‘Operation Wide Receiver’: The Bush Administration Had Its Very Own ATF ‘Gun Walking’ Scandal

[DreamSmoker]

What’s also fascinating about the documents turned over to investigators is that they reference a little-known ATF operation called “Operation Wide Receiver”, which just like “Fast and Furious,” let guns “walk” to Mexico.

The operation, run by ATF’s Tucson office and the U.S. Attorney for Arizona, started in 2006 — when George W. Bush’s Attorney General Alberto Gonzales was running the show — and ran until the end of 2007. No charges were filed.

Fast forward to 2009, when the Obama administration took over the Justice Department. The former Gang Unit inside DOJ’s Criminal Division (it later merged with the Organized Crime and Racketeering Section) reviewed the case for possible prosecution. At that time, a federal prosecutor in the unit “learned the ATF Arizona had permitted guns to be transferred to suspected gun traffickers and had not interdicted them,” according to a DOJ official.

http://tpmmuckraker.talkingpointsmemo.com/2011/10/wide_receiver_the_bush_administration_had_its_very_own_atf_gun_walking_scandal.php

[Politicalboi]

1. Oh but we're

Looking FORWARD now.

[MrDiaz]

2. yes but

it was wrong then, and is WRONG now. You are implying that because BUSH did it then OBAMA should be able to do it. The difference is that if we knew about it back then we would of been outraged, and now the majority are defending OBAMA on this. It is absolutely absurd!

[benld74]

3. Implying NOTHING of the sort, get the facts straight from the article

if you even read it my friend
Whistlblowers came out in 2011, based upo evidence from Bush administration.
Incoming head of DOJ got 'briefed' on the matter he did not study it or his doctoral
The actual tactics of the operation being performed were not discussed.
Finally there is NO PROOF, Holder even knew of said tactics when GOP says he did.
NONE

[TBMASE]

4. There is no reason not to let the facts come out

none whatsoever. Holder and Obama should be happy to have this all become public instead of having it sealed up and hidden from public scrutiny.
If there's evidence that Holder knew, he should be gone. This whole thing stinks

[sofa king]

9. Same sort of program, same place... same people?

Care to place a bet on whether or not some of the same people were involved in both?

Because if that happened, the Obama administration may be guilty of lack of proper oversight by failing to find a leftover Bush scandal, but the Bush administration is equally culpable and we get to ask how high at the top the idea was known and we get to determine whether or not the scandal was a manufactured operation deliberately created by Bush holdovers.

Don't get us wrong--I am sure most of us here are outraged, but our outrage is properly focused on the people who are trying to get political traction out of this story. It is further outrageous because dirt from the Bush administration is still, four years later, the best weapon the Republicans have against President Obama.

[liberalnationalist]

5. OPERATION WIDE RECIEVER?

YEAH....when bush bent the country over and told us to "wide receive"

and now Raw Money's long con....what a joke America has become...

if America puts Raw Money in...we might as well just bend over.

[underpants]

6. That has been the elephant in the room and I have seen it barely mentioned by the MSM

CBS news mentioned it in paragraph #15 in one article that I read...that's about it.

[hack89]

7. Which makes “Fast and Furious” even more inexplicable

"it was a total disaster the first time we did it so let's do it again."?

[bemildred]

8. I think it has the great advantage of being relatively safe.

Messing with narcotrafficantes directly can be most dangerous.

[hack89]

10. But having lost track of the weapons the first time

you would think they would have found a better way to track them once they left US soil.