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(CNSNews.com) - Political commentator Charles Krauthammer said the record of outgoing Department of Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano was that "the underwear didn't explode." When discussing the announcement of Napolitano’s resignation on Special Report with Bret Baier on Fox News on Friday, political analyst for Fox News Juan Williams offered a defense for her tenure: “Can I just offer one contrary note, which is under her tenure we've had no attacks, we've been safe as Americans— "Fort Hood," Bret Baier interrupted. "We've had no attacks--I mean she has managed this, to me, very well,” Williams said. “They're now looking at...

War On Terror: The Justice Department employs nine lawyers previously involved in the defense of terrorist detainees. This is a colossal conflict of interest. Just whose side are they on? From the dropping of a voter-intimidation case against the New Black Panther Party to the decision to try 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheik Muhammed in a civilian court within blocks of where the World Trade Center once stood, the actions and attitudes of the Justice Department and Attorney General Eric Holder toward the thugs and terrorists who threaten us has grown curiouser and curiouser. We may now have a clue as...

No clearer difference can be seen in how the Old Media and its left-wing compatriots treat mass killers, terrorists and nutjobs than the way Abdul Farouk Abdulmutallab and Joe Stack have been portrayed by the Old Media and the left. Abdulmutallab, the jihadi Christmas Bomber, was treated as an aberration unconnected with any larger group -- despite that he trained with al Qaeda -- and Joe Stack, who flew a plane into an IRS building in Austin, Texas, has been held up as the epitome of the “teabaggers” and the “anti-government right” despite that not a single tie to those...

Like it or not, one of the advantages that al Qaeda does have is an ability to change strategy without their leaders mulling it over for four months, the way President Obama did when he was trying to figure out Afghanistan. The Washington Times is reporting that during the underwear bombers second wave of talking he admitted meeting some other English Speakers at terrorism school in Yemen. Thank goodness his parents talking him into speaking, because this was all well after he shut up upon being read his Miranda rights.

Obama says he has not made a final decision to move the 9/11 trial out of New York City but he indicates the trial and security costing a mere billion dollars from “his stash,” i.e. taxpayer dollars, will not be the deciding factor. Wherever it is held, Attorney General Eric Holder wants transparency. Apparently, Obama has finally found something he is willing to see C-SPAN conduct non-stop coverage of: the 9/11 trial. Do they still prefer a federal show trial? You betcha! Meanwhile, Obama’s “intelligence” choir is singing the praises about a Bush 43 intelligence failure: Richard Reid being allowed...

“Now, President Obama has taken them off the table. He announced when he came in last year that they would never use anything other than the U.S. Army Manual which doesn’t include those techniques. I think that’s a mistake.”

First, [he] would have gathered [his] entire national-security team, not just the Justice Department ... Second, assuming Abdulmutallab had been designated as an enemy combatant, the interrogators would have thoroughly interrogated him to learn if he had information that could prevent a future attack. ... Third, once they were satisfied that he had no additional intelligence to provide, he would have been transferred for prosecution to either the civilian or the military system. ... But don’t take our word for it. Let’s briefly review what the Bush administration actually did after 9/11. (Warning to all leftist drones: Do not click...

McCarthy points out Reid was just one of many attacks we saw. Allowing Richard Reid to remain silent did nothing to prevent Flight 253. Instead of making that same mistake, President Bush had thousands of terrorists interrogated and dozens of attacks were prevented; not affording Constitutional rights to terrorists (besides Reid) prevented those attacks. Initially repeating a past mistake with Abdulmuttalab is not mitigated by the fact President Bush "did it" eight years earlier. McCarthy went on to write: That brings us to a third point Democrats would prefer to forget: “The Wall,” the internal regulations adopted by the Clinton...

Liberal host Ed Schultz tried to paint the entire Republican argument as “political posturing” and challenged Rivkin, saying he was pitting his credibility against the word of Brennan. But Rivkin remained adamant that officials would not have simply assumed Miranda rights were being given automatically. Rivkin also pointed out that there should be less blame cast by both sides and more attention to the underlying failures in common sense procedure. “We’re talking about somebody who is interrogated for 50 minutes, that interrogation was interrupted and he is Mirandized. I don’t know of any serious interrogator who does not believe that...

This past week gave us an interesting insight in how the Obama Administration is politicizing terror; ironically, something they accused the Bush Administration of regularly during the campaign. This week, the intelligence services told the White House and Congress that Christmas bomber Umar Farouk Abdulmuttallab is now speaking to interrogators...a full 5 weeks after his initial arrest. The information was given to Congress in closed door meetings. However, the White House, primarily their political and communication wings (led by Robert Gibbs and David Axelrod), immediately went on the attack in public forums, exclaiming how well their strategy worked in obtaining...

In a breathtakingly cynical example of playing politics, the White House just accused Republicans of playing politics over its Miranda-rights Christmas gift to the crotch bomber. With fumbling terrorism czar John Brennan walking point, administration spokesmen attacked those who believe that treating would-be suicide-bomber Umar Abdulmutallab the way we handle shoplifters harms our national security. The White House position is a PR blend of lies, half-truths and ignorance. Let's strip out the politics and lay out the facts from an intelligence professional's perspective:

The Obama administration apparently never made or discovered a mistake not worth repeating....Stupid is as stupid does, that Richard Reid was read "his" rights was a poor example to follow; that too was an intelligence failure. Reid was arrested not three months into our invasion of Afghanistan, while the hunt was still under way in Tora Bora, and several months before Jose Padilla, Binyam Mohammed, Abu Zubaydah, and Ramzi Binalshibh were captured. Bush 43 could have ordered Reid turned over for military detention as his November 13, 2001 Military Order proscribed and yet he at least seemed to learn from...

Holder's decision to Mirandize the Christmas bomber was bad enough. Telling the world he was talking again waseven worse Security: The administration says the Christmas bomber is now cooperating with authorities. We thought they got all the information he had in a 50-minute chat. So just why are we letting our enemies know he's talking? In any war, it's vitally important that you know what your enemy is planning and doing, just as it's important that your actions and plans remain secret. And when you know about your enemy's plans it's important they don't know that you know. We were...

At the White House briefing Thursday afternoon, Press Secretary Robert Gibbs attacked Bond for politicizing intelligence and haughtily demanded an apology: “No briefing is done here or anywhere in this administration where classified information is used in a place where it shouldn’t be,” Gibbs said. “And I would suggest that somebody that alleges that, when they know it doesn’t happen, owe[s] people an apology.” The White House contends that the sensitive information about cooperation from Abdulmutallab was unintentionally disclosed during a Senate Intelligence Committee hearing on Tuesday. At the hearing, Mueller responded to concern from Senator Olympia Snowe that the...

The suspect in a failed Christmas Day airliner bombing attempt told federal investigators that radical Yemeni cleric Anwar al-Awlaki directed him to carry out the attack, CBS News has learned. Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, the 23-year-old Nigerian who faces terrorism charges in the Christmas bombing, has been cooperating with the FBI for about a week, providing information about his contacts in Yemen and the al Qaeda affiliate that operates there. Abdulmutallab has turned against the cleric who claims to be his teacher, al-Awlaki, and has helped the U.S. hunt for him in Yemen, a law enforcement official said Thursday.

AG Eric Holder said he knows we are at war during his November 18, 2009 testimony before the Senate Judicary Committee concerning his decision to prosecute Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and the other four 9/11 conspirators in federal court. Unfortunately, Mr. Holder does not walk that talk. (See video of Fox News report here.) Attorney General Eric Holder says he made the decision to charge the Christmas Day terror suspect in the civilian system with no objection from all the other relevant departments of the government. In a letter to Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell, the attorney general says that the...

Attorney General Eric Holder said Wednesday he made the decision to charge the Christmas Day terror suspect in civilian court rather than the military system, with no objection from all the other relevant departments of the government. In a letter to Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell, the attorney general wrote that the FBI told its partners in the intelligence community on Christmas Day and again the next day that Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab would be charged criminally. Holder's letter was the latest volley in a vigorous counterattack by the Obama administration to Republican charges that the arrest and FBI interrogation of...

WASHINGTON — Attorney General Eric Holder said Wednesday he made the decision to charge the Christmas Day terror suspect in the civilian system with no objection from all the other relevant departments of the government. In a letter to Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell, the attorney general wrote that the FBI told its partners in the intelligence community on Christmas Day and again the next day that Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab would be charged criminally.

WASHINGTON — Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, the Nigerian man accused of trying to blow up a jetliner bound for Detroit on Dec. 25, started talking to investigators after two of his family members arrived in the United States and helped earn his cooperation, a senior administration official said Tuesday evening. Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab Mr. Abdulmutallab, 23, began speaking to F.B.I. agents last week in Detroit and has not stopped, two government officials said. The officials declined to disclose what information was obtained from him, but said it was aiding in the investigation of the attempted terrorist attack. “With the family, the...

Here is a video report on what the White House has confirmed as an attempted "terrorist attack" aboard a Northwest Airlines flight that was about to land in Detroit. A Nigerian national sought to ignite an explosive device aboard the plane, and was burned in the attempt: A male passenger on an international flight bound for Detroit Friday tried to blow up the plane with an explosive device in an incident that the White House is labeling an attempted act of terrorism. Several people were hurt on the plane, which had Delta markings, but was listed as Northwest Flight 253....