White House turn on terrorby Ralph PetersSomething big is happening. Big enough to alarm the White House. So big that the administration did an abrupt about-face regarding terrorism.A week ago, failed Times Square bomber Faisal Shahzad wasn't even a Muslim, but a 40-something white male and, as Mayor Bloomberg insisted, probably an opponent of ObamaCare.Then, after Shahzad's apprehension, we were told that he was just another "one-off" in the tradition of Islamist terrorists who aren't really Islamist terrorists at all, but distraught homeowners unable to meet mortgage payments or victims of our prejudice (such as Maj. Nidal Hassan, the traitor and butcher of Fort Hood).Vigilant: In one sign of heightened alert, NYPD Emergency Service Unit members patrolled the financial district last week.Even generals who knew better lined up to deny that Shahzad was part of a terror network.Then wham! Over the weekend, the Obama administration unleashed a reverse-course media offensive -- deploying Attorney General Eric Holder, terror czar John Brennan, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and plentiful back-channel messages from staffers.Instead of Shahzad being a one-off, Brennan tied him to the Pakistani Taliban and stressed to TV viewers that there are dangers we're "taking very seriously."Clinton and others warned Pakistan that it must crack down on militant strongholds in North Waziristan, hinting that Islamabad's failure to do so might lead to direct US intervention in Cambodia (uh, sorry, that's Pakistan).But the administration's biggest policy reversal to date came from Holder, the longtime advocate of terrorist "rights," who offered one of the most belated acknowledgments in history when he told a TV network, "We're now dealing with international terrorism."Holder, of all people, now wants Congress to change the rules for Miranda rights, giving the government more time under a "public-safety exception" to permit extended questioning of terrorist suspects before arming them with lawyers.And there wasn't a single mention of "man-caused disasters" this time around. Every administration point person talked "terrorism." Next thing you know, somebody in the White House will use the term "Islamist terrorist."
And we may even be "alledgedly" back in a War on Terror. Read the rest.
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