Posted on 11/12/2009 11:41:26 AM PST by MissesBush
The only good news out of the Fort Hood massacre is that U.S. electronic surveillance technology was able to pick up Major Hasan's phone calls to an al Qaeda-loving imam in Yemen. The bad news is the people and agencies listening to Hasan didn't know what to do about it. Other than nothing.
Next week, Sen. Joe Lieberman (I., Conn.) will convene the Homeland Security Committee to find out if someone in the Army or FBI dropped the ball on Hasan. At Ford Hood itself, grief has been turning to anger as news of possible dropped balls has emerged.
Earlier in the week at Fort Hood, President Obama spoke about the consequences of doing nothing. He named and described each of the 13 dead. That properly gave individual reality to what soon will become "the victims of Fort Hood."
Daniel Henninger discusses the question of who was at fault in the Fort Hood tragedy. This is how it always goes. For about a week after these awful incidents—such as the USS Cole bombing in Yemen (year 2000, 17 dead)—the rest of us feel, just a little, what the surviving families feel. This week, 13 American families are shattered, forever. It's a big deal, the biggest deal there is.
On Tuesday night at 9:06 p.m. in Virginia, the state executed the Beltway sniper, John Allen Muhammad, who gunned down 10 in 2002. The day before the execution, the father of a dead daughter described why he would witness it:
"I want to see what he made me see. He forced us to look at our little girl laying in a coffin. I want to see justice done. I want to see him take a last breath. I want to be able to describe it to the rest of the family."
(Excerpt) Read more at online.wsj.com ...
I lay this at the feet of AG Eric Holder and his war on the CIA. No one wants to stick there neck out. They might find a rope around it.
Ping
This needs clarification to end a lot of confusion.
Is this a war on Islam or not?
Bush said Islam is a religion of peace, why did this guy think it is a war on Islam?
Somehow reminds me of when Japanese Zeroes were spotted headed for Hawaii on Dec 7, 1941 but nobody did anything about them. I think they thought they were ours. I guess the military made the same mistake with Hasan: they thought he was OK since he was “one of ours.”
One thing I haven't seen addressed is whether or not they had the authority to collect against Hasan. Unless authorized specifically, they can't just target US citizens for signals collection. If they intercepted his calls, they can take just long enough to analyze them and determine his US citizenship before destroying the intercept.
USSID 18.
Best analysis of Ft. Hood I’ve read.
>>they can’t just target US citizens for signals collection
This guy was an Army Officer. Not just a civvie. Why would they need any authority to investigate an Army guy.
Where was Army Counter Intel/Terror or whoever. The Internal Affairs eqivalent.
The left as always is soft on crime, soft on criminals, and soft on national security.
This inexcusable lapse must be laid at the feet of Obama, Holder, and their not-so-merry band of ultra libs (including some in the military)whose ideology proves yet again, if proof be needed, that liberalism is a mental disorder.
This is BS...Way back in 2007 he was hijacking military seminars spouting pro-Muslim support.
This is the president who told his attorney general to decide if the CIA officers who water-boarded Khalid Sheikh Mohammed should be held criminally liable.
Sometimes the truth is really really ugly.
Henninger continues under the misapprehension that Leftists want Western Civilization to win.
They don’t. 0bummer and his ilk want us to lose.
So, 0bummer will do nothing. In 0bummer’s world, it is better that troops die in Afghanistan or Ft. Hood, rather than win a war for the side of Capitalism and Political Freedom that impede Leftism.
Good article but, I still want the Patriot Act gone.
It will eventually become RICO and used against Americans in direct contravention to what we intended.
We already have laws and capability to do everything the Patriot Act promised.
It was just window dressing to make it look like our Representatives were doing something.
The last descent democratic President, Harry Truman, has a plaque that said "The Buck Stops Here".
zer0 probably threw it out, but it doesn't change the fact that this is ultimately HIS responsibility.
There may be other considerations (legally and not just for our survival). I don't think it's productive to go into the details, but those doing the intercepts may not have done anything legally wrong in collecting the information.
The socialist in our White House needs a sign that says:
January 19, 2009
George W. Bush's Last Day
The Buck Stopped There
It's clear that, according to the media and the White House, no blame attaches to any action taken after that date.
You're right. All I'm doing is commenting on the phone calls. And I'm not implying anything illegal was done. It could simply be a matter not being able to do ANYTHING with the information. You can't just intercept a US citizen and then if you find something interesting report on it.
No, the smoking gun would be if the Hasan's calls were intercepted, analyzed and then permission sought to continue the investigation was denied. I bet my last dollar that's what happened.
I would agree with you on that, it is clear there was considerable unease with him based on his theology and faith and pronouncements. Seems to me any action on him was consistently nixed further up the food chain. Now, if there was empirical evidence of more than just rantings in front of other officers (alarming all by itself) and no action was taken......
Pull that string, Rep. Hoekstra!
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.