Obama surfaces from golf w/ weak statement on Terror incident

After 3 days, Obama interrupts golf, basketball and working out to offer brief, unemotional statement on airplane terror incident.

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Obama Holds Three-Day Late News Conference On Terrorist Attack, Doesn't Wear A Tie http://bit.ly/57AwJ3

Ok, now back to vacation.


Hoekstra: With Napolitano, It's 299,999,999 Vs. One [Robert Costa]

Rep. Pete Hoekstra of Michigan, the top Republican on the House Intelligence Committee, tells National Review Online that he’s “disappointed” with President Obama following the president’s remarks this afternoon on the attempted bombing of Northwest Airlines Flight 253. “We almost lost 270 American lives on Christmas Day and the president has decided to review a watch list. This is about more than a watch list,” says Hoekstra. “It’s about leadership.”

Criticism of Janet Napolitano, the Homeland Security secretary, for her handling of the incident, “should be directed to President Obama, since she’s taking her lead from him on this,” says Hoekstra. “I think she’s made some terrible mistakes. Like many in this administration, she’s reluctant to use the word ‘terrorism.’ Though she may prefer the term, this was not an example of an almost ‘man-made disaster.’”

“Out of 300 million Americans, she is the only one who thinks the system is working when a guy with a bomb gets on a plane,” he says. “The other 299,999,999 of us know it’s not.” Obama, he adds, “needs to articulate a clear, concise strategy” to address “the threat of radical jihadists.”
“After eleven months in office, the president is still sending contradictory messages on national security,” says Hoekstra. “He says he wants to address the threats yet look at how he has responded to this, how he responded to Fort Hood, how he’s open to prosecuting folks in the CIA, how he’s closing Guantanamo Bay, and how he’s bringing terror suspects to New York City.” Such moves, he says, “make no sense” if one is “trying to build a strong national security policy.”

“The president may express his concern but his decisions are the statements that people remember,” says Hoekstra. In coming days, the congressman tells us that he will continue to call for an investigation into Flight 253 and the government’s homeland-security operations.

Janet Napolitano’s Mentality [Daniel Pipes]

Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab smuggled 80 grams of PETN in his underwear on a Northwest flight on Christmas Day from Amsterdam to Detroit and almost killed 288 passengers and crew.

How did the geniuses in the Obama administration respond? Janet (“ man-caused disasters”) Napolitano, secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, concluded that the system “worked really very, very smoothly.”

Need one really point out that, had the system worked, Abdulmutallab would not have been allowed on the aircraft, and certainly not with a bomb? When her statement was criticized, Napolitano reversed course and announced a day later that “Our system did not work in this instance.”

While it’s good to see that even Obama appointees can learn from their errors, Napolitano’s original gaffe reveals a state of mind among this country’s top decision makers that so long as hundreds of people do not perish, all is well.

Abdulmutallab’s near-success and Napolitano’s idiotic response tell Americans about the weakness of counterterrorist efforts so many years after 9/11. In brief, because law enforcement refuses to “threat profile” and focus on Muslims, the flying public is both inconvenienced and unsafe.— Daniel Pipes is director of the Middle East Forum, Taube distinguished visiting fellow at the Hoover Institution of Stanford University, and a columnist for the Jerusalem Post.


Napolitano Changes Her Tune [Jonah Goldberg]

She now says that her repeated mantra of "the system worked" was taken out of context. Translation: Her hackish talking points were a flop, so she's pretending she didn't mean what she said and is blaming others for not understanding her.

I thought the head of the DHS was supposed to have the trust of the American people.

Again: This hack should be fired.


Re: Firing Napolitano [Peter Kirsanow]

The effect of firing DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano would be symbolic only.This isn't to say that ritual firings are without value, but replacing a Napolitano isn't likely to improve the security of American citizens. Napolitano's replacement will, after all, report to a boss who thinks it's a splendid idea to send Gitmo detainees to Yemen (or perhaps Illinois), try al-Qaeda's chief operating officer in a New York City civilian court, and credulously engage — almost to the point of supplication— the world's chief state sponsor of terrorism.

As long as the boss remains invincibly callow toward the threat of terrorism, his underlings are likely to reflect that mindset.


Fire Napolitano, Or at Least Grill Her [Daniel Foster]

Sen. Joe Lieberman's (I., Conn.) Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee is the third Congressional body to announce that it will hold hearings on the Flight 253 attack:

The hearing will focus on the security measures the alleged bomber, 23-year-old Nigerian Umar Farouk Abdul Mutallab, evaded in bringing explosives onboard the plane.

"We were very lucky this time, but we may not be so lucky next time, which is why our defenses must be strengthened," said committee Chairman Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.) in a statement. "I view Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab as a terrorist who evaded our homeland security defenses and who would have killed hundreds of people if the explosives he tried to detonate had worked."

Presumably, Secretary Napolitano will be in attendence. Let us hope that Lieberman and the Republicans on the committee give her ample opportunity to further . . . clarify her assertions that “the system worked.”


Ashcroft v. Napolitano [Jonah Goldberg]

Some may not remember the anti-Ashcroft hysteria of yesteryear. Here's a pretty good summary-snapshot from a 2003 Wall Street Journal editorial:

Frenzy mounts uncontrolled over John Ashcroft, now considered—in those quarters touched by the delirium—enemy No. 1 of the Bill of Rights, the Constitution and all that Americans hold dear. What is the cause of these fevers? Is there a doctor in the house?We may exclude Dr. Howard Dean, running for the Democratic presidential nomination, who has already offered his findings, to wit: "John Ashcroft is not a patriot. John Ashcroft is a descendant of Joseph McCarthy." Sen. John Kerry, once properly—and eloquently—infuriated over the campaign of cretinous slanders mounted against John McCain in the last Republican presidential primary, has in turn offered his views on the attorney general. During the Democrats' debate in Baltimore, candidate Kerry said he saw before him "people of every creed, every color, every belief, every religion. This is indeed John Ashcroft's worst nightmare here." Richard Gephardt, eyes similarly on the prize, has let America know which of our great national concerns he considered most pressing—a good thing to know about a candidate. The national priority looming largest in his mind is, Mr. Gephardt has let it be known, to fire John Ashcroft in "my first five seconds as president."On the subject of the attorney general, no candidate has waxed more passionate than John Edwards, who warned, "we cannot allow people like John Ashcroft to take away our rights, our freedoms, and our liberties." And further: John Ashcroft and this administration can "spin their wheels all they want about the Patriot Act. . . . They have rolled over our rights for the past two years," says Mr. Edwards, one of the most uncompromisingly staunch Senate supporters of the Patriot Bill when it was passed after September 11—a fact the candidate seems to have found little or no occasion to mention in the course of his current crusade. Also among those voting for the bill were Rep. Gephardt, and Sens. Kerry, Lieberman and Graham.It's hardly necessary by now to list all the charges and the alarms being raised about Mr. Ashcroft, by those portraying the attorney general as the menace to civil liberties that should haunt the dreams of all Americans who want to preserve our way of life. This is no exaggeration; the fever has spread wide, fed largely by the American Civil Liberties Union and allied sentinels of freedom, its signs clear in the ads calling on citizens to "Save Our Constitution," in emergency rallies led by the ACLU, and such groups as "Families for a Peaceful Tomorrow" and "The New York Bill of Rights Defense Committee."

Never mind that many of Ashcroft's worst alleged sins are now pretty much Obama-Pelosi policies. But the Napolitano-Ashcroft comparison is telling.

Ashcroft was demonized for suggesting that Americans be on the lookout for terrorists. One of Napolitano's main talking points these days is the need for vigilance from the public. Heck, she claimed the "system worked" because a flying Dutchman took out the "alleged" terrorist.
Ashcroft was demonized because he allegedly was turning America into a police state where political enemies were targeted (remember that's why Naomi Wolfe had a years-long mental breakdown). Janet Napolitano oversaw a report that singles out American citizens and returning vets as potential terrorists because of their political views.

Ashcroft was mocked as a provincial hick who didn't know much. Napolitano — who runs our immigration service and was governor of a border state — thinks it's not a crime to illegally cross the border and insists that the 9/11 hijackers came from Canada.

John Ashcroft was a dangerous ideologue because he believed the war on terror is real. But

Janet Napolitano isn't a dangerous ideologue for believing the war on terror isn't real?

What sounds more ideologically blinkered after 9/11?

Ashcroft's view: Organized Islamic terrorists want to kill Americans in a holy war.
Napolitano's view: Islamic terrorist attacks are merely "man caused disasters" by disturbed individuals — who should be assumed to be acting alone as criminals, not terrorists, despite credible evidence — while peaceful "right-wing extremists" should be given extra scrutiny on the assumption they could well be terrorists.


Bad Year Coming? [James Jay Carafano]

Since 2001, there have been 28 failed terrorist attacks against the United States. That averages out to about three foiled attempts per year. That was until this year. This year there were six failed attempts that make 2009 a banner year — the most in one year.

The fact that six attacks were foiled is cold comfort. In stopping #28, America just got lucky. Despite the warning signs, authorities did nothing to impede Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab's travel. The plan of attack on the Detroit-bound plane didn't work and the passengers and crew stopped the assailant.

Additionally, in 2009, not every terrorist attack was stopped. In November, Nidal Malik Hasan gunned down a dozen of his fellow soldiers and shot up a score more — despite the fact that there were red flags galore that he was some one to worry about. Others were recruited here to attack over there, including five young men from northern Virginia who shipped-off to Pakistan; youth from Minneapolis enticed to fight Al-Shabaab, an al-Qaeda affiliate; and David Coleman Headley, who allegedly helped plan the Mumbai attacks and other potential strikes.

In short, the system has failed a number of times in 2009. To make matters worse, Washington hasn't shown that it cares very much. It doesn't like to call the war a war. It doesn't seem to care that some Patriot Act authorities will expire in 60 days. It would rather the Department of Homeland Security push for a mass amnesty bill than fight terrorists and try control the border.

— James Jay Carafano is senior research fellow for national security and homeland security in the Douglas and Sarah Allison Center for Foreign Policy Studies at the Heritage Foundation.