The most feckless of the Sunday morning talk show hosts (and yes I do mean worse than Chris Wallace... it is possible to be biased & competent) actually accused the Obama Justice Department of politicizing the trials of 9/11 plotter suspects! I really see this as a new low in terms of the Washington establishment's tendency to grab a hold of a narrative and stick with it to the point of lunacy. You gotta read the transcript to understand...
MR. GREGORY: New York doesn't want it. New York doesn't have the resources for it. You just deployed all these FBI agents to catch Shahzad. What if they had to protect a trial of KSM? I mean, it's fairly clear that it doesn't belong in New York, according to elected officials and other law enforcement officials, and yet there is this basically inaction on this issue of where the trial is. Is this being overly politicized by this administration and by you?
MR. HOLDER: No, it's not being overly politicized. What we're trying to do is come up with the best decision that we can. We're taking our time, we're considering all of our options. We want to make sure that we put this trial in the place where it can best be held.
All I can say is WTF!!!??? Actually I can say a little bit more... but that sums it pretty well.
If I'm Eric Holder, my response to this idiocy goes something like this:
If you want to know what politicizing the terrorism issue looks like, look no further than the Republicans and the previous Administration. Ever since 9/11 they've been in the business of using this issue for political gain and they're still at it.
That's why we're having this conversation. Instead of letting me do my job as the nation's top law enforcement officer, they've chosen to ratchet up the rhetoric, and claim that trying these people in U.S. courts poses some kind of security risk, even though this very thing has been done hundreds of times successfully. We have tried and convicted hundreds of terrorists in this country. We can do it again, especially when the evidence against those terrorists is so compelling.
Let me ask you this David Gregory: When was the last time you asked one of these guys if THEY are politicizing the issue of terrorism? To suggest that this Administration is trying to use this issue for political gain is like saying a dishwasher washes the dishes because he's trying to impress the customers!
The bottom line is we have a job to do, or rather, a mess to clean up. The previous Administration really jammed things up for us by torturing these people and not setting up a system that passes constitutional muster. They're own conservative Supreme Court ruled against them for crying out loud! Now we have to figure out what to do. And I'd really appreciate it if we could do that job without having to respond to outrageous inquiries like this.