GAINESVILLE, GA (06/15/2011)(readMedia)-- Maryulett Charlaine Chestang from Bettendorf, Iowa, graduated from Brenau University with a Master of Business Administration degree after majoring in business administration.

Chestang was one of 750 Brenau undergraduate and graduate degree recipients in ceremonies May 6 and May 7 ceremonies at the Georgia Mountains Center in Gainesville, Ga. All told, Brenau awarded 771 degrees - 341 graduate diplomas and 430 undergraduate diplomas - some in dual degree programs like occupational therapy and interior design.

For more information, go to www.brenau.edu.

ABOUT BRENAU - Founded in 1878, Brenau University currently enrolls about 2,800 students in graduate, undergraduate programs on campuses and online. The main campus of the Georgia-based liberal arts institution, which includes the Brenau Women's College, is in Gainesville with other campuses in Augusta, Kings Bay and in two metro Atlanta locations, Norcross and Fairburn. The university offers a range of undergraduate and graduate programs, including a Doctor of Nursing Practice degree. Brenau's 2011 ranking as one of the top 15-best higher education values in the Southeast by U.S. News & World Report marks the university's sixth consecutive year in that position for the magazine's America's Best Colleges guidebook. Brenau University also has been cited as one of the best colleges and universities to work for by The Chronicle of Higher Education and one of the best universities in the Southeast by The Princeton Review.

Bipartisan Group Urges Accelerated Transition of Forces

WASHINGTON - U.S. Senator Tom Harkin (D-IA) today joined a bipartisan group of 27 senators in sending a letter to President Obama calling for a shift in strategy in Afghanistan ahead of next month's announced deadline to begin an accelerated transition to Afghan security forces. In the letter, the senators urge the President to use the deadline as an opportunity to begin a "sizable and sustained" drawdown of troops that puts the U.S. on a path toward removing all regular combat troops from the country.

In their letter, the senators noted that the primary objectives for U.S. involvement in Afghanistan have been largely met - including the removal of the Taliban government that sheltered al Qaeda, the killing of Osama bin Laden and the disruption of terrorist networks allied with Al Qaeda and those who planned the Sept. 11th attacks on the United States. Noting those successes and the ability to pursue counter-terrorism and humanitarian goals without a massive nation-building effort, the senators wrote, "the costs of prolonging the war far outweigh the benefits. It is time for the United States to shift course in Afghanistan."

"We urge you to follow through on the pledge you made to the American people to begin redeployment of U.S. forces from Afghanistan this summer, and to do so in a manner that is sizable and sustained, and includes combat troops as well as logistical and support forces. We look forward to working with you to pursue a strategy in Afghanistan that makes our nation stronger and more secure," the letter reads.

The full text of the letter is below:

June 15, 2011

The President
The White House
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW
Washington, DC 20500

Dear Mr. President:

We write to express our strong support for a shift in strategy and the beginning of a sizable and sustained reduction of U.S. military forces in Afghanistan, beginning in July 2011.

In 2001 the United States rightfully and successfully intervened in Afghanistan with the goals of destroying al Qaeda's safe haven, removing the Taliban government that sheltered al Qaeda, and pursuing those who planned the September 11 attacks on the United States. Those original goals have been largely met and today, as CIA Director Leon Panetta noted last June, "I think at most, we're looking at maybe 50 to 100, maybe less" al Qaeda members remaining in Afghanistan.

In addition, over the past few years, U.S. forces have killed or captured dozens of significant al Qaeda leaders. Then, on May 2, 2011, American Special Forces acting under your direction located and killed Osama bin Laden. The death of the founder of al Qaeda is a major blow that further weakens the terrorist organization.

From the initial authorization of military force through your most recent State of the Union speech, combating al Qaeda has always been the rationale for our military presence in Afghanistan. Given our successes, it is the right moment to initiate a sizable and sustained reduction in forces, with the goal of steadily redeploying all regular combat troops.

There are those who argue that rather than reduce our forces, we should maintain a significant number of troops in order to support a lengthy counter-insurgency and nation building effort. This is misguided. We will never be able to secure and police every town and village in Afghanistan. Nor will we be able to build Afghanistan from the ground up into a Western-style democracy.

Endemic corruption in Afghanistan diverts resources intended to build roads, schools, and clinics, and some of these funds end up in the hands of the insurgents. Appointments of provincial and local officials on the basis of personal alliances and graft leads to deep mistrust by the Afghan population. While it is a laudable objective to attempt to build new civic institutions in Afghanistan, this goal does not justify the loss of American lives or the investment of hundreds of billions of taxpayer dollars.

Instead of continuing to be embroiled in ancient local and regional conflicts in Afghanistan, we must accelerate the transfer of responsibility for Afghanistan's development to the Afghan people and their government. We should maintain our capacity to eliminate any new terrorist threats, continue to train the Afghan National Security Forces, and maintain our diplomatic and humanitarian efforts. However, these objectives do not require the presence of over 100,000 American troops engaged in intensive combat operations.

Mr. President, according to our own intelligence officials, al Qaeda no longer has a large presence in Afghanistan, and, as the strike against bin Laden demonstrated, we have the capacity to confront our terrorist enemies with a dramatically smaller footprint. The costs of prolonging the war far outweigh the benefits. It is time for the United States to shift course in Afghanistan.

We urge you to follow through on the pledge you made to the American people to begin the redeployment of U.S. forces from Afghanistan this summer, and to do so in a manner that is sizable and sustained, and includes combat troops as well as logistical and support forces.

We look forward to working with you to pursue a strategy in Afghanistan that makes our nation stronger and more secure.

Sincerely,

Sen. Tom Harkin (D-IA)
Sen. Max Baucus (D-MT)
Sen. Michael Bennet (D-CO)
Sen. Jeff Bingaman (D-NM)
Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-CA)
Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-OH)
Sen. Maria Cantwell (D-WA)
Sen. Ben Cardin (D-MD)
Sen. Kent Conrad (D-ND)
Sen. Richard Durbin (D-IL)
Sen. Al Franken (D-MN)
Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY)
Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-MN)
Sen. Mary Landrieu (D-LA)
Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D-NJ)
Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-VT)
Sen. Mike Lee (R-UT)
Sen. Robert Menendez (D-NJ)
Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-OR)
Sen. Patty Murray (D-WA)
Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY)
Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT)
Sen. Charles E. Schumer (D-NY)
Sen. Debbie Stabenow (D-MI)
Sen. Tom Udall (D-NM)
Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI)
Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR)

Prepared Statement of Senator Chuck. Grassley
Before the United States House of Representatives
Committee on Oversight and Government Reform
"Operation Fast and Furious: Reckless Decisions, Tragic Outcomes"
Wednesday, June 15, 2011

Thank you, Chairman Issa, for calling these important hearings and for the great work you and your staff have done. I am grateful to Agent Brian Terry's family for being here today and wish to express my sympathies for their loss.  I hope we can get them the answers they deserve. I also want to thank the federal agents who will be testifying from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms.  I know they are here to tell the unvarnished truth.  I also know that can be tough, since they still work for ATF.  These agents already risk their lives to keep us safe.  They shouldn't have to risk their jobs too.  Any attempt to retaliate against them for their testimony today would be unfair, unwise, and unlawful.

When I became Ranking Member of the Judiciary Committee in January, this was the first oversight issue to land on my desk.  Several other Senators' offices contacted my office to pass along these allegations about an ATF case called "Operation Fast and Furious."  At first, the allegations sounded too shocking to believe.  But sadly, they turned about to be true.

ATF is supposed to stop criminals from trafficking guns to Mexican drug cartels.  Instead, ATF made it easier for alleged cartel middlemen to get weapons from U.S. gun dealers. Agents were ordered to stand by and watch these middlemen ? these straw purchasers ? buy hundredsupon hundreds of weapons.  Agents warned that inaction could lead to tragedy, but management didn't want to listen.  We will hear from some of those agents today.

Inaction would be bad enough, but ATF went even further.

ATF encouraged gun dealers to sell to straw buyers.  Emails prove that at least one dealer worried prophetically about the risk.^[1] He wrote to ATF about his concern that a border patrol agent might end up facing the wrong end of one of these guns.^[2] ATF supervisors told the dealer not to worry.  So, the agents said it was a bad idea.  And, the gun dealers said it was a bad idea.

Who thought it was a good idea?  Why did this happen?

The President said he didn't authorize it and that the Attorney General didn't authorize it.  They have both admitted that a "serious mistake" may have been made.  There are a lot of questions, and a lot of investigating to do.  But one thing has become clear already ? this was no mistake.

It was a conscious decision by senior officials.  It was written down.  It was briefed up to Washington, D.C.  According to an internal briefing paper, Operation Fast and Furious was intentionally designed to "allow the transfer of firearms to continue to take place."^[3]

Why would the ATF do such a thing?

Well, the next line in the brief paper tells us.  It was, "to further the investigation and allow for the identification of additional co-conspirators[.]"^[4] So, that was the goal.  The purpose of allowing straw buyers to keep buying was to find out who else might be working with them ? who else might be in their network of gun traffickers.  Of course, that assumes that they are part of a big, sophisticated network.  That kind of assumption can cause you to start with a conclusion and work backwards, looking for facts that fit.  Until you figure out that you've got the cart before the horse, you're probably not going to get anywhere.

Professor of Criminology Gary Kleck recently published an article in the Wall Street Journal called "The Myth of Big-Time Gun Trafficking."^[5] Professor Kleck said that according to his study of national crime data, ATF handles only about 15 operations each year that involve more than 250 guns.^[6] According to his study, a typical trafficking operation involves fewer than 12 guns.^[7] 

So why would the ATF make it a priority to identify large networks of traffickers?  Why would senior leadership decide to explicitly elevate that goal above ATF's traditional work of seizing weapons that were illegally purchased?

On October 26, 2009, emails indicate that there was a meeting of senior law enforcement officials at the Justice Department.^[8] It appears to have included the heads every law enforcement component of the Department, including directors of the FBI, the DEA and the ATF.^[9] It also included the U.S. Attorneys for all the Southwest border states, the Director of the Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Force, and the Chair of the Attorney General's Advisory Committee.^[10]

Sounds like a pretty big, important meeting, doesn't it?

On the agenda at that meeting was a document describing the Department's strategy for combatting the Mexican cartels.  In a section called "Attacking the Southbound Flow of Firearms," it says:

Thus, given the national scope of this issue, merely seizing firearms through interdiction will not stop firearms trafficking to Mexico.  We must identify, investigate, and eliminate the sources of illegally trafficked firearms and the networks that transport them.^[11]

The message was clear.  Trying to identify networks of traffickers is more important than seizing weapons.  This document was transmitted to the head of the Phoenix Field Division on October 27, 2009.^[12]

Four days later, the Phoenix Field Division began investigating Uriel Patino on suspicion of being involved in a gun trafficking ring.  Ten days after that, Patino was assigned his own case number.  In the first 24 days that the ATF was on to him, Patino bought 34 guns from dealers cooperating with the ATF.  That's nearly three times more than the typical gun trafficking operation, according to the study in the Wall Street Journal I mentioned earlier.

But that was just the beginning.

Since the dealers were cooperating, ATF received notice of each purchase right away.  Analysts entered the serial numbers into ATF's Suspect Gun Database, usually within days of the purchase.  On November 20th, one of the 34 guns Patino bought turned up in Mexico ? just 14 days after he bought it in Phoenix.  ATF learned of the recovery through a hit in the suspect gun database on November 24th.^[13] That same day, Patino brought Jaime Avila into a cooperating gun dealer and they bought five more guns.^[14] ATF had real-time notice from the dealers and agents rushed to the store to follow them, but arrived too late.

Over the next six weeks, Avila bought 13 guns at dealers cooperating with the ATF.^[15] The dealers notified the ATF of each purchase right away.  Analysts entered the serial numbers into the ATF database, usually within about 2 days of the purchase.

Yet ATF did nothing to deter or interrupt the straw purchasers.  Avila went back to the cooperating dealer and purchased three more AK-47-type weapons on January 16, 2010.^[16] ATF simply put the serial numbers in its database.  Still, ATF did nothing to stop Avila and Patino.

11 months later, two of those three rifles were recovered at the scene of Agent Terry's murder.^[17] During those 11 months, Avila purchased another 34 firearms.  Patino purchased 539.

Again, cooperating gun dealers notified ATF of each purchase. It usually took about 5 days to enter the serial numbers into ATF's database.  But ATF often had real-time or even advanced notice of the purchases from the dealers.

ATF even specifically approved particular transactions. 

For example, in August of 2010, a gun dealer cooperating with the ATF asked for guidance.  Patino wanted 20 more weapons, but the dealer only had 4 in stock.^[18] The dealer told ATF that if he were to sell the guns, he would have to "obtain the additional 16 specifically for this purpose."^[19] An ATF supervisor wrote back, "our guidance is that we would like you to go through with Mr Patino's request and order the additional firearms[.]"^[20] At this point, ATF already knew that he bought 673 guns from cooperating dealers and that many had already been recovered at crime scenes.  I want to be clear that we don't know whether this particular order was actually filled.^[21]

However, these new emails support what agents and dealers have been telling us for months.  According to them, dealers notified ATF whenany of the straw purchasers bought guns ? either before, during, or shortly after the sale.

We don't know what the exact totals are.  But, we know the Suspect Gun Database had at least 1,880 guns related to this case.^[22] At least 30 of them were high-power, .50 caliber rifles.^[23] The straw purchasers bought 212 guns in just six days in December 2009.^[24] 70% of all the guns in the database were bought by just 5 straw purchasers.^[25] If ATF agents had been allowed to stop just those five buyers, most of the guns in this case would not have fallen into the wrong hands.

Finally, I want to say something about the politics of gun control.  This investigation is not about politics.  It is about getting the facts.  No matter what side of that issue you are on, the facts here should be disturbing.  There will be plenty of time for both sides to argue about policy implications of all this at some point.  But I hope we can do that another day.

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Vera Stokes, ISU Extension Nutrition and Health Program Specialist, 563-210-0587, vstokes@iastate.edu is offering a workshop, Home Food Preservation 101, Friday, June 24, 10:30am - Noon at the Davenport Public Library on Eastern Avenue.

The workshop is intended for those wanting to learn how to safely preserve food and will also serve as a good refresher for those who have experience preserving food. The workshop is free and will cover canning, freezing, drying, pickling and making jams and jellies.

Pressure canner gauge testing will be from Noon - 2 p.m. at the same location. Pressure canners with a dial-type pressure gauge should be tested each year for accuracy. To have a dial-gauge tested, bring the canner lid only - the entire canneris not needed. It is not necessary to test weighted or rocker-type pressure regulators because they cannot be adjusted and will usually remain accurate.

Participants will receive current ISUE food preservation publications and additional research based resources will be on display.
To register for the Home Food Preservation workshop only, call the ISU Scott County Extension office at 359-7577 by June 23, 2011.

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