Free Republic

John Brennan, President Obama’s top terrorism adviser, rallied to the defense of the administration Sunday, taking on critic-in-chief Dick Cheney and explaining the deep-seated “systemic failure” that Obama mentioned in comments last week. Mr. Obama has come under heavy criticism from Republicans since an attempt to blow up Northwest Flight 253 over Detroit failed on Christmas Day, primarily because the man charged in the incident, Nigerian Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, was on a US terrorism watch list. Mr. Cheney has arguably been the most pointed in his criticism of Obama, declaring last week that the president “is trying to pretend that...

The Obama administration’s handling of the Christmas Day terror plot has been “schizophrenic” says King. “It’s reflective of their handling of other incidents. They still haven’t given us any information on Fort Hood. Even with the gate crashers, they’ve refused to give us on information on communications between the White House social secretary and the Secret Service. They’re giving us nothing and Democrats in Congress are very reluctant to have any meaningful investigations.” Politics, not national security, is driving these decisions, says King. “They’re holding back because they don’t want to share embarrassing material.”

As I noted previously, Kurt Haskell - a passenger who was on board Northwest Airline flight 253 on Friday - claims that after the flight had landed, a bomb-sniffing dog was sent in to check the bags, and that something was detected in a passenger’s carry-on bag. Mr. Haskell retold the story to Fox News anchor, Gregg Jarret on Monday. The following is an excerpt from the interview: JARRETT: Fast forward... The plane lands safely, although, obviously, given the terror attack or the attempted terror attack, a great deal of commotion. And then you see someone else being arrested other...