Total Firearms

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08/02/2012

INGHAM COUNTY
SHERIFF
GENE L. WRIGGELSWORTH

I have had the pleasure of working with Stuart Goodrich for many years. During that time Stuart has worked very hard to make our co
mmunity not only safe but an inviting and attractive place to raise our families. He has a commitment to public safety and education that will serve this community for many years. His years on the Board of Education with the Holt Public Schools and the Ingham Intermediate School district as well as a strong commitment to providing a strong law enforcement commitment to this community serve as great examples. Stuart is the person who came up with the H.O.L.T. Scholarship program, insuring children's educational futures! His commitment to continue growth in the Township I believe is best
demonstrated by our communities many new subdivisions and businesses. We are fortunate to have Stuart Goodrich as supervisor and I strongly support his re-election!
Photo: INGHAM COUNTY SHERIFF GENE L. WRIGGELSWORTH I have had the pleasure of working with Stuart Goodrich for many years. During that time Stuart has worked very hard to make our community not only safe but an inviting and attractive place to raise our families. He has a commitment to public safety and education that will serve this community for many years. His years on the Board of Education with the Holt Public Schools and the Ingham Intermediate School district as well as a strong commitment to providing a strong law enforcement commitment to this community serve as great examples. Stuart is the person who came up with the H.O.L.T. Scholarship program, insuring children's educational futures! His commitment to continue growth in the Township I believe is best demonstrated by our communities many new subdivisions and businesses. We are fortunate to have Stuart Goodrich as supervisor and I strongly support his re-election!

07/19/2012

Can the U.N. Grab Americans’ Guns?

For much of the past two weeks, I’ve been attending the U.N.’s Arms Trade Treaty conference in New York and blogging on the craziness of Turtle Bay. A number of comments on my blogs—and many external commentators—have raised the question of whether the ATT is, pure and simple, a “gun grab” treaty.

Let’s start with three basic points:

No external power, and certainly not the U.N., can disarm U.S. citizens or deprive us of our Second Amendment rights by force. If there is a Second Amendment problem, it comes from the actions of U.S. authorities.
The U.N. and many of its member states are hostile to the private ownership of fi****ms.
The U.S. is exceptional: It is one of the few nations that has a constitutional provision akin to the Second Amendment.

Thus, the default U.N. tendency—partly out of malevolence, partly out of ignorance—is to act in ways contrary to the Second Amendment, and the fundamental job of the U.S. at the U.N. is to try to stop bad things from happening. The alternative of completely quitting the entire U.N. is appealing but unwise, because the U.N. would keep doing things that would affect the U.S. even if we were not in it.

The U.N. is aware of the political dangers of appearing to stomp openly on the Second Amendment. It uses code words; it runs closed meetings—a veteran of the process tells me that meetings were normally open until the National Rifle Association began showing up at them—and, above all, it plays a long game. A big problem with talking about the ATT as a “gun grab” treaty is that the U.N. works by taking slices: when it comes to the U.N., being outraged by one development is no substitute for focusing on how the slices pile up over time.

I don’t give much too much credit to the U.S. for stating as a red line that it will uphold the Second Amendment, because that raises the question of what relevant activities are (as the State Department puts it in its red line) “permitted by law or protected by the U.S. Constitution.” Simply backing the Second Amendment is good, but it is better to spell out—as Senator Jerry Moran (R–KS) did at Heritage recently- exactly what rights and activities you believe the Second Amendment protects. Only in that way does a promise to uphold the Second Amendment carry the full weight that it deserves.

So what are the domestic concerns posed by the ATT? Four are important.

Transfer requirements. First, there are specific textual requirements. The most recent draft text states, for example, that the ATT will apply to “all international transfers of conventional arms” but then goes on to define “international transfers” as “the transfer of title or control over the conventional arms.”

Does this mean that any transfers, including domestic ones, count as international and are thus subject to the treaty’s provisions? There are similar concerns related to the potential reporting requirements of the treaty and thus to the possible creation of a U.N.-based gun registry. If it is to be true to its published red lines, the U.S. cannot accept any of this.

International business. Second, most major U.S. arms manufacturers have an international financing, insurance, and parts and components chain. The ATT could become a means for foreign countries to pressure U.S. firms to exit the market, reducing the ability of Americans to make effective use of their fi****ms rights.
Further review of the rules. This is not the end of the process. The ATT will be elaborated at review conferences, where the U.S. goal is to develop “best practices” for its implementation. Similarly, if President Obama were to sign the ATT but not submit it to the Senate for ratification, the U.S. would hold itself obligated to “refrain from acts which would defeat the object and purpose” of the ATT.
Constitutional interpretation. Finally, the ATT is part of a process that will inspire judges and legal theorists who believe that the Constitution needs to be reinterpreted in light of transnational norms. This is the most important problem of all, though it is broader than the ATT.

Just because the ATT is not a “gun grab” treaty does not mean it raises no domestic concerns: “Gun grabs” are less plausible than “death by a thousand cuts.” On the other hand, the ATT should raise concerns beyond the Second Amendment. Representative Mike Kelly (R–PA) recently led 130 of his colleagues in expressing a range of concerns about the ATT to the Administration.

It makes sense to balance legitimate expressions of concern for the Second Amendment with concerns on economic, foreign policy, and national security grounds. There’s enough to dislike about the ATT to keep everyone busy.

07/18/2012

Shoot That Old-Timer! How to Clean and Shoot Old Rifles

Nope, I’m not talkin’ about puttin’ Grandpa or Uncle Fred down. What I am talking about is pulling that old military bolt-action rifle you picked up years ago out from the back of your gun vault and using it.

In most cases, you don’t want to just grab the gun and some ammo and head for the range. An old military rifle needs to be carefully inspected and prepared before loading up.

Take It Apart
Once you’ve made sure the rifle is unloaded, you’ll need to take it apart. It’s not enough to just pull the bolt out of the receiver. The degree and type of care some of these old rifles received varied from fantastic to none. Also, many of these rifles were literally dipped in various types of preservative when they were initially stored. While the outside might have been wiped down when they were sold, the insides may still be filled with hardened oil or grease.

If you’re not sure how to disassemble your rifle, bring it in and we'll take care of it for you.

Clean and Inspect It
It’s important to disassemble your rifle for thorough cleaning, and it also gives you an opportunity to check for damage that might otherwise go undetected. For example, you need to check the stock carefully for cracks or damage within the receiver inletting. The area behind the recoil lug is especially prone to damage. If you do find damage, you’ll want to have it repaired before shooting.

Clean the barrel carefully to remove storage grease as well as any fouling. The soldiers using these rifles didn’t have access to modern solvents and cleaners, so don’t be surprised if once the fouling is removed the bore appears a bit rougher than anticipated. I’ve seen more than one barrel where rust pits were actually filled with fouling and gave the appearance of a relatively smooth bore.

Another important area to check is the inside of the bolt. Many times you’ll find the bolt packed with thick grease, which can slow or even prevent movement of the striker or firing pin. All of that grease and gunk must be removed. I’ve found Birchwood Casey’s aerosol Gun Scrubber to be ideal for cleaning out hard-to-reach areas like this.

While it’s rare, you’ll sometimes discover the striker or firing pin spring has collapsed or compressed with age and use. If this is the case, replacement springs for many older rifles are available from outfits such as Wolff Spring Co., Numrich Gun Parts, and Brownells.

Check the condition of the tip of the firing pin. If it’s pitted, rough, or damaged, then you might need to replace it or carefully polish it. The tip of the firing pin should have a smooth, rounded surface. For most older military rifles, the firing pin tip should not project from the face of the bolt more than about 0.065 inch. Excessive protrusion along with a rough firing pin tip can lead to pierced primers and a dangerous release of gas into the action.

Check the Headspace
Many military rifles were built with generous headspace to allow for the use of dirty or corroded ammo; consequently, older rifles have often been improperly labeled as unsafe due to excessive headspace. Part of the problem relates to the fact that military headspace standards and gauges are often not the same as those normally used with civilian fi****ms. Many gunsmiths have only standard civilian Go and No-Go headspace gauges. I have a set of British military .303 gauges made in 1953, and with this set the No-Go is 0.010 inch larger than the Go gauge. At the same time, the current SAAMI standard for the civilian .303 chamber has the maximum, or No-Go gauge, length only 0.007 inch beyond the Go (minimum). This is just one example of the difference you may encounter between civilian and military gauges.

In the absence of military gauges, you can at least get a general idea of the relative headspace of a rifle. First, completely disassemble and clean the bolt. It’s important for both safety and accuracy that the bolt be completely stripped with the firing pin removed. Next clean the chamber. Then select four or five samples of the ammunition you plan on using and, in turn, place each round in the chamber and then place a small piece of brass or steel shim stock between the case head and the face of the bolt. With the shim stock in place, carefully close the stripped bolt. By varying the thickness of the shim and using several different rounds, you can get a feel for the amount of space between the case head and the boltface. For our purposes, this is the relative headspace for that rifle with that ammunition. Generally, if it’s not more than 0.010 inch, the headspace will be adequate for the rifle with that specific ammunition.

Use Good Ammunition
Speaking of ammunition, one of the reasons these older rifles often fail to shoot well is the ammo. If you want to get good accuracy, you have to use good ammunition. Using old military-surplus ammo of unknown origin and age picked up at the local gun show will seldom result in optimal accuracy. The best commercial ammo I’ve found is the new Hornady Vintage Match ammo that’s designed and loaded specifically for these older rifles. And with the Hornady ammo, you’ll never have to worry about whether or not the ammo is corrosive and could damage the bore.

While this is not all that could be done to check out and prepare these old rifles, this should get you headed in the right direction. As always, if you run into a problem or have questions about the safety of your rifle, take it to a knowledgeable, competent gunsmith. These old rifles are just too much fun to not shoot and enjoy.

07/18/2012

"No free man shall ever be debarred the use of arms. The strongest reason for the people to retain the right to keep and bear arms is, as a last resort, to protect themselves against tyranny in government." - Thomas Jefferson

07/15/2012

Gun case raises firearm law concerns

Two of the jurors who acquitted Sean Michael Combs on a gun-carrying charge Thursday believe Michigan lawmakers need to tighten up state regulations on fi****ms.

“The law needs to be revisited,” said the Rev. Julius Del Pino, pastor of St. Luke's Methodist Church in Rochester Hills. “We no longer live in the Wild West. This is the 21st century. With all the issues of violence, not only in this state but across the country, we can do a better job in terms of ensuring the safety of people.”

The reverend was one of seven jurors who acquitted Combs on two misdemeanor counts stemming from his April 13 arrest in downtown Birmingham, where he was taken into custody for walking around with a loaded rifle strapped to his back.

Michigan is an open carry state that does not require a person to produce ID when stopped by the police. In this case, however, the three officers involved in the arrest each testified they wanted to see some ID from Combs because he did not appear to be 18, the legal age to openly carry a firearm.

When he refused to produce ID, they arrested him. He was charged with brandishing a firearm in public, disturbing the peace and obstructing a police officer. Judge Marc Barron of the 48th District Court dismissed the third charge on a lack of evidence.

Juror Ed Kickham, a real estate attorney who lives in Bloomfield Township, said the issue over identification needs to be addressed.

“I think there's a hole in the statute,” he said. “To me, I think the legislature needs to couple this open carry law with a requirement that people show ID when they're asked to show it. We have such laws for drinking or for getting a driver's license. I think if you're going to carry a gun around, it seems reasonable that you should have to identify yourself if there's a requirement that you have to be 18.”

Combs just graduated high school in June and had received the long gun — a vintage 1942 M1 Garand .30 caliber combat rifle — as a gift from one of his brothers on his 18th birthday.

In his testimony, Combs said he decided to walk around with the rifle to exercise his civil rights.

“I was just exercising my rights,” he testified. “Freedom of expression, freedom of speech.”

Del Pino and Kickham both said they thought Combs used poor judgment — but he didn't break the law.

“I wouldn't do it,” said Del Pino. “But based on how the law is now written by the state legislature, he did not break the law.”

After the verdict, defense lawyer Jim Makowski said the prosecutor and police failed to make the distinction between openly carrying a firearm and brandishing a firearm, which is prohibited in Michigan.

“Brandishing is not open carry and open carry is not brandishing,” Makowski said. There is a distinction and the Birmingham police tried to break that distinction — and the jury saw that.”

The case sparked national attention over gun rights — Combs was even invited to appear on The Today Show, which he declined.

Kickham said he thought the police acted appropriately in handling the situation.

“I felt the police behaved perfectly reasonable and I think their testimony was accurate,” he said. “But I don't believe what they described rose to being a breach of the peace or brandishing — those were the things we were charged with deciding.”

07/14/2012

Hillary’s Small Arms Treaty Swindle

About every twenty-fifth message in my Inbox concerns the efforts of Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to impose, on every American she claims to represent, a treaty written by and for the United Nations that would result in the end of private fi****ms ownership in this country.

Smart money has it that Hillary was appointed Secretary of State in the first place for no other reason than to keep her out of Barack Obama’s administrative hair — just before he took over foreign affairs – so she had to find something else to do with her spare time.

Hillary and her Yoonie goblins obviously agree with her husband that the Founding Fathers “gave” us too many rights and now maybe some of them need to be taken “back“. They think they’re being clever – a common failing among critters toting diplomas from overrated Ivy League colleges -- having found an end-run around the Second Amendment that has caused them so much heartache throughout the past several decades.

Under Article 6, Section 2 of the United States Constitution, they reason – to the extent that reason’s involved -- a treaty possesses equal authority to any American law, including the Constitution itself. The proposed U.N. small arms treaty would nullify the Second Amendment. Shamefully, there are lot of people and organizations, nominally on “our side” making money – or political hay – from these circumstances.

But here’s what the original document has to say:

This Constitution, and the Laws of the United States which shall be made in Pursuance thereof; and all Treaties made, or which shall be made, under the Authority of the United States, shall be the supreme Law of the Land; and the Judges in every State shall be bound thereby, any Thing in the Constitution or Laws of any State to the Contrary notwithstanding.

At first, it looks like Hillary and her U.N. goons are pretty much correct. ” … all Treaties made … shall be the supreme Law of the Land … “

Not so much, actually.

This is the point where I should tell you that I’m not a lawyer. However, unlike a lawyer or two I know (and so do you), I can read and think.

Lawyers are especially fond of grandly informing you that the rights you believed the Constitution guaranteed you are not quite what you always thought they were — because, after all, you’re not a lawyer.

“But come,” as the late President Lyndon Baines Johnson used to put it, “let us reason together”. (I love quoting LBJ to support any position he bitterly opposed; I figure if we could wire his coffin up while it was spinning, we could light the lights in a couple of small cities.)

As the victim disarmament crowd is fond of pointing out, “This Constitution, and the Laws of the United States … and all Treaties made, or which shall be made … “ are of equivalent authority under Article 6, Section 2. But there is a notable, if unnoted, exception: amendments.

What is the essential nature of an amendment? An amendment, by its very passage, supercedes and takes precedence over the provisions of whatever document it happens to be amending. That is exactly what amendments are for; that is exactly why people write and pass them. And that is exactly what makes the Bill of Rights — the first ten amendments to the U. S. Constitution — “the supremest Law of the Land”.

Accordingly, the Second Amendment, by its nature as an amendment, supercedes and takes precedence over the rest of the Constitution, every other law on the American books (including every gun law, making them all illegal) and any treaty ever signed or unsigned, ratified or unratified.

Q., as the saying goes, E.D.

Even if the Bill of Rights were only equivalent to other laws and treaties, then ratifying the U.N. weapons treaty — which was intended from the outset to spare international thugs by disarming individuals fighting against their own oppressive governments — would not nullify the Second Amendment. It would only mean we have two laws of equal authority that contradict one another. But don’t worry, that isn’t the case, the Bill of Rights, and the Second Amendment along with it, is tops.

Trust me….I’m not a lawyer.

Not that it would help much if I were. On more than one occasion, I’ve heard lawyers (I think the first was Don Kates, or maybe Gary Kleck) admit that their formal schooling in the Second Amendment – an embarrassment to the legal establishment -- was sketchy at best and that interested laymen usually know more about Second Amendment case law.

And lawyers, especially those who get kicked upstairs by their colleagues to become judges, are often wrong. Their track record, especially on matters related to the Bill of Rights, isn’t anything to you or I would want to brag about. Their “body of law”, is a rickety contraption of lousy reasoning, outright corruption, blatant lies, and contradictions.

If you’re in any doubt at all, ask Dred Scott (you’ll need a Ouija Board) whose status as somebody else’s property was confirmed by the United States Supreme Court. And it’s important to remember that although the court made the ruling, it was lawyers who brought the arguments.

Ask the eleven states (especially Texas) whose legal and natural right to withdraw from a “voluntary” association was illegally suppressed by the Lincoln Administration, at the cost of 620,000 lives.

Ask the millions later drafted into military slavery because the court, in the 1890s, absurdly claimed that – although amendments by their nature supercede the document being amended – the government’s power to “raise an army” somehow takes precedence over the crystalline mandate of the Thirteenth Amendment, explicitly forbidding involuntary servitude.

Ask the millions more whose lives were stunted and distorted by policies of racial segregation that were long upheld by the courts at every level, even though they clearly violated many provisions of the Constitution.

Or ask the legions of falsely imprisoned victims of the Supreme Court’s flawed ruling in U.S. v. Miller (1939) in which the judges held that it was just peachy to outlaw “sawed-off shotguns” because they have no military application (which is the perfect opposite of today’s hoplophobic contention that a weapon’s potential military application somehow makes it illegitimate) clearly demonstrating the court’s abysmal ignorance of close combat in trench warfare – only 20 years after a World War of which most of them should have been vets – never mind the very purpose of the Second Amendment, or the way that they consistently ignore the fact that whenever the Constitution, in the parlance of its times, mentions “the people“, it means the individual.

Then again, the Supreme Court (any court, for that matter) is part of the government, and as the great teacher and philosopher Robert LeFevre pointed out, it is the government that writes their paychecks. Thus any part that they may take in disputes concerning government power versus individual rights represents a blatant conflict of interest.

Furthermore, if “the right of the people to keep and bear arms” is truly “necessary to the security of a free state”, as the Second Amendment implies, then any attempt – legislatively or otherwise – to deprive Americans of their weapons constitutes an offer of aid and comfort to every enemy America has, and the charge for doing that is treason.

Aaron Zelman taught us that, historically, mass disarmament of the kind Hillary Clinton and the U.N. advocate is almost always a prelude to genocide. No matter who wins the next election – or any other – we all have a lot of work to do, not just to prevent that kind of mass murder, but to make this the kind of country we always thought it was. As we work, it will be important to remember that we are the goodguys — the law belongs to us. They are the badguys, the breakers of the law.

If I’m wrong, show me where; show me how. Maybe somebody ought to send this to Judge Napolitano and ask him his opinion. As I have freely admitted all along, I’m not a lawyer. But I can read and I can think.

And what I think is this: that if justice and the rule of law still mean anything at all in this poor, sad, battered land of ours, and if logic still prevails in the universe, then, at the very least, nobody can nullify the second article of the Bill of Rights — or any Constitutional amendment – simply by passing a law or signing a treaty.

Somebody tell Hillary.

07/11/2012

"There's been a tendency, on the part of this administration, to try to hide behind executive privilege every time there's something a little shaky that's taking place." - Barrack H. Obama

Boy is that the pot calling the kettle African American what?

07/11/2012

Obama: Anti-Founders Debt-Accumulating Spendthrift (Part 1 of 2)
By Chuck Norris

In 2007, when I began writing my New York Times best-seller “Black Belt Patriotism,” unemployment was less than 5 percent; the annual federal budget was about $2.9 trillion; the federal deficit was $161 billion; and the national debt was $9 trillion.

Today unemployment is stuck at 8.2 percent; the federal budget is $3.8 trillion; the national deficit is $1.3 trillion; and the national debt quickly is approaching a staggering $16 trillion.

And to add insult to injury, our vassalage to other countries deepens as they bankroll increasing amounts of U.S. debt, and more than 50 percent of our public debt is held by private investors in foreign lands.

Last week, the International Business Times reported: “China overtook Japan as the largest holder of U.S. national debt in 2009. As of December (the most recent data available), it held about 23.1 percent, or $1.15 trillion, of all foreign investment in U.S. privately held federal debt, according to a newly released report by the Congressional Budget Office, or CBO. … Without monetary policy change, the CBO warned in its 2012 Long-Term Budget Outlook on June 5, the U.S. federal debt could be twice the size of the U.S. gross domestic product by 2037.”

The national debt is not merely the result of excessive spending; it is also the result of revenues not being high enough to pay for government outlays. In other words, while the feds have spent trillions of dollars bailing out everyone from automotive businesses to zebra-loving environmental companies, they have done virtually nothing to build up Main Street business productivity. (Disturbingly, just a few days ago, Vice President Joe Biden again called for more government spending.)

When the receipts don’t cover the outlays, it should be a sign that the U.S. government is in trouble, but that’s just another typical day of federal government operation. When the federal government wastes more than $100 million a year on minting pennies, which cost 2.41 cents each to make, and nickels, which cost 11.18 cents each, it should be the first to recognize that it runs the worst business in the world; but it is the last to admit it. (Between 2006 and 2011, the government’s production of pennies and nickels is estimated to have generated losses of nearly $360 million.)

In 2008, the country elected Barack Obama to clean up Washington and lead the economic restoration of our country based upon his following campaign promises:

“Today I’m pledging to cut the deficit we inherited in half by the end of my first term in office.” (Spoken at the opening of the fiscal responsibility summit on Feb. 23, 2009.)
“We will launch a sweeping effort to root out waste, inefficiency and unnecessary spending in our government, and every American will be able to see how and where we spend taxpayer dollars by going to a new website called recovery.gov.” (Spoken in a speech Jan. 28, 2009.)
“There is no doubt that we’ve been living beyond our means, and we’re going to have to make some adjustments. Now, what I’ve done throughout this campaign is to propose a net spending cut.” (Spoken during a presidential debate Oct. 15, 2008.)
“Under my plan, no family making less than $250,000 a year will see any form of tax increase — not your income tax, not your payroll tax, not your capital gains taxes, not any of your taxes.” (Spoken in September 2008 at a town hall meeting in Dover, N.H.)

Last week, The Fact Checker, a service by The Washington Post, quoted Crossroads GPS’ itemization of the Obama administration’s fiscal debt record:

“January 20, 2009: The National Debt Was $10,626,877,048,913.08 (Obama Takes Office). (Treasury Department, accessed 5/23/12)
“May 22, 2012: The National Debt Was $15,721,218,607,447.09 (Most Recent). (Treasury Department, accessed 5/23/12)
“Obama Has Been In Office For 1,219 Days (1/20/09-5/22/12). (Convert Units, accessed 5/17/12)
“$5,094,341,558,534.01 (divided by) 1,219 Days (equals) $4,179,115,306/Day.”

And people want to re-elect President Obama? Why?

It’s tragically unfortunate that President Obama turned a deaf ear to the recommendations of the Bowles-Simpson deficit commission. Instead, while serially blaming his presidential predecessor for excessive spending, he skyrocketed the national budget, deficits and debt by trillions and trillions of dollars and, to boot, strapped upon our backs and those of our posterity trillions more for yet another socialized medicine program, called Obamacare.

Is the White House even listening anymore to anyone or just running amok its own way?

The actions of this White House remind me of an ancient proverb that says, “The way of a fool seems right to him, but a wise man listens to advice.”

Next week, I will discuss how the first eight presidents handled national debt and what I know they would say to Obama, whether he wants to hear it or not.

07/06/2012

NRA Says Magazine Ran Fast & Furious Disinformation Piece

In support of Attorney General Eric H. Holder, Jr. and his congressional allies this week was an obviously coordinated media campaign, aimed at rewriting the history of "Fast and Furious" and smearing the whistleblowing BATFE agents who alerted Congress to the scandal, the NRA-ILA reports.

In an article published the day before the vote and written by a former Bill Clinton campaign operative, Fortune magazine claimed that virtually everything we know about this disaster--after more than a year of investigations by House and Senate committees and by every media outlet in the country that's dared to touch the issue--is false. Tellingly, many of Fortune's sources were agents "speaking out for the first time." (Another BATFE official, who had not previously spoken to the media, gave an interview that appeared in the Washington Post the day of the vote.)

In its piece, Fortune claimed:

That Agent John Dodson and other whistleblowers who brought the operation to light were actually rogue agents who jeopardized their careers at the BATFE just to settle scores over petty disputes with a supervisor--who happens to be Fortune's main source and the "hero" of the article.

That Agent Dodson had actually (in a separate and much smaller case) advocated using the same tactics he risked his career to denounce in "Fast and Furious." What's more believable: Fortune's version, or Agent Dodson's explanation that he proposed the tactic on orders of his supervisor, who was also in charge of "Fast and Furious"?

That gun prosecutions were thwarted by a pro-gun federal prosecutor, even though that prosecutor worked for U.S. Attorney Dennis Burke, who had a long record of anti-gun activity on Capitol Hill and in the Clinton White House.

Most outrageously, if these allegations are true, the Justice Department itself falsely admitted that "gunwalking" tactics were used--for example, when Attorney General Holder acknowledged that in his Nov. 8, 2011 testimony--even though the embarrassing admission deepened the congressional investigation.

And if the Justice Department was wrong to rescind the Feb. 2011 letter denying that "gunwalking" occurred," the subpoenaed documents concerning that letter should show that. If the documents might exonerate the administration, why are the White House and Justice Department fighting so hard against releasing them?

Fortune also repeats a string of lies about the larger context of "Fast and Furious":

—That the real problem is weak gun laws, including the lack of "a real-time database of gun sales"--in other words, national gun registration. It should be no surprise that Fortune points to that, when there are already at least three emails proving that the BATFE wanted to use information from "Fast and Furious" to support its border-state registration scheme for multiple rifle sales.

--That it's "nearly impossible" to bring cases against straw purchasers--even though the BATFE website contains dozens of press releases announcing the arrest, conviction and sentencing of straw purchasers. That straw purchasing penalties are "minimal."

Here are the penalties Fortune calls "minimal": Any statement to a licensed dealer that is "intended or likely" to deceive the dealer about the legality of a sale is punishable by up to 10 years in prison.

"Knowingly making any false statement" in a dealer's records--such as falsely claiming on a transfer form that you are the actual buyer--is punishable by up to 5 years in prison.

That "2,000 weapons are smuggled daily from the U.S. into Mexico." There is no credible source for this figure. If it were true, smuggling to Mexico would account for 730,000 guns a year--nearly a tenth of the guns produced in the U.S. or imported here every year. That's obviously impossible.

—Another recurring claim this week was that "gunwalking" began under the Bush administration. In reality, there is no parallel between "Fast and Furious" and earlier operations such as "Wide Receiver." Specifically:

In "Wide Receiver," the Mexican government was informed and involved, and was supposed to interdict the guns as they were tracked into Mexico. In "Fast & Furious," the Mexican government was never informed and was never called on to interdict any of the guns.

—The guns lost in the "Wide Receiver" program were lost primarily by the Mexican authorities, or due to the failure of electronic tracking devices. In "Fast & Furious," agents were specifically ordered to end surveillance.

—“Wide Receiver" was shut down when BATFE officials learned of the lost guns. It took the death of Brian Terry to shut down "Fast & Furious."

—“Wide Receiver" involved a few hundred guns, most of which were recovered. The program nevertheless was considered a failure by BATFE officials and was terminated for that reason. "Fast & Furious" involved thousands of guns, the bulk of which are still at large.