with ATF Acting Director Kenneth Melson hobbled by the scandal over Operation Fast and Furious and by indications he’s at odds with senior Justice Department officials, many are saying a breakup of the storied agency could just be a matter of time.
“I think something like that is likely to happen,” said Paul Helmke, president of the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence. “Unless they take some action to give it a director, it’s inevitable it’s going to have to get to that stage. It cannot continue the way it’s going now. … Right now, ATF is so weak it’s amazing.”
Christopher Cox, legislative director for the NRA, the agency’s longtime nemesis, also said arguments for shuttering or breaking up ATF are building.
It’s about time. It should have happened after Waco, if not Ruby Ridge.
Wishful thinking. Bureaucracy is power. To fold it into the FBI is not really an elimination. The FBI was part of Waco. They got promotions after burning children alive.
The Valentines day massacre (mobsters killing mobsters) used to cause public indignation. That public sensitivity doesn’t exist any longer.
Even if the public did, they’ve insulated themselves from any kind of meaningful censure. The rot is amazing.
To be sure, the ATF is one of the few Federal agencies I wish to see abolished directly by Presidential executive order rather than defunded and shut down in an orderly manner by Congress, but as Ken says, the article is wishful thinking. The head of the Brady Campaign thinks the ATF is “weak,” huh? They’d probably think it was weak if it arrested ten million people a year and got them detained without trial in camps in Alaska.
Also note the proposals to keep the agency’s functions alive, hidden away in several separate organizations. Great. Also also note the unintentional hilarity of “I’m not sure anybody thinks that’s a good idea, to concentrate that much power in one agency,” as though concentrating that much power in one government is any less dangerous.
And unfortunately, this episode proves that you can, in fact, “have any kind of organization and expect it to run well without some kind of leader.” What has happened to the ATF’s budget and headcount in the five years it hasn’t had “some kind of leader”? Does anybody think it’s actually shrunk?
Finally, not to overlook the obvious, the ATF isn’t the only “successor to Treasury’s Prohibition Unit that … has outlived its usefulness.” There’s at least one successor directly involved in modern-day Prohibition.
Rand,
Somebody mentioned to me that the ATF violated ITAR by wilfully aloowing those guns to walk. You are familiar with ITAR, does that sound possible?
Mike Puckett wrote:
Somebody mentioned to me that the ATF violated ITAR by wilfully aloowing those guns to walk. You are familiar with ITAR, does that sound possible?
Well, ITAR is the International Trafficking in Arms Regulations. Since arms were trafficked across an international border, it would seem to be a Duh-easy question. Unfortunately when lawyers are involved, there are no such things as Duh-easy questions.
Mike
Why is it Republican AGs are evicerated in the press but it is Democrat AGs who kill innocent people?
“Why is it Republican AGs are evicerated in the press but it is Democrat AGs who kill innocent people?”
That’s horridly simple. It’s the same reason people at the bottom of a HS student hierarchy get stomped by jocks at the top of it. Those at the top perceive that they have permission to do so. In the HS case permission is given by administrators who either will not intervene, or make it clear they dislike those being stomped as much as the Jocks on top hate them. In the case of a Dept. of Justice run amok, they perceive that they will have permission from the press, because the press discounts or actively dislikes the same people.
Recurrent public violence in any organized society *requires* at least the perception that no punishment will take place for initiating violence. It is even easier, of course, when those who *can* harm the DoJ personnel agree with their selection of targets, and it is known by all.
Republicans don’t too often have anything like equal permission, except in military activity in a war outside the borders, which we are also engaged in since 2011.
The only issue I would take with Tom Billings’ reply is, I would have said junior high school — but for the jock analogy to work I guess it has to be high school.
Or do they have jocks in middle schools now?
The ATF does have other critically important missions. One of my friends in the DEA related how he and his fellow agents were eating at a local steak house when a bunch of ATF trucks rolled up and agents piled out in their full SWAT tactical raid type gear, took it off, and went in to eat.
After the ATF agents were seated and had ordered, my friend wandered over and said, “You know, we didn’t get a heads up that you’re conducting a raid in the area,” which is normal procedure to make sure other agencies don’t have undercover agents or ongoing investigations that might be compromised.
One of the ATF agents said, “We didn’t think it was necessary. We got a complaint from a farmer who thinks one of the tobacco warehouse’s scales might be rigged, so we’re going in to check its calibration.”
Without the ATF, who will conduct surprise raids to check tobacco scale calibrations, the Bureau of Weights and Measures?
Oh yeah. I guess it would be up to them.
Since the ATF is an agency founded to make sure taxes are collected on alcohol, tobacco, and firearms, and since we now get more taxes from motor fuel, shouldn’t it be expanded into Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Motor Fuel? Then they could raid gas stations or kick in your door if you ordered a siphon hose from an online sting operation, charging you with illegally diverting motor fuel to an undocumented alien so he could refill his weedeater and finish your lawn. Bet you’d serve 5 to 10 in the big house for that one, while the undocumented alien would be asked to smuggle a truckload of assault rifles and rocket launchers to Mexican narco-terrorists in return for dropping charges on the use of illegally obtained unleaded premium in a 2-stroke motor.
“ATF should be a convenience store, not a government agency.”
Holding government officials accountable for their actions? Why, that’s just crazy talk!!
We have a winner, Larry J.
Zowie. Here’s some scary hypocrisy.
Hey, if they want to stem the illicit flow of weapons to Mexico, perhaps the Justice Department should stop selling illicit weapons to Mexican drug cartels. Just a thought.
This release sounds like the right hand doesn’t know what the left hand is doing. Some part of their bureaucracy apparently didn’t get the memo saying their illegal scheme had been blown wide open.
Or it’s part of a plan to muddy the waters… a common lefty tactic.