Starvin Larry

In a Thursday report on a 2011 Phoenix “gang-style shooting” in which a gun from the Operation Fast and Furious “gunwalking” scheme was used, Mail Online repeats unsubstantiated claims that give cover to the administration and mask the government’s intentional uncontrolled release of guns into the criminal underworld. U.S. Political Editor David Martosko tells readers the purpose of the operation was to track the guns.

“[The] Phoenix gang-style shooting in 2013 was carried out with an AK-47 purposely sold to gun-runners under the watchful eye of the ATF,” a preface bullet reads. That much is true, with the reporting problem starting with the second point, claiming “[The] Obama administration tried to track 2,000 guns into Mexico to drug cartels.”

The latter claim is where the ubiquitous administration-serving media narrative falls apart. How does one track guns without making any attempt to do so? That, in turn, leads to the fraudulent, but often-repeated media claim that Fast and Furious was a “botched gun sting.”

That’s despite whistleblower sources claiming in early January, 2011, that guns were being walked “to pad statistics.” It was through these sources that the story was investigated and reported by citizen journalists while “legitimate news media” remained deliberately indifferent, until information coming to light could no longer be contained, prompting many “Authorized Journalists” to manage and spin it instead.

Undaunted by the facts, Martosko soldiers on with the wholly unsubstantiated “tracking claim.

“Fast and Furious was “an ill-fated Obama administration program that tried in vain to track firearms across the Mexican border to drug kingpins,” he asserts. “In vain” implies an exhaustive effort, does it not, as opposed to just letting guns go without even trying, and in fact, ordering agents to allow the guns to “walk” while intentionally keeping the Mexican government in the dark — in itself a violation of both U.S. and Mexican laws?

“’Operation Fast and Furious’ involved straw-buyers who sent 2,000 guns to Mexico (including these weapons) with help from the ATF, which hoped to track the firearms to drug cartels — but failed,” a photo caption accompanying the article reads. All evidence points to the hope being geared toward change — to U.S. gun laws. To date, the administration has had to content itself with requiring additional reporting of multiple rifle sales from Southwest border gun dealers, with the real goal, to justify banning misnamed ‘assault weapons,” thankfully still beyond their grasp.

How one ‘devises’ a program that completely omits the part where weapons are followed from gun stores to cartel leaders, and then expects any other result, is left unexplored by Mail Online and other “legitimate news media” apologists. How anyone can track guns without even attempting to, or botch a sting that has no mark, are questions those who spread such excuses never try to answer.

Perhaps the best analogy for challenging the “failed tracking/botched sting” theory was conceived by St. Louis Gun Rights Examiner Kurt Hofmann.

“We are … being asked to believe that the BATFE’s grand strategy for bringing down the drug cartels … resembled ‘South Park’s’ Underpants Gnomes’ business plan … with the BATFE adaptation going something like this: ‘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,’” he wrote.

To date, no one advancing the “failed/botched” apologia has even attempted to explain “Phase 2,” and provide documentation, or even a plausible hypothesis, on how the government — which according to all evidence kept their own attaché and Mexican law enforcement in the dark — intended to track any guns once they crossed the border.

Except, of course, to recover them at crime scenes after shootouts and deaths had occurred and then point fingers when serial numbers allowed them to be traced back to U.S. gun shops. Not that a public largely relying on “real reporters” from “mainstream” outlets would be likely to know.

http://www.examiner.com/article/daily-mail-fast-and-furious-report-repeats-unsubstantiated-claim?CID=examiner_alerts_article

An Islamic gunman who took Sydney cafe employees and customers hostage is among the three people reported dead after automatic weapon-wielding police using flash grenades stormed the building early Tuesday morning Australian time, Fox News is reporting. Man Haron Monis, an Iranian immigrant charged with the murder of his wife and the sexual assault of another woman, and who waged a campaign against families of fallen soldiers by mailing them letters calling the deceased “murderers,” highlighted both the problems of a country welcoming hostile foreign nationals, as well as the ease with which one armed assailant can victimize multiple unarmed citizens.

Touted as a model for the U.S. to emulate after passing sweeping gun control legislation in 1996, Australia has adopted many of the laws currently existing in some states and being pushed for in the rest. Per GunPolicy.org, a project of the Sydney School of Public Health, which, while decidedly anti-gun, nonetheless provides instructive and useful compilations of gun laws from around the globe, Australian gun laws are “categorized as restrictive.

“In Australia, the right to private gun ownership is not guaranteed by law,” the analysis advises. “[C]ivilians are not allowed to possess automatic and semi-automatic firearms, self-loading and pump action shotguns [and] private possession of handguns (pistols and revolvers) is only permitted subject to stringent conditions.”

In addition to registration and regulation of sales for what is permitted, there are waiting periods, “safe storage” requirements for firearms and ammunition, and transport regulations. Carrying firearms openly or concealed, “in a public place is prohibited without genuine reason. In law, personal protection is not a genuine reason.”

The people with no “genuine reasons” Monis took captive were all unarmed and “law-abiding,” and thus helpless to do anything to protect themselves except wave an Islamic flag when ordered to, wait for men with guns to save them, and hope or pray they would survive. If domestic advocates of citizen disarmament have their way, petitioning U.S. cafes and other businesses to disallow guns on their premises, and further, demanding government pass laws prohibiting them, Americans obeying such edicts could find themselves in the same dilemma as the Sydney hostages.

http://www.examiner.com/article/jihadist-hostage-taker-enabled-by-australian-gun-laws?CID=examiner_alerts_article

Florida law does not provide for open carry of handguns except in limited cases, such as while hunting, camping and fishing. At the heart of the legal issue is prior precedent declaring concealed carry a privilege, Norman’s attorney Eric Friday, who is also lead counsel for the statewide grassroots gun rights group Florida Carry, maintained. With open carry prohibited, there is no legally-recognized right to bear arms, a situation that directly contradicts the U.S. and Florida constitutions.

Among those opposing Norman’s challenge is Artie Williams of Mothers Against Murderers, who says the practice “gives the carrier an intimidation factor.” As prohibited persons may not possess a gun without being in violation of the law, just who lawful gun owners might be intimidating, aside from those intent on victimizing others, is not clear.

The anti-gun group’s website notes it was founded “in memory of … Torrey Donnell Manuel, who lost his life due to a senseless act of violence.” Further explanations on the circumstances of that act are not provided, nor is any further clarifying information apparent from search engine results. Co-founder Angela Williams maintains “she also lost 13 additional family members to gun violence in Palm Beach County, Florida.”

That there may be solutions to prevent similar losses that don’t involve the state depriving law-abiding gun owners of their rights is left unstated. “Gun violence,” without further examination of individual circumstances, is a broad term, and identifying the factors contributing to the cited family losses might shed light on superior alternatives.

For its part, Florida Carry continues to support and promote Norman in his appeal. The group has established a Norman v. State resource page to give background on the case, including providing access to many of the filings, as well as an interesting side trip of sorts explaining how “the Florida Attorney General’s Office filed an extraordinary motion with the Florida Supreme Court attempting to prohibit the Fourth District Court of Appeals from hearing the case.” The page also links to online donation and membership forms so that gun owners can support the group’s legal, legislative, educational and outreach efforts, allowing Florida Carry to continue its work and to expand its influence.