Obama Lies About Fast and Furious Program

Obama indulged in his two favorite activities during his Univision forum-- lying to cover himself and lying/blaming Bush for making the problem in the first place.

Does Obama take responsibility for anything? Is anything not Bush's fault?

From Jack Tapper at ABC News:

"Asked about the Fast and Furious program at the Univision forum on Thursday, President Obama falsely claimed that the program began under President George W. Bush.

"'I think it’s important for us to understand that the Fast and Furious program was a field-initiated program begun under the previous administration,” the president said. “When Eric Holder found out about it, he discontinued it. We assigned a inspector general to do a thorough report that was just issued, confirming that in fact Eric Holder did not know about this, that he took prompt action and the people who did initiate this were held accountable.'"

Good Lord, that's brazen.

"In actuality, the Fast and Furious program was started in October 2009, nine months into the Obama presidency.

"Previous programs involving ATF agents allowing guns to 'walk' across the border so as to trace them were run during the Bush presidency, but not this particular 'field-initiated program.'

"Asked for comment, White House Spokesman Eric Schultz said, 'The President was referring to the flawed tactic of gun-walking, which despite Republicans efforts to politicize this issue, began under the previous Administration and it was our Attorney General who ended it. In fact, this week’s IG report affirms this and if Republicans still have any legitimate questions about Fast and Furious, the 450-page report answers them. In light of this thorough report and Congress’s 16 month-long investigation, Republicans have no excuse to keep wasting time and taxpayer resources on politically-motivated, election-year attacks.'"

But that's not what Obama said Mr. Schutlz. Obama said that the Fast and the Furious program was started by Bush, which is an utter lie. The gun walking programs under Bush were conducted with the the full knowledge and cooperation of Mexican law enforcement and resulted in no loss of GPS marked weapons nor deaths.

I find Schultz's comments particularly cloying since the Obama Administration declined interviews with the Inspector General and refused to provide any internal White House communications. But nothing to see here... Holder ended the program begun under his watch... after it resulted in the death of an American (and hundreds of Mexicans) and it's all politically motivated any way. And probably racist. Move on. Move on.