By David Codrea
USA – -(Ammoland.com)- “Part of the plan was to have those weapons bought — this was key — they had to be bought in America, traceably bought in American gun stores,” Rush Limbaugh told listeners to his Monday broadcast. He was speaking about Fast and Furious “gunwalking,” and the reason behind it that has been deliberately obscured by the “mainstream press.”
“Those guns ended up in the hands of Mexican drug cartels,” Limbaugh explained.
“So the way they do it is to try to create a mass hysteria,” he elaborated. “The program backfired because it was discovered.”
Yes, it was, and if any are interested in the early reporting on how that happened, including efforts to get the story noticed by Senate Judiciary, House Oversight, and the media, a little-noticed (and deliberately ignored) documented record exists via the Internet Archive/Wayback Machine. And within the compilation of stories included in that link are reports from early January, 2011, when a whistleblower source claimed exactly what Limbaugh is publicly recognizing now:
Coming next will be more info on what the agents refer to as the Phoenix ATF office ‘walking across’ ARs and AKs to pad their statistics…
Unsurprisingly, “progressives” such as the George Soros-funded “Think Progress” made no mention of this corroborating insider source, instead dismissing such claims as “wild conspiracy theory.” Also unsurprisingly – but disappointingly – the mainstream press has helped mask real motives by directing attention away from them using the ubiquitous “botched gun sting” excuse as the explanation for what went wrong. Go ahead and click on that last link to see for yourself how successful they’ve been at propagating that perception.
What those who employ Alinsky Rule 5 Ridicule, and those who promulgate the ridiculous “botched sting” contrivance fail to account for, is how you can carry out a sting when you have included no mechanism to conduct it in your design. Guns were allowed to be bought by straw purchasers and then allowed to cross the border and disappear without a trace. The only way they would be “found” again would be through crime scene recoveries, meaning oftentimes next to bodies.
Those behind the scheme knew that. They were counting on it. And what does that say about the success of the”progressive” deception machine that those cynically willing to accept hundreds of dead Mexicans (and rising) in order to advance an agenda enjoy overwhelming political support from that demographic?
Colleague Kurt Hofmann came up with a great analogy, inspired by, of all things, the underpants gnomes on “South Park.” Their “business model” was explained in three phases:
Phase 1: Collect underpants.
Phase 2: ?
Phase 3: Profit.
Note Phase 2 is left completely unexplained.
Stupid, right? No more so than the “botched gun sting” misdirection, which Hofmann laid out using the same “logic” the media and all the “Gunwalker” apologists accept as the preferred explanation:
Phase 1: Encourage gun dealers (and sometimes pay them, as confidential informants) to sell guns to known traffickers
Phase 2: ?
Phase 3: Humbly accept plaudits as Mexican drug cartel comes crashing down.
What’s the difference?
It’s gratifying seeing a figure with major reach like Rush Limbaugh helping to spread the truth on this (although the phrase “Welcome to the party, pal” comes to mind).* It would also be gratifying to see activists who know the difference challenge the “botched gun sting” lie whenever the media or some politician trots it out.
Most helpful of all – especially when some “progressive” apparatchik plays the “right wing conspiracy theory” card to try and obfuscate the truth – would be to counter it. That can be done by showing the “padded statistics” allegation came not from “gun bloggers,” not from NRA, not from Republicans with a vendetta against Obama, but from an ATF insider.
It came from one of the same sources that helped bring this government-sanctioned criminal enterprise to light in the first damn place, one who was sick and tired of systemic, unaddressed agency waste, abuse, corruption and fraud.
* UPDATE: It looks like Limbaugh has been consistent on the “gun control” motive behind Fast and Furious for years, so I apologize for my wrong assumption:
So it looks to me like they wanted to put American-bought guns in the hands of Mexican drug cartels in order to outrage the American public so that you, upon hearing of all this mayhem, would finally understand that our government laws are too lax and need to be tightened down. Particularly on these kinds of guns, assault weapons, because this had failed in Congress.
About David Codrea:
David Codrea is the winner of multiple journalist awards for investigating / defending the RKBA and a long-time gun rights advocate who defiantly challenges the folly of citizen disarmament.
In addition to being a field editor/columnist at GUNS Magazine and associate editor for Oath Keepers, he blogs at “The War on Guns: Notes from the Resistance,” and posts on Twitter: @dcodrea and Facebook.