Jan 06 Palin to Obama: It's a War, Not a Crime Spree

Sarah Palin is at it again, using her FB page to excoriate President Obama again, this time on national security:

President Obama's meeting with his top national security advisers does nothing to change the fact that his fundamental approach to terrorism is fatally flawed. We are at war with radical Islamic extremists and treating this threat as a law enforcement issue is dangerous for our nation's security. That's what happened in the 1990s and we saw the result on September 11, 2001. This is a war on terror not an "overseas contingency operation." Acts of terrorism are just that, not "man caused disasters." The system did not work. Abdulmutallab was a child of privilege, radicalized and trained by organized jihadists, not an "isolated extremist" who traveled to a land of "crushing poverty." He is an enemy of the United States, not just another criminal defendant.

President Obama and his staff have repeatedly said that "the system failed." That's rubbish. What failed was that President Obama took his eye off the ball. Instead of paying the proper amount of attention to defeating the jihadists, President Obama focused on health care, pork, taking over banks, more pork, taking over GM and Chrysler and more pork.

What failed is that President Obama's, and Atty. Gen. Holder's, policies are predicated on closing Gitmo rather than on preventing future terrorist attacks.

It's time that this toy president pulled his head out of his posterior and got serious about protecting the United States.

John Brennan, the President's top counterterrorism adviser, bizarrely claimed "there are no downsides or upsides" to treating terrorists as enemy combatants. That is absurd. There is a very serious downside to treating them as criminals: terrorists invoke their "right" to remain silent and stop talking.

When I first heard Brennan's answer, I had to hit rewind, twice, to be sure I'd heard what I thought I'd heard. Unfortunately, I heard the same thing three straight times.

Several important points need to be made about this. Here are the most important of my suggestions:

• President Obama's starting premise is wrong and it needs to change ASAP.
• Janet Napolitano is vastly underqualified. She needs to be fired ASAP.
• John Brennan needs to stop being President Obama's yes man. If he insists on playing the role of President Obama's yes man, then he needs to be fired ASAP.

Scrapping President Obama's policies is only the first step. It's important to replace them with time-tested policies. President Obama loves talking about "the failed policies of the last eight years." If he doesn't start reverting back to President Bush's policies soon, he'll be seen as the failure. For all the criticism that he got from lightweights like President Obama, the undeniable truth is that President Bush's results in fighting terrorists and preventing terrorist attacks were pretty solid, considerably better than President Obama's record thus far.

The Obama administration isn't the gang that couldn't shoot straight. They're the gang that won't use all the weapons in their arsenal. Yes, they've effectively used drones to kill terrorists. That's nice but there's more to winning the war against the jihadists than introducing them to their 72 virgins.

What intel have they gained in interrogating terrorists? Has President Obama made interrogating would-be terrorists a high priority? Based on Attorney General Holder's decisions, I can't say for certain that that's a priority. In fact, this administration's decision to Mirandize Abdulmutallab tells me that they haven't put a high priority on interrogating terrorists.

If I was forced to give this administration grades on fighting jihadists, I'd give them a B for killing terrorists and an F- for interrogating terrorists. For an overall grade, I'd put that at a D- because getting information that'd prevent future terrorist attacks is more important than killing the jihadists.

Once again, Sarah Palin has exposed the "fatal flaws" in President Obama's policies. That's pretty good for a woman that the elites think of as a joke and a backwoods hick.

Comments welcome at LFR.