UNBELIEVABLE – AT 8:57 A.M. ET:  Charles Krauthammer examines the growing evidence that, with Eric Holder's Justice Department in charge, the Christmas-day bomber was entirely mishandled.  From The Washington Post:

After 50 minutes of questioning him, the Obama administration chose, reflexively and mindlessly, to give the chatty terrorist the right to remain silent. Which he immediately did, undoubtedly denying us crucial information about al-Qaeda in Yemen, which had trained, armed and dispatched him.

We have since learned that the decision to Mirandize Abdulmutallab had been made without the knowledge of or consultation with (1) the secretary of defense, (2) the secretary of homeland security, (3) the director of the FBI, (4) the director of the National Counterterrorism Center or (5) the director of national intelligence (DNI).

Look, maybe they just didn't have the phone numbers handy.  They're new in town.  It's only a year.

The culprit should have been interrogated by the High-Value Detainee Interrogation Group.  But, uh, there was a bit of a problem:

Perhaps you hadn't heard the term. Well, in the very first week of his presidency, Obama abolished by executive order the Bush-Cheney interrogation procedures and pledged to study a substitute mechanism. In August, the administration announced the establishment of the HIG, housed in the FBI but overseen by the National Security Council...

...he HIG was not deployed because it does not yet exist. After a year! I suppose this administration was so busy deploying scores of the country's best lawyerly minds on finding the most rapid way to release Gitmo miscreants that it could not be bothered to establish a single operational HIG team to interrogate at-large miscreants with actionable intelligence that might save American lives.

These things are so difficult, especially with the health-care bill.

The fact is that Eric Holder and his crowd want us to return to the pre 9-11 view of terror, that it's merely a law-enforcement problem, something for the cops.  It's the view from the left. 

We are tempting fate with Eric Holder as AG.  The president does not seem to understand.  Or maybe he understands all too well...and doesn't really care.

January 29, 2010