Fast and Furious Mission

On December 1, 2011 it was reported that another drug tunnel was found between Tijuana, Mexico and San Diego, California (1800 feet long). The tunnel that connected warehouses in both cities was equipped with electric rail cars; $53 million in marijuana had been confiscated. December 26 the Mexican army captured the security head of the Sinaloa cartel. January 5, 2012 a Mexican drug cartel kingpin pled guilty in a US court. February 1 Police nabbed a Mexican drug boat just north of Los Angeles, California. February 10 the US warned Americans to stay out of most of Mexico due to the war between police and drug cartels (last year 120 Americans were killed in Mexico). March 22 a drug lord hunted by ATF was discovered to be an FBI informant. July 12 DEA found a major drug tunnel (over 600’ long, 6’ High and 4’ Wide) 50 feet underground in Arizona – Mexico; the tunnel was complete with lighting and ventilation and allowed drugs to flow into the US while cash and guns flow into Mexico. Our efforts with drug cartels will probably be slowed as the newly elected Mexican President said he’ll focus on making their streets safer and work to grow their economy so children won’t want to work for the drug cartels; he’s not as concerned about the drugs coming over the US border.

All drug missions are not successful. On February 2, 2012 it was reported that the family of a slain border patrol agent is suing the Justice Department. Progress on this was kept quiet until June. At this time we hear that border agent Brian Terry was killed in 2010 while on a mission called Fast and Furious that began in 2009. Fast and Furious allowed criminals to buy guns so the government could trace/track Mexican drug cartels but the agents lost track of hundreds and they started showing up at crime scenes. The Justice Department disbanded the operation in 2011 but a Congressional investigation was initiated. On June 9 we heard Fast and Furious will be holding Grand Jury type investigations, using FBI agents and subpoenaing journalist and government officials. During the investigation, we heard that this was the first time the President exerted executive privilege to shield documents from Congress; that every email or communications between officials is not the business of Congress. On June 20 Republicans said the lack of transparency is sickening and using executive privilege to maintain the vow of secrecy is even more sickening. On June 28 the House approved a resolution holding the US Attorney General in criminal contempt of Congress.

On July 9 it’s reported that the FBI is looking for 4 men in the Fast and Furious government mission that killed Border Agent Brian Terry and a reward of $1 million each is being offered. The details of Terry’s operation are now being revealed. On December 14, 2010 at about 11pm Terry and his team were about 10 miles from the Arizona/Mexico border looking for drug runners when an electronic sensor told them that someone was coming their way. It turned out that while the Border Agents were firing bean bags the criminals that rob drug runners were using live bullets. The robbers were using weapons that had been disbursed by the US government to low level gun runners hoping they would lead to cartel leaders. I don’t know what the Agencies’ plans were for tracking the guns but apparently, the gun runners sold the weapons to the highest bidders instead and Terry got killed in the process.

This is not the only failed mission the US government has had. I am not amused by Republicans publicly overreacting to a situation and feel that they did so solely to discredit the President and not for the safety of the people. 

Tomorrow I’ll talk about the Republicans claim that the Obama Administration is exerting too much transparency. They really need to make up their minds or get to work making the line clearer. But, right now I wish they’d spend more time working on job creation.