| I can kind of see Candace Miller's strategy at work here ... if federal authorities hadn't read the underwear bomber his Miranda rights, it would have opened a giant, gaping hole through which he could walk away from federal custody. That, in turn would be proof positive that the civilian court system isn't the place for terrorism suspects. Washington -- Rep. Candice Miller, R-Harrison Township, called Friday for Attorney General Eric Holder to testify before Congress about his decision to read the Christmas Day bombing suspect his Miranda rights to remain silent when arrested. Miller, who sits on the House Homeland Security Committee, has sharply criticized the Obama administration for not treating Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab as an enemy combatant. ...
Meanwhile, it turns out, Peter Hoekstra -- the second of Michigan's Pillars of Hercules in Republican homeland security circles -- was briefed about the underwear bomber having his rights read to him the day he was charged as a civilian criminal suspect. If Hoekstra thought it meant that the terrorists had won the war, it's something he apparently kept to himself ... or at least away from Candace Miller. Hoekstra himself is miffed that the Obama administration said that the underwear bomber was again talking -- despite having not had one fingernail pulled out -- on the grounds that al-Qaida bases crucial security decision making based on what they read from the Associated Press. “I do find it an interesting strategy that we hastily call a briefing to let America and our friends and our enemies in the Middle East know that he’s now singing like a canary,” said Rep. Pete Hoekstra, R-Mich., the top Republican on the House Intelligence Committee.
Yes, it is interesting, isn't it? Anyway, so what we've learned from the last week is that a person accused of committing a crime on American soil is, in the course of his incarceration under civilian federal authorities, giving important information without the need to waterboard him, or kick him in the stomach, or rip his fingernails out, or stick a burlap sack with an enraged rat over his head, or anything. We also know that it turns out that the one case in which we were told that torture not only worked but also spared Western Civilization from the despotic thumb of Islamofacist commie Mooslems (except the one in the White House) turned out to be something of a fairy tale. But, what has Candace Miller worked up is that the criminal suspect was read his rights, and what has Peter Hoekstra worked up is the belief that al-Qaida didn't think until a month and a half after to consider whether any of their other operations might be compromised by the fact that the underwear bomber was in custody. |
