During the 1990's, when terrorism was mostly an overseas phenomenon, it was generallly government policy to treat terrorists as common criminals. When the World Trade Center was initially bombed in 1993, Andrew McCarthy handled the prosecution of the bombers, and it was handled as a criminal case. We simply weren't prepared for the plans the radical Islamists had for us, and we reacted according to what we knew. Well, that was then; this is now.
Yesterday Ed Morrissey at Hot Air wrote an article refuting John Brennan's claim that the Republican leadership knew about the plan to Mirandize the Christmas Day bomber. Mr. Brennan stated that Senator Kit Bond and Representative Pete Hoekstra were briefed on the Administration's intent to handle the case through the criminal justice system. However, both Congressmen have denied that they were told of the intention to Mirandize Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab.
Mr. Morrissey concludes:
"It seems ridiculous to claim that Bond and Hoekstra got fully briefed on the strategy for handling Abdulmutallab when DNI Dennis Blair, FBI Director Robert Mueller, and others in the counterterrorist chain of command have already testified that they didn't get briefed on that decision until it was made. If the White House didn't consult Mueller or Blair, why would they have picked up the phone and called Bond and Hoekstra? Brennan's claim that a call giving the two the outline of the attack somehow amounts to acquiescence of the point of Mirandizing a terrorist before fully interrogating him is ludicrous, and obviously self-serving. It's almost as bad as Janet Napolitano's "the system worked" spin on the Sunday after Christmas."
It seems to me that at some point, the administration needs to admit the whole episode of the Christmas Day bomber was a fiasco. The fact that the man was allowed on the plane was the first mistake, and it went downhill from there. Rather than try to deny their mistakes, they need to simply learn from them.
Leave a comment