The 2013 budget for the Department of Justice is up for review. During deliberations, Utah Representative Jason Chaffetz attached House Amendment 1068. The text of the amendment sounds like CSPAN on Valium:

An amendment to prohibit the use of funds used in contravention of paragraph (1), (2), or (3) of section 1001(a) of title 18, United State Code.

The code section in question is this,

(a) Except as otherwise provided in this section, whoever, in any matter within the jurisdiction of the executive, legislative, or judicial branch of the Government of the United States, knowingly and willfully—
(1) falsifies, conceals, or covers

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Sharyl Attkisson reports that the draft of a contempt citation naming Eric Holder is being circulated to members of the House Oversight Committee today. The citation addresses the Attorney General's lack of cooperation in the investigation of Fast & Furious.

Resolved, That Eric H. Holder, Jr., Attorney General of the United States, shall be found to be in contempt of Congress for failure to comply with a congressional subpoena.

Resolved, That pursuant to 2 U.S.C. §§ 192 and 194, the Speaker of the House of Representatives shall certify the report of the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, detailing the

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Attorney General Eric Holder testified before the House Oversight Committee again today. As with his previous appearances, we were treated to a litany of evasions and excuses. Long story short:  he doesn't know what's going on in his department, and he claims to have had no knowledge of any gunwalking operations prior to the death of Brian Terry.

It's been over a year since he promised an internal investigation, and he has yet to provide any explanation or any proof of action. Representative Labrador pointed out that Holder continues to show up for Congressional hearings unprepared, and that he seems oblivious to happenings at Justice. Representative Farenthold took it a step further, asking Holder, "knowing what you know, do you think you're qualified to lead the Department of Justice?"

Holder's response? "If you're going to ask me to resign (…) you've asked the wrong question."

I don't think we are.

Two years after the election, gun sales are still going through the roof.

Two years after the boom in sales, violent crime is still dropping.

As I've pointed out before, correlation does not equal causation. We can't attribute the drop in crime to an increase in gun sales. What we can show, however, is that a vast increase in civilian gun ownership does not lead to more crime.

In other news, Eric Holder's trotting out the race card:

This is a way to get at the president because of the way I can be identified with

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This week, 23 state Attorney Generals signed off on a letter (pdf) to Attorney General Eric Holder, in which they advised against any sort of renewal of the 1994 Assault Weapons Ban. Part of the letter reads,

As Attorneys General, we are committed to defending our constituents’ constitutional rights –including their constitutionally-protected right to keep and bear arms. This duty is particuarly important in light of the United States Supreme Court’s recent Heller decision, which held that the Second Amendment “elevated above all other interests the right of law-abiding, responsible citizens to use arms in defense of hearth and home.” The high court’s landmark decision affirmed that individual Americans have a constitutionally-protected right to keep and bear arms. We, the undersigned Attorneys General, are staunch defenders of that right and believe that it should not be encroached upon without sound justification – and a clear law enforcement purpose. (…) we believe that additional gun control laws are unnecessary. Instead, authorities need to enforce laws that are already in place.

Georgia Attorney General Thurbert Baker, who has had a hit-and-miss record with gun rights, signed the letter.

This follows a similar letter sent by 65 Democratic Congressmen to Holder in March.

Ten years ago, these sorts of initiatives would have been unthinkable. Given the current administration's well-documented contempt for gun rights, it would seem even more unlikely now. Yet here we are.

We're winning, folks.

I was going to take today off, but I just caught two things on the news.

First off, reporst indicate that Richard Phillips was freed by a team of Navy Seals around 13:30EDT. Three pirates are reported dead, and one wounded. I'm glad to hear it, and I hope this sparks an initiative to arm our sailors from now on.

It also occurs to me that an American maritime vessel was taken by pirates for the first time in almost 200 years, and the President has remained mute on the issue. Same as with the North Korean missile launch last week. Mark my words, this administration will be known for its foreign policy failures more than any other issue in the balance of history.

The second thing was an interview with Mexican Ambassador Arturo Sarukhan, in which he revived the myth that 90% of weapons confiscated in warfare between Mexican law enforcement and drug dealers (who are often one and the same) come from American dealers.

In the wake of last week's violence in New York and Pittsburg, it's not unwise to expect calls for new gun restrictions. Couple that with this administration's published stance regarding gun rights, and we all have reason to be worried.

However, it looks like the current administration is learning from history, and they're not salivating over gun control as rabidly as they were fifteen years ago.

In an interview with Katie Couric, Eric Holder quickly backpedaled on his prior support for a new Assault Weapons Ban, stating,

I don’t think it has and in fact, I look forward to working with the NRA to come up with ways in which we can use common-sense approaches to reduce the level of violence that we see in our streets and make the American people as safe as they can possibly be.

When prodded further, all the elaboration he'd give about his support for gun control was,

These are issues that we’ll have to discuss. The president will be the one who will ultimately set policy — things that are politically saleable and things that will ultimately be effective.

The Left is realizing that gun control isn't as "politically saleable" as they thought going into this election. Holder's muzzling was echoed by the ever-articulate Robert Gibbs in Thursday's press briefing.

The following letter was sent to Attorney General Holder in response to his comments about a renewed Assault Weapons Ban. It was not sent by a gun-rights group. It was not sent by the NRA.

Nope; it was sent by 65 Democratic Congressmen. Read on.

So, here we go. Yet again. The whole thing is getting tiresome, and I've got a sneaking suspicion I haven't heard the last of it.

It works like this:

Someone in the current administration says, "hey, wouldn't it be great to bring the Assault Weapons Ban back?"
People on the internet (or Bob over in accounting, who "knows guns"), who have no clue how politics works, go into apoplexy. They start screaming that the Last Days have come, and discuss how they're going to cope. Usually this involves the phrase, "from my cold dead hands."
I am regaled, via internet and in person, by these people. I get hoarse and very sick of explaining political reality to them.
It turns out that the comments made by said official turn out to have no real gravity or effect.
Internet people come down off the roof, grumbling that we "dodged a bullet…this time."

Eric Holder made the remarks as a follow-up to a letter sent last week, which urged President Obama to pass a new ban. It was written and signed by 53 Democrats, all of whom seem to have only recently realized that we share a border with a corrupt third-world country.