Brennan attacks dissent as helping Al Qaeda

No one seems to have noticed, but John Brennan, a high-ranking counterterrorism official in the Obama administration, recently castigated Republican critics of the White House as "playing into Al Qaeda's strategic effort," reprising an anti-dissent argument frequently used by the GOP during the Bush years:

The president’s statement that there was a “systemic failure” [to detect the attempted Christmas Day bombing of Flight 253] did not quell the political furor, and White House officials were caught off guard by the intensity of the criticism. After reading a Cheney statement that attacked Obama for only pretending to be at war with terrorists, David Axelrod angrily wrote a long statement trashing the former vice president and gave it to Dan Pfeiffer, the White House communications director, who revised it and posted on the White House Web site. The criticism got Brennan’s back up too, particularly coming from some of his former colleagues in the Bush administration.

“A lot of the knuckleheads I’ve been listening to out there on the network shows don’t know what they’re talking about,” he told me after the Christmas Day attempt. Some Republicans, including Cheney, were blatantly mischaracterizing the record, he fumed. “When they say the administration’s not at war with Al Qaeda, that is just complete hogwash.” It was the angriest I had heard him during months of conversations. “What they’re doing is just playing into Al Qaeda’s strategic effort, which is to get us to battle among ourselves instead of focusing on them,” he said. [emphasis added]

Brennan's comment comes on the heels of an even more explicit attack on anti-Obama dissent by Salon's Joan Walsh, who smeared Republican criticism of Obama as "un-American" and "traitorous" on MSNBC. These statements suggest that White House and its supporters are starting to adopt the same disreputable tactics that were used to stifle criticism of the government during the Bush administration. It's a discouraging trend.

Comments

[David]

Those who claim that the President is only pretending to be at war with terrorists point to actions supporting that POV, such as
-- Choosing to have some Gitmo prisoners tried in the US under non-military laws
-- Closing Gitmo and moving its prisoners to domestic criminal prisons
-- Giving the Christmas Day airplane bomber civilian status.

Maybe Mr. Obama is taking other actions consistent with his statement that we're at war with al Qaeda. It would have been nice if Mr. Brennan had defended the President by pointing to such actions.

[daniel rotter]

Richard Reid was given "civilian status" by the Bush administration David (even though military tribunals were already in place at the time, so this status was not a requirement), and I don't remember any Democrat suggesting that Bush was "only pretending to be at war with terrorists" because of this.

You're first two points are stronger (especially as they don't rely on a double standard), although I disagree with a. your "terrorist" automatically ="al Qaeda" equation, or b. your assumption that the only way to accurately label whether an administration can be said to having a war with x group of people is to try them under the auspices of the military. Plenty of illegal drug dealers and manufacturers were tried "under non-military laws" and sent to "domestic criminal prisons" during the Reagan administration, and I don't remember any Democrats carping that this meant that Reagan was only "pretending" to have a war on drugs.

[David]

When Bush was President, everything he did was wrong, according to liberals. He was the worst President in history, according to many of them. Now, his behavior is the standard against which Presidential behavior is judged? That's a stretch.

Daniel, setting aside comparisons to Bush and Reagan, what advantage was there to giving Abdulmutallab non-military status? It clearly harmed us, because his civilian lawyer got him to stop providing information. However, I cannot think of how it was supposed to help us.

[daniel rotter]

"Now, his behavior is the standard against which Presidential behavior is judged?"

No, his behavior is the standard against which to measure the hypocrisy of those Republicans/conservatives when Obama behaves in the exact same manner. Bush gives Reid non-military status and they stay silent. Obama does the exact same thing to Abdulmutallab and they verbally pounce on him.

"...what advantage was there to giving Abdulmutallab non-military status?"

What advantage was there to giving Reid non-military status?

"...because his civilian lawyer got him to stop providing information."

So you want to deny lawyers to all people arrested in the U.S.A. who have/might have "information," David? I think you're making a much broader argument here than you realize.

[David]

So you want to deny lawyers to all people arrested in the U.S.A. who have/might have "information," David? I think you're making a much broader argument here than you realize.

This comment shows that daniel rotter doesn't see the battle against terrorists as a war. Otherwise he wouldn't equate terrorist saboteurs with ordinary criminal defendants. IMHO we'd be better off if those working for al Qaeda or in tandem with them were handled solely by the military. A President who saw the battle as a war would strive to have the military handle these cases to the degree allowable by the courts.

[daniel rotter]

"...battle against terrorists as a war."

So EVERYTIME there is a terrorist act in the U.S., it's an act of war?

"...we'd be better off if those working for Al Qaeda or in tandem with them were handled solely by the military."

David, Richard Reid (the "shoe bomber") was tried in a civilian court under the Bush (43) Administration. He wasn't "working for al Qaeda or in tandem with them?" You're misinformed if you believe this.