THE HILL: Eric Holder Has A Gun Problem.

As the chief law enforcement officer Attorney General Eric Holder came out swinging in the first months of the Obama administration as he pushed to reinstate the assault weapons ban, pointing to the rising levels of violence in Mexico and increased presence of U.S. guns south of the border.

But nearly two years later assault weapons can still be bought and Holder has found himself at the center of a quagmire involving a botched gun-tracking operation that sent thousands of high-powered firearms to Mexico in the hands of known or suspected straw buyers for drug cartels.

Amid a plethora of Republican calls for Holder’s resignation, Democrats have silently indicated their support for the attorney general. Instead of taking him to task for Operation Fast and Furious, Democratic lawmakers have tried to draw attention to what they describe as the country’s weak network of gun laws.

In other words, they’re trying to stage a distraction. Let me be clear: I think it’s possible, and maybe even likely, that this operation was intended to provide PR support for the Administration’s gun-control program by putting traceable U.S. guns at Mexican crime scenes so that Holder could point to them as a reason for more gun control in the United States. (Other explanations — such as that this was a sort of Iran/Contra deal involving the U.S. Government deliberately arming one side in the Mexican drug wars, are even worse). Heads should roll, starting with Holder’s, but not ending there.