Also, at The Hill, "Obama Pledges 'Thorough Review' in Wake of Attempted Airline Bombing." (Via Memeorandum.) But from AFP, the administration will take a law enforcement approach:
US President Barack Obama on Monday vowed an all-out pursuit of plotters of a failed Christmas Day bombing of a US-bound airliner, vowing "we will not rest" until they are captured and tried.The Wall Street Journal responds, "The Terror This Time: Janet Napolitano Says the System Worked. No, We Were Brave and Lucky" (via):
"A full investigation has been launched into this attempted act of terrorism and we will not rest until we find all who were involved and hold them accountable," Obama said in his first direct public comment since a 23-year-old Nigerian allegedly tried to blow up Northwest Airlines Flight 253 as it approached Detroit.
A U.S. government that has barred the phrase "war on terror" has nonetheless acknowledged that a failed Christmas day bomb attack on an airliner was a terrorist attempt. Can we all now drop the pretense that we stopped fighting a war once Dick Cheney and George W. Bush left the White House?See also, Michelle Malkin, "Obama's Statement on the Christmas Day Jihadi Attack; Perfunctory, Hasty, and Bloodless." Added: Gateway Pundit, "3 Days Later… Obama Finally Comments on Attempted Detroit Terrorist Bombing."
The attempt by 23-year-old Nigerian Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab follows the alleged murders in Ft. Hood, Texas by Islamist-inspired Major Nidal Hasan in November. Brian Jenkins, who studies terrorism for the Rand Corporation, says there were more terror incidents (12), including thwarted plots, on U.S. soil in 2009 than in any year since 2001. The jihadists don't seem to like Americans any better because we're closing down Guantanamo.
This increasing terror tempo makes the Obama Administration's reflexive impulse to treat terrorists like routine criminal suspects all the more worrisome. It immediately indicted Mr. Abdulmutallab on criminal charges of trying to destroy an aircraft, despite reports that he told officials he had ties to al Qaeda and had picked up his PETN explosive in Yemen. The charges mean the Nigerian can only be interrogated like any other defendant in a criminal case, subject to having a lawyer present and his Miranda rights read.
RELATED: From ABC News, "Abdulmutallab: More Like Me In Yemen: Accused Northwest Bomber Says More Bombers On the Way; Al Qaeda Promises to Hit Americans."
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