Presidents Obama & Calderon talk gun control at border; ZERO mention of Fast & Furious

by Chad D. Baus

Despite a year-long Congressional investigation into the BATFE gun-running operation known as Operation "Fast & Furious," which has uncovered proof that the Obama administration's Department of Justice was forcing American gun stores to sell hundreds of firearms to Mexican drug cartels operatives, media who attended a press conference between Barack Obama and Mexican president Felipe Calderon this week failed to ask a single question about the program.

For more than three years, the two men have sought to sell the idea that rights enjoyed by Americans as enumerated by the U.S. Constitution's Second Amendment are to blame for the drug-fueled violence that has plagued Mexico. When their use of manipulated statistics claiming that most of the guns recovered at crime scenes came from America was uncovered, "Fast & Furious" was hatched. The program seems to have been designed to make the statistics true.

From the Associated Press:

In the thick of political contests in both the United States and Mexico, Obama and Mexican President Felipe Calderon traded unusually direct claims about the cause and effect of the drug violence that has consumed a swath of northeastern Mexico. They were cordial and complimentary to one another, but did not hide the degree of worry on both sides about a six-year spasm of violence that has killed more than 47,000 people.

"It can have a deteriorating effect overall on the nature of our relationship," Obama said. "And that's something that we have to pay attention to."

Calderon made a government crackdown on warring drug cartels the hallmark of his six-year term, which expires later this year. His center-right party has seen its election chances fall in the face of a wide perception in Mexico that the crackdown has not worked.

The Mexican presidential election that formally began last week will culminate with elections July 1.

...Obama warned of a possible "spillover effect" on American tourism and American expatriates living in Mexico and bordering nations that also have had problems with drug cartels.

Sounding testy, Calderon remarked that no American "spring-breakers" were harmed in Mexico this year. Mexico is a favorite place for U.S. college students to spend their springtime holiday breaks from school.

The flow of guns, especially assault weapons, from the United States to Mexico sabotages the work of his government in fighting the drug gangs, and the U.S. government has not done enough to stop it, Calderon said.

...He credited Obama with making an effort to reduce the gun traffic, but said Obama faces "internal problems ... from a political point of view." That is a reference to Republican opposition in Congress and wide opposition from Republicans and gun-rights advocates elsewhere to a new assault weapons ban or other curbs on gun sales that feed the Mexican market.

So rather than rightfully placing the blame on Obama for a BATFE program which literally supplied guns to the Mexican cartels, Calderon continued to sing the song that his country's woes are a result of the right to bear arms that Americans enjoy, and to call for passage of more gun control laws in the U.S.

In addition, Calderon reportedly singled out the high number of gun shops along the U.S.-Mexico border, dangling the possibility that there is a deliberate attempt to profit from the Mexican market.

In truth, the high number of gun shops along the border reflects the fact that there alot of Americans living there, and reveal a deliberate attempt to make a profit from the American market!

The AP article begins its conclusion with the following...

Notable by its absence from a post-summit news conference in the Rose Garden was the controversial...

Of course, the most logical thing the AP would note as an elephant in the room at this press conference should have been "Fast & Furious." But alas, as did Calderon and Obama, the White House's willing media accomplices ignored the elephant entirely.

Chad D. Baus is the Buckeye Firearms Association Vice Chairman.