Thursday, March 18, 2010

Are Obama/Holder/Napolitano on the right side of national security?

http://tinyurl.com/ykylr5x
Liz Cheney's Big Question Is the Obama administration on the right side of national security? By DANIEL HENNINGER
...The real question the ad raised was bigger than that: Is the Obama administration on the right side or wrong side of national security? That anyone should ask suggests a problem....from the actions and public statements on fighting terror at home by the men at the top: President Obama and Attorney General Holder. Every call seems to be a jump ball—closing Guantanamo, trial venues, reading airline bombers their Miranda rights. This is an inefficient and dangerous way to run an antiterror bureaucracy that needs clarity and consistency....Last March they rebranded the "war on terror" as "overseas contingency operations." Then came the "civilian" trial for 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, which even hyper-liberal Manhattanites couldn't take, no matter the assurances about the need to rediscover "our values."
In September seven former CIA directors, citing Agency morale, asked Mr. Obama to shut down Attorney General Holder's criminal probe of the CIA terrorist interrogators. Mr. Obama dismissed the appeal in a "Face the Nation" interview, asserting "nobody's above the law."...I'm convinced the reason liberal New York City re-elected Rudy Giuliani and then Mike Bloomberg twice was mainly to continue the 1990s' no-nonsense policing program of Commissioners William Bratton then and Ray Kelly now. The comfort level on the streets is the city's No. 1 issue, each day. After 9/11, that's true everywhere in the U.S....Where along the spectrum of personal safety do I and my family feel comfortable? On this score, the incoherence of the Obama administration's policies on domestic terrorism, detainees and military tribunals unsettles people...Looking at the failed Christmas airliner bombing, the aggressive recruitment of home-grown jihadis and the aborted Najibullah Zazi bombings in New York City, I'd say establishing a policy of coherence and constancy in meeting this threat is more urgent than the health-care odyssey Mr. Obama has forced on us for a year....You look at the Obama team's views on terrorism and the law, from the top down, and then ask yourself, Are they going to protect us 24/7 . . . or not? That's one question you never had to ask about John Yoo.

No comments:

Post a Comment