The Underwear Bomber and the Shoe Bomber

I'm getting tired of reading Obama Administration officials state that Mirandizing the Underwear Bomber (I won't type his name because it is too long, but you know who I mean) was no problem, 'cause it's what the Bush Administration did with Richard Reid (The Shoe Bomber). This is ridiculous, and Dana Perino and Bill Burck have a nice rejoinder for it here.

Reid's attempted attack occurred a little more than 90 days after the terrible events of 9-11--the country, the Administration, the courts, the military--everyone was still largely groping their way forward in determining how to prosecute this war against Islamic extremism. In fact, there were NO military commissions empaneled to deal with such a situation--though there soon would be.

Any suggestion that 8 years later--after all we've learned and all we've done--a "Bush" team would have Mirandized the underwear bomber--enabling him to "lawyer up"--is just loony. The team in there now just reflexively looks at these events as law enforcement issues, not acts of war worthy of intelligence exploitation.


More on the arrest of the Shoe Bomber.