IN TERROR'S SIGHTS ... (Mukasey was compelled to surrender his freedom, for a decade)

New York Post ^ | September 18, 2007 | John Podhoretz

[IrishMike]

MICHAEL Mukasey - President Bush's nomi nee to be his next attor ney general - will be the first senior official in the U.S. government with the experience of living with an Islamofascist target on his forehead.

Mukasey presided over the two-year trial of the "Blind Sheik," Omar Abdel-Rahman, and his collaborators accused of plotting the 1993 strike on the World Trade Center.

For his labors, which were extraordinarily complex, Mukasey was considered a possible target for violent reprisal by Rahman's followers.

He was, in effect, an American Salman Rushdie.

Unlike Rushdie, Mukasey couldn't go into hiding: He was a sitting federal judge. But he and his wife basically lived for years inside a security cocoon.

For a decade - 24/7/365 - they were surrounded by a platoon of U.S. marshals, who stood guard outside their home and went everywhere with the Mukaseys - to the grocery store, the movie house, the bookstore, dinner with friends . . .

At the Mukaseys' Long Island beach house, a rotating team of nine marshals crowded the driveway at all times. I spent time in a house about 20 yards away, and no matter how many times I passed by (in a very recognizable green Volkswagen Beetle), the marshals were watchful, careful, making eye contact with me and paying close attention to the car.

"You get used to it," Judge Mukasey told me once. And he spoke with great respect and affection for the marshals, who themselves had to make great sacrifices to protect him and his family. "They're terrific," he said - adding, with rueful amusement, "It's a pretty boring detail."

For his service to his country as a U.S. district court judge, Mukasey was compelled to surrender his freedom, in a certain sense, for a decade.

[syriacus]

Thanks for posting this interesting column, IrishMike.

[stevie_d_64]

Thumbs up...

Thanks for a great read!