, 2012 @7:41 am
   

   Maybe it's half sarcastic?

   I know when I talk to people about a certain industry whose standard practices I find repugnant, I tell them "don't look into it", because I know that it will only be unpleasant…I'm half-kidding, because while I do kind of think they should, I also do believe that it will only be unpleasant and necessitate their overlooking the repugnance or changing their outlook. Maybe he's going for something similar here.

   Or,

   "How long as this been in the fridge? I think I'll eat it."
   "You don't want to know"

2. Stephen  •  Jun 27, 2012 @7:48 am
   

   I think the last 3 paragraphs give it away.

   Think about it: We have allowed weapons to cross the Mexican border and into the hands of criminals for years. Many of these weapons were involved in killing innocent Mexicans. There's nothing very admirable about that. But the truth is, it's very American.

   By allowing guns to infiltrate Mexico's drug cartel, we thought we could trace them up the ladder to the leaders. Take off the head and the body dies. As for the innocent people who lost their lives? Collateral damage. That's the uncomfortable backstory to this scandal. And there are likely other operations like it in our nation's history that we don't even have a clue about.

   And maybe it's better for us not to be so nosy, not to know everything because, to paraphrase the famous line from the movie "A Few Good Men," many of us won't be able to handle the truth.

   I haven't read a lot of his work, but I have heard him on a few podcasts. I don't believe he would support the government hiding things from us. I think he is disgusted with calls from "his side" to sweep it all under the rug.

   Or maybe I'm just projecting.

   Also, the comments on that piece are fairly troubling as well.

3. Frank Prumagio  •  Jun 27, 2012 @8:00 am
   

   Granderson's point has to be taken in context: The United States is by an enormous margin the most racist nation in the history of this planet — the only nation where racism is fundamentally and incurably woven into society, rather than a fading, white-empire-imposed afterthought — and the racism is still getting worse. Rapidly, frighteningly worse. By any objective standards at all — particularly by conservative objective standards — our current President is easily the best we've ever had. He's done more to bridge divides than any president in history. He's the most reasonable, the most conciliatory, the smartest, the most understanding, the least partisan.

   But the hatred of that President from one side of the aisle — the side he's reaching out to, not the side he has disappointed with his constant willingness to compromise — is orders of magnitude greater than any hatred of any president we've ever seen. We just spent eight years watching the left calmly, despairingly refuse to sacrifice their fundamental principles of reason and restraint in their measured criticisms of some of Georged Dumbya Bush's most vicious, sadistic, psychotic imbecile excesses, and now look at the tide of truly insane hatred directed at the heretofore sacrosanct office of the presidency.

   The only possible explanation is racism. When conservatives pour such irrational, terrifying, wild-eyed loathing on a man who they know is doing a great job for them and doing his damnedest to help them out, well, there's only one possible reason for it. It's got to be race. Everything is about race for them. Everything. They are obsessed with race to the point where they don't even have to mention it, any more than a fish mentions water. With the right wing, everything comes back to race, every time.

   In an environment like that, black people have to stick together.

4. Tim  •  Jun 27, 2012 @8:00 am
   

   He's generally a sane columnist, so I have to believe it's his way of going back to the herd to prod them forward unwillingly.

   If you want to run a poll of who thinks it is "well intended sarcasm", I'd vote for sarcasm.

5. C. Ellis  •  Jun 27, 2012 @8:13 am
   

   I read it also and I wasn't feeling like it was especially sarcastic. I like most of his work, but that article made me feel a little queasy.

6. Sean  •  Jun 27, 2012 @8:38 am
   

   I talked to him about this on Twitter, yesterday. He seems to believe what he's saying.

   https://twitter.com/seantmcmanus/status/217695749620760578
   https://twitter.com/seantmcmanus/status/217697848425324544
   https://twitter.com/seantmcmanus/status/217698298784526337
   https://twitter.com/seantmcmanus/status/217701750570885121
   https://twitter.com/seantmcmanus/status/217705334045806593
   https://twitter.com/seantmcmanus/status/217705757595009024
   https://twitter.com/seantmcmanus/status/217709782025515008

7. ParatrooperJJ  •  Jun 27, 2012 @8:47 am
   

   Frank – You've apparently never spent any time in Asian countries have you?

8. Stacey  •  Jun 27, 2012 @8:52 am
   

   From reading his twitter account and his response to Glenn Greenwald he's definitely not kidding. He honestly thinks that the Government should be able to claim that some things are just secret and that's it. I sure as hell don't trust the Government with that sort of power. And I'm about as far from libertarianism as one can get.

9. Dave  •  Jun 27, 2012 @8:56 am
   

   Frank, was that sarcastic? I may need to change the batteries in my sarcasm detector, but you really think the Democratic Party's version of Nixon isn't devisive?

10. Robert White  •  Jun 27, 2012 @9:12 am
    

    Funny thing is…

    I can think of several ways to use the sale of "untraceable guns" to trace drug cartel activity. Hint: Follow the People, and Follow the Money, not "the Guns" per se. Remember that a good confidence game, and proper conman shenanigans never follow the pea in the shell-game.

    I don not believe for a second that the U.S. Government is an innocent actor when it comes to douchebaggery. I kind-of noticed the Bush Era torture thing -and- the Obama era doing-nothing-about-it (while continuing to keep secret prisoners in secret prisons etc) and I knew it was true back when whomever was president, or kink, or whatever back whenever this annual misuse of power happened every other time in every other year going back beyond human memory.

    So as far as what to do about this particular tempest, since we don't know if its in a tea-pot or an ocean, is to do some prying while the actors delay long enough to move their shells.

    But there is a good chance that what is being "covered up" by executive privilege is -not- incompetence but things that would make the USA PATRIOT Act look like libertine forgetfulness and largess. You know things like C.I.A. spying on U.S. Citizens, and N.S.A. warrantless wire-tapping, and more secret imprisonment in secret prisons.

    Obama is probably just not wanting to admit to carrying on the Bush doctrines.

    Or in other words, this is government business as usual.

    The only part that is annoying is the fact that "getting caught is bad" but instead of this being a case of "getting caught" the partisan-crap-amplifier at Fox News has turned this from a real story into a pointing match. And since no -real- media dare take the same position as any Fox hystronic actors Goodwin(ing) (or actually Watergate(ing)) event, no real coverage will now ever really out. So instead of truth or oversight we now have Fox vs World sideshow.

    In truth, invoking executive privilege was an Obama master stroke. It so inflamed Fox that the anti-Fox knee-jerk has happened on cue and the real issues will fade as the spectacle sails beyond the horizon.

11. nlp  •  Jun 27, 2012 @9:22 am
    

    The United States is by an enormous margin the most racist nation in the history of this planet — the only nation where racism is fundamentally and incurably woven into society,

    Get back to me when you've done some field work in India. And while there please pay close attention to the problems of the former 'Untouchable' class, including the skin color. I'd also appreciate it if you paid some attention to apartheid in South Africa.

12. Robert White  •  Jun 27, 2012 @9:36 am
    

    In practical terms you cannot follow one untraceable gun. But if you can engender a few "very large" job-lot purchases of guns you can find the people with the money and inclination to job-lot purchase guns. If you can get the people who match your suspected profile to buy several lots on different occasions then you can dissect their travel and financial activities. You find them with the first sale, you set up your tracking system, then you track them with their second and subsequent sales.

    Think about it. Almost every government knows how to track and disassemble money laundering operations. Cash is more anonymous than "untraceable" guns. Since the guns were paid for, tracing the "untraceable" guns is really tracing the "untraceable" cash.

    The real problem, starting out, is knowing -which- money laundering operations were for "guns going to mexico" as opposed to "drugs coming/going anywhere" or any other criminal enterprise including cash being laundered for its own sake by one-time actors.

    In short, they tracked who they sold the "untraceable" guns too, then waited for one of the "untraceable" guns to be definitely used in one of the crimes somewhere and be noticed for that action.

    At this point the government knows which of the "trails of cash" out of tens of thousands is -known- to -end- in interstitial drug/turf wars in Mexico. This provides exact knowledge of the starting point for one or more transactions.

    Now it can take several years to properly trace and "remediate" a money laundering system.

    So the administration needs to delay the probes and publicity long enough to actually harvest the fruit of the action. Between then and now the administration -needs- the criminals to -believe- the guns are "untraceable" so they don't break up their system. So the "public outcry of incompetence" serves the investigation now that the original secrecy is gone.

    As long as the idiot criminals (criminals are always idiots because they don't actually understand the effort/cost/benefit/value exchange inherent in what they have and do) keep looking at the "untractability" of the guns and forget to consider the eminent traceability of the people and the money, the investigation can keep bearing fruit.

    I could be over-stating the intelligence of the intelligence community, but in this case I don't think I am.

    I know I could do this if I were them, given what we know so far.

13. egd  •  Jun 27, 2012 @9:38 am
    

    I think Frank's comment was sarcasm. Seriously guys.

14. Arclight  •  Jun 27, 2012 @9:46 am
    

    I think LZ was being serious. And I vote Frank was just showing everyone how to recognize subtle sarcasm. "He's the most reasonable, the most conciliatory, the smartest, the most understanding, the least partisan." That level of worship was the clue to me that it wasn't a serious post that happened to be off topic.

15. Matt F.  •  Jun 27, 2012 @10:04 am
    

    I'm not certain that LZ Granderson isn't serious and also isn't at least partly correct.
    It appears that a substantial source of Congress's inability to function stems from the 24 hour news cycle's Eye of Sauron recording everything that come out of every Congressman's mouth. When your every action is subject to post hoc review and will be dredged up, misquoted, and thrown in your face by your subsequent opponents it becomes challenging to speak at all.
    In the present circumstances while the American people are rightly demanding accountability for a operation gone upside-down and sideways perhaps more could be learned from the mistakes if every comment wasn't splayed across CNN and Fox News at the top of the hour.
    This point of view however requires something that Americans are notable lacking, faith that their elected officials will do their jobs right. "Right" of course meaning, "in a manner that comports with each different citizens widely varied morals, opinions (educated or not), and world view" as opposed to "supporting and defending the Constitution and faithfully discharging their duties."
    There is a time and a place for a public hanging but perhaps the halls of Congress should not be a 24 hour gallows.

16. Robert White  •  Jun 27, 2012 @10:14 am
    

    @Matt F. Thing is, people keep saying the operation went upside down and sideways. I've said it here already, and explained it, that this op is probably right on track -except- -for- the media coverage.

    Most people don't know how black-box analysis works. The guns have been fed forward, in parallel through a system of exchange as a "hole current" who's "practical current" is a movement of cash and people. We now know which initiators (initial purchasers of guns) lead to which regions of Mexico. Now it's just a matter of forensic accounting and a few warrantless wiretaps and secret prisons.

    If the beans hadn't already spilled, the op could have gone on for years until the entire root system was laid bare. Now the administration just needs to stall long enough to collect up fruit they can before the criminals purturb their money laundering conduits.

17. Matt F.  •  Jun 27, 2012 @10:54 am
    

    @ Robert White
    You make a good point. Finding a balance between accountability for perceived problems and operational success is important. The 24 hour instant news cycle does little to find that balance, with the need to come up with new headlines every few hours. A little less public knowledge might go a long way, but before the average person will accept that idea they need to have faith that elected officials are engaging in oversight and accountability.

18. Chris R.  •  Jun 27, 2012 @11:48 am
    

    @Matt F, unfortunately the balance I think needs to be left in the public's hands. Any measure to reduce access to criticism and news could be used for nefarious purposes. We are just now getting used to the reality of constant content through the digital age, I believe we as a society will adapt to this. I think everyone in one way or another is experiencing an information burnout. Society can adapt to these changes better then regulation of information. If the information becomes public, there should be public debate.

19. Robert White  •  Jun 27, 2012 @12:06 pm
    

    @Chris R. & @Matt F. Thing is, we already have a system where all sorts of stuff is "Classified" (secret, top secret, etc.) so we already have a system predicated on having a number of relatively anonymous people who decide what should and should not be public.

    In computer terms, someone has to be trusted to be the system administrator because systems don't and cannot administrate themselves. But what do you do, and how do you check, whether your system administrator is doing right by you and yours? This is an initial trust problem. It is universal.

    I know of one project where everybody could replace some key information because everybody knew the password on the account that let them do that. People were constantly losing data becuase someone would lose some data so they would restore things from backup files unilaterally. The project foundered until I came in and took the passwords from everybody including the project manager and his many trusted lieutenants. They screamed for about a week and threatened me and such, but after that week, when people miraculously stopped losing code and data all the time, the screaming stopped.

    Substitute "system" for "government" and you see the exact same set of problems.

    We don't need to each be able to police everyone individually, we need a system to garner and engender trust and then we trust those people.

    I have no idea what such a system would look like, nor what its failure cases would look like, but absent that we need a set of constant tensions, which we have, and call checks and balances, and then we hope for an at least partially rational outcome.

    Sometimes it fails.

    More transparency in most sections would be better, but universal transparency would be a disaster unless that universal transparency was -actually- -universal- and nobody, including you or I or the president or random people all over the world were operating with 100% disclosure.

    Such a system would have to allow for a heck of a lot of people getting away with a heck of a lot. We would have to accept all sorts of interpersonal and sexual and financial and social things that we do not accept today. The idea of Taboo would have to be stricken from our mentality. That is, until we as a species and to the very last man can banish utterly the idea of purity and paragon ideals, we just cannot survive with full accountability at any level.

    I just don't see that happening. So absent that, we are stuck with a constant game of liars poker.

20. Moebius Street  •  Jun 27, 2012 @12:07 pm
    

    @Frank – your comment was absolutely masterful. You skirted the ragged edge of caricature. crossing just enough to show that it was a joke, while doing a great job of demonstrating the way that fundamental attribution error completely drowns out rational discourse in so much partisan discourse.

21. Robert White  •  Jun 27, 2012 @12:38 pm
    

    My last post may seem a little far-reaching so consider:

    Lets say we had this guy who was an absolute rocket scientist when it came to managing the economy. Under his careful guidance it's still not possible to make everyone rich, but nobody is really poor. All the money is going to all the right places. Its like voodoo. Then one day in June there is a huge crash in the financial sector because of a truly unforeseeable event on, say June 27th. And lets say the commodities market is trashed, stocks half die, and bonds rise sharply. And lets say our guy is personally quite heavily favoring bonds in his personal portfolio.

    So everybody yells "Hey Mr Rocket Scientist, why weren't you at the helm? Why didn't you do your magic? Where is my transparency and accountability? And WTF with you making a bunch of money while we all suffered? You set this up you bastard!"

    Well it turns out Mr. Rocket Scientist is also very fond of pooping in diapers and having someone else clean him up. He had been working for three straight months and decided to take one of his comp days and go spend the day with his diaper diddler special-friend. The fact of the case is that the truly unexpected and unforeseeable thing just happened by coincidence while he was all poopy.

    Full disclosure and absolute transparency would reveal the poopfest, obviously.

    Mr. Rocket Scientist is also the person we already know is the best at balancing the economy so he's our best bet, but absent his alibi he isn't going to be allowed to work.

    In -our- world neither disclosure nor secrecy get us Mr. Rocket Scientist back in charge and fully trusted to do his repair work.

    In a full disclosure world, where the diaper thing could -never- be an issue, he'd just say "I was at das-poopinfest, sorry guys" and get to fixing things.

    But -really- in a full-disclosure world, when the crash started, Mr. Rocket Scientist would have been broadcast live to his staff or the world, full diaper and all, as soon as the problems started and the crash would likely have been mitigated without so much as a blink of the eye at the diaper because, um, not to pun, but "shit happens" would be a given of full-disclosure world so nobody would even notice the diaper et al.

    See, privacy and taboo cut all ways for people, and so to organizations and governments made up of people. Full disclosure only works if its -FULL- disclosure all the way to the ugly misshapen bones.

    "Some Disclosure" must be constantly tuned and tweaked because, frankly, the diapers are out there and someone knows about them, but lots of people can only face the day by pretending that no such thing happens, at least not involving anybody of import or use.

    The stock market, and the government, are both "reputation lotteries" and "popularity contests" and as such they are unfixable in the absolute because that's the way humans -demand- it work.

22. Just Plain Brian  •  Jun 27, 2012 @1:20 pm
    

    This isn't about privacy. People aren't trying to get intimate details of what ATF agents do in bed. This is about our employees refusing to disclose the details of the work we pay them for. It's absurd to conflate professional accountability with personal privacy.

23. Mike  •  Jun 27, 2012 @1:41 pm
    

    Nice! "I have not the shadow of the doubt that many of the loudest critics of the government have partisan motives. But if we dismiss criticism of government misbehavior because of partisan motivations, we'll never entertain significant criticism of the government. We'll always have partisanship. We can't let it be an excuse to abandon our obligations as citizens to monitor and criticize the government."

24. Grifter  •  Jun 27, 2012 @1:48 pm
    

    I always start twitching when the "state secrets" and "executive privilege" discussions come up. Never in the Constitution, the first real test of its existence (that I know of…you lawyer folks could point out that I'm wrong, probably) was http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v._Reynolds .

    And they found out later it had been misused.

    Now they want to try to assert it about another monumental cock-up.

    On the one hand, I understand the need for secrecy in general, on the other hand how can there be oversight if the overseer can't see what's happening?

25. DHC  •  Jun 27, 2012 @1:54 pm
    

    I think LZ Granderson is serious. And honestly, I agree with him.

    I think it's important to point out that he's not saying that these people shouldn't be made accountable for the mishaps. Accountability is important. He's also not saying that nothing should be done, or that no action should be taken, he's just saying that there are some things that don't need to be known by the public at large.

    This is true.

    When some things are known by the public at large, other things become very dangerous. Especially for the good guys, when the bad guys secrecy is still pretty secure.

    Justice and fall guys are needed when operations go south, or when bad operations don't work out as they were planned. But that doesn't mean it needs to be publicized to the entire world either. We need to be made aware of what's happening, so we can know what kind of leaders we have, but we there are some details that just endanger us more if they become public access.

26. Dawn  •  Jun 27, 2012 @2:16 pm
    

    Granderson, as well as the rest of the media, is wrong on a pivotal point. This investigation into Fast and Furious has long since stopped being about the operation itself, or even the DOJ's or Obama administration's handling of it, and has become a self-indulgent exploration of whether there has been anything fishy in how they discussed and decided how to respond to the committee's requests for information. Chairman Issa does not even appear to be claiming that they are improperly withholding vital information about the F&F operation, but that there may be something nefarious in how they have provided the information.

    Of course we deserve to have the details of a disastrous operation investigated, this kind of oversight is what (hopefully) prevents such failures in the future. But the focus of the investigation is no longer on the botched operation, but on scoring political points. Issa even admits that he has no evidence of wrongdoing to support his demands for this information. Since when is it proper to demand work product, without any justification other than using it to embarrass and undermine your opponent?

    Please don't be taken in by sleight of hand.

27. Dave  •  Jun 27, 2012 @2:21 pm
    

    "When some things are known by the public at large, other things become very dangerous. Especially for the good guys"
    What good guys? We're talking about people who apparently think aiding in the murder of thousands of Mexicans is acceptable collateral damage for a chance to capture/kill a few drug lords who would likely all be replaced just as quickly as Pablo Escobar was. All these 'good guys' are acomplishing is raising black market prices, moving distribution networks around a bit, burning obscene amounts of tax dollars, making crime more profitable, and getting more people killed. Brilliant strategy.

28. Robert White  •  Jun 27, 2012 @2:28 pm
    

    Again, "Disastrous Operation"? Can someone prove this operation is even flawed beyond apparent misunderstanding?

29. Robert White  •  Jun 27, 2012 @2:37 pm
    

    Note that "aiding in the murder of Mexicans" etc is only true if the action was material aid. Given the practically inexhaustible supply of firearms crossing the boarder, providing a minuscule fraction of same so that the pipeline can have anonymous guns displaced by guns of known origin, so that the pipeline can be disrupted once its key nodes can be identified, isn't "aid" its valid police action.

    We are so used to "blaming guns instead of gunmen" (and the illusion of safety) that we are blind to the possible value of this activity, or indeed any risky activity, that might actually stop key players from carrying on their actions forever.

    This is so penny wise and pound foolish I can barely process it.

30. Robert White  •  Jun 27, 2012 @6:10 pm
    

    Of course it could be a case of lick-spittle incompetence if they -didn't- get the target information.

    Or the news coverage may have aborted the information before they got in with a sufficient bulk purchaser.

    It's the weak as wet tissue justification for public hanging before anything is known that gets my goat.

31. Dawn  •  Jun 28, 2012 @5:17 pm
    

    Robert White, can you pinpoint a way in which F&F wasn't flawed? They wasted time, money, personnel and other resources (that could have been more effectively elsewhere) on an operation that produced no apparent result whatsoever and was ultimately shut down because it was so woefully unsuccessful. They didn't even bother to ensure that they would have the legal authority and necessary support from other agencies to accomplish what they set out to do, and so were generally thwarted even in their least ambitious actions, such as confiscating weapons from obvious low-level bulk buyers. Gross incompetence is the nicest phrase you can use for that. What would you prefer to call it, a resounding success?

32. Firehand  •  Jun 29, 2012 @1:10 pm
    

    Let's see…
    There was no way to trace the firearms in question, either in where the wound up or who got them.
    UNTIL they turned up at crime scenes.
    Which doesn't do squat to lead you to higher-ups, the people in command.
    They made a point of not letting the Mexican government know about the operation; which killed any chance of trying to trace the arms to particular people.
    We've got long-time LE personnel stating flatly that they were PREVENTED from tracking the straw buyers.
    We've got long-time LE personnel stating flatly that they could see no way for this to be a LE operation(as in 'tracing guns to big guys', especially since the big guys would never be near them).
    We have testimony of supervisors being delighted at new reports of walked guns found with dead bodies("Have to break eggs", etc.)
    We've got e-mails showing ATF and DoJ people asking for reports of the above so as to use them to push for more sales reporting/gun control laws.
    And last, if this was a serious, no-BS LE operation in progress, all they had to do was go to Issa and Grassley in confidence and show them the proof; end of problem. Instead they lied, submitted false documents and ignored subpoenas.

    At this point I have to agree with the statement from someone that "The only thing botched in this operation was the coverup."

33. Robert White  •  Jun 29, 2012 @8:42 pm
    

    @Firehand – you are thinking about the problem all wrong.

    Supposed you have a river in Florida and you know its headwaters is an upwelling from a cave. You suspect that one of several places where water is disapearing into the earth is the source for that water. So you go to all those places and you pour different colors of dye into those various waters. If dye comes up on the river you know which feeder(s) lead to the river by comparing the color. All without being able to actually track the water while it passed through the earth.

    Contemplate that. That is a back-box analysis….

    So now, I am the FBI and CIA. I know that there is a flood of firearms crossing out of South Texas and Arizona. I strongly suspect that the guns that are appearing in various mexican criminal events are being sourced from one or more particular cities.

    I get a bunch of guns and I record their serial numbers and then I sell them in known patterns and I keep track of who bought which guns. At first I can only sell a few at a time, but I get a good reputation as a supplier and begin to sell "job lots" of guns. I still record the serial numbers.

    Someone who buys and sells-on one gun is untraceable because $50 bucks just doesn't leave a trail, but someone who buys $9,999 of guns thinks they aren't leaving a trace because it's under the $10,00 reporting limit. But the banking system -does- trace this stuff.

    When the guns work their way "untraced" through the pipeline they start showing up in places.

    So now I plot the places where the guns show up against who bought them. It turns out all the guns that ended up in Provence A were sold to members of a local biker gang, and all the guns that ended up in province B were originally sold to frat-boys for from the local college.

    Now the banking system is a series of blind exchanges, and so is the travel history. We find that the bikers traveled but the frat boys didn't. We look for movements of money that match the "cost+profit-margin" profile of the gun lots that was recorded in the correct time frame(s) involving the known persons and their known associates.

    Lather rinse repeat, and while it can take a year or more to unravel, the certian knowledge of the start and end points of the journey taken by the known guns makes it possible to trace the reverse flow of cash and people.

    In an uninterrupted scenario, e.g. if the news haden't broken, once the best theoretical paths are known, investigators are placed, a sale is made, the transfers are documented and each participant is arrested after the deal is over.

    The guns, being numbered, work as marker die and they DONT NEED TO BE TRACED at each step. They just "tag" their starting points as correct by showing up at the crimes.

    The "addition" of these guns to torrent already passing through the system is beneath the noise floor.

    And since we know, or think we know, that some of the "legal actors" in the Mexican law enforcement system are corrupt, we tell them that we screwed up just like everbody else so that they don't realize that they may have been incriminated. They couldn't have been…

    because the guns are "untraceable"… right…

    I cannot say that this -is- what happened, but this plan is completely workable and would look -exactly- like what we are seeing in the evidence so far.

    The thing to remember is that each time a "lot" of guns moved, a lump of cash ha to build-up, be transferred from buyer to seller, and then be sumpped back into service (laundered) and cash is terribly unwieldy. It leaves a mark when it moves. The system auto-collects those marks. Passing the guns through the system with a known starting point in space and time and a known end-point makes telling the likely from the unlikely relevant cash movements many orders of magnitude more easy.

    So now, with the data already collected, the forensic accountants hit the books to trace the money laundering that was the inverse current of the movement of the guns. At which point you -know- who the "kingpins" are, or at least where they keep and move their money.

    If you've got their money, you've got them.

    It's not that tough or confusing to see that this may be no debacle at all. And it would make the assertion of executive privilege make a heck of a lot of sense. Particularly it would be bad if we have located corrupt mexican federal officers but we are not ready to move on them. So time must be bought.

    And nothing buys time like a media circus.

34. Robert White  •  Jun 29, 2012 @8:53 pm
    

    ASIDE: The -stated- reason that the U.S. Mint no longer prints bills larger than $100 is to make sure that cash is unwieldy in large lots. You don't need a tinfoil hat theory about the little strips and such. The termination of the $1,000 bill etc made sure that you couldn't stuff $100,000 down your pants any more.

    Finding criminals by their guns or their drugs is pointless. It just isn't done. It isn't necessary. We always follow the money. Google up how quickly a successful crack-house chokes to death on effectively un-spendable mountains of $1s and $5s and $20s even.

    We don't need to source the drugs to undo a drug pipeline because the drugs have value so we can find the drugs and workd backward to the source. But since the guns get dumped (thrown away) after use and are dissipated (handed out) before use, we needed to source them so we could find "starting end" of the pipelines and work forward.

35. Firehand  •  Jul 1, 2012 @10:14 am
    

    That theory would mean they'd have to be able to show that 'X' received the guns; when, unless they've been lying or are willing to see the AG held in contempt rather than meet with Issa and Grassley and say "Here's what's going on, here's the documentation", after they watched the guns smuggled they just waited for them to be found at crime scenes. That doesn't exactly link any particular guy to being the end-customer, it just means 'the crooks who committed these murders wound up with those guns.'

    It's possible you're right, but I seriously doubt it. There's too many holes, too much lack of control or knowledge, too many LE personnel flatly saying "This makes no sense as an investigation." There's also that there wasn't a 'flood' of firearms from shops in the US going to the cartels; I think the actual number was about 17%, and that included guns sold by the US to the Mexican government that wound up in cartel hands.

36. Firehand  •  Jul 1, 2012 @11:52 am
    

    "In Fast and Furious, agents for the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives allowed assault guns bought by “straw purchasers” to “walk,” which meant ending surveillance on weapons suspected to be en route to Mexican drug cartels.

    The tactic, which was intended to allow agents to track criminal networks by finding the guns at crime scenes, was condemned after two guns that were part of the operation were found at U.S. Border Patrol agent Brian Terry’s murder scene. "
    If your only way to 'track' the guns is to find them at crime scenes, that doesn't exactly tell you 'who, where' and so forth, does it?
    http://www.rollcall.com/news/darrell_issa_puts_details_of_secret_wiretap_applications_in_congressional-215828-1.html

37. Ajitater  •  Aug 18, 2012 @6:55 am
    

    Frank, absolutely masterful. Guys, please note the contrast of condemnation for racism throughout the letter, with the use of racism as a closing.

    Regarding F&F… I am a firm believer in doing the right thing only in the right way. I think Popehatters in general support that as well. The Bill of Rights contains such a sentiment, and we lament as a community when the offensive is suppressed through expedient (and unconscionably unconstitutional) means. I think F&F is one such effort. The sale of weapons to organizations known to murder law enforcement and civilians is ridiculous on its face. Think of the children, please.

38. Ajitater  •  Aug 18, 2012 @6:59 am
    

    I forgot to say that I heartily agree with Ken that the federal government is not due an expectation of privacy. I'm not sure if he really made that point, to be sure, but it's as diametrical as I can concoct to Mr. Granderson's, so… I think our hearts are together.

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• Jun 29, 2012: "If we dismiss criticism of government misbehavior because of partisan motivations, we'll never entertain significant criticism of the government" - Hit & Run : Reason.com
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