Sarah Palin Vs. John Brennan on Counterterroism
Posted by James Lamond
For those who missed it this weekend, Sarah Palin put on quite a show. At the teabagger conference the former vice presidential candidate touched upon national security, specifically counterterrorism. About the Abdulmutallab case she said:
The choice was only question him for 50 minutes and then read his Miranda rights. The administration says then there are no downsides or upsides to treating terrorists like civilian criminal defendants. But a lot of us would beg to differ. For example, there are questions we would have liked this foreign terrorist to answer before he lawyered up and invoked our U.S. constitutional right to remain silent... There are questions that we would have liked answered before he lawyered up, like where exactly were you trained and by whom. You are bragging about all these other terrorists just like you, who are they? When and where will they try to strike next?
Palin joins her colleagues in the Senate, Senators Collins, Bond and McConnell -who said Larry King gives a tougher interview than the FBI -in insisting to go against the facts to push the meme the U.S. did not properly interrogate the Underwear Bomber. It has been shown time and again that this is not the case. In fact the FBI only read him his rights after he had stopped talking. In addition, they continue to ignore the fact that Richard Reid was read his Miranda Rights when in 2001 -during the Bush administration -he was arrested for similarly trying to blow up a commercial flight. So why the continued misleading on the facts and double standard?
John Brennan -the career CIA official, who describes himself as neither a Democrat nor a Republican -explains:
On Christmas night, I called a number of senior members of Congress. I spoke to Senators McConnell and Bond, I spoke to Representative Boehner and Hoekstra. I explained to them that he was in FBI custody, that Mr. Abdulmutallab was, in fact, talking, that he was cooperating at that point. They knew that "in FBI custody" means that there's a process then you follow as far as Mirandizing and presenting him in front of a magistrate. None of those individuals raised any concerns with me at that point. They didn't say, "Is he going into military custody?" "Is he going to be Mirandized?" They were very appreciative of the information, we told them we'd keep them informed, and that's what we did. So there's been a--quite a bit of an outcry after the fact where, again, I'm just very concerned on the behalf of the counterterrorism professionals throughout our government that politicians continue to make this a political football and are using it for whatever political or partisan purposes, whether they be Democrats or Republicans.
For some reason conservatives, who claim to be the ones who take national security so seriously, are the ones who don't seem to respect the men and women who serve in America's national security apparatus . From the FBI to the intelligence community to the foreign service to America's veterans and even active military, conservatives in congress have continued to seek political gain at the expense of the the people serving in America's national security apparatus.


