I was sitting in a hotel room in Vegas watching CNN when the news broke about a light plane crashing—quite intentionally—into that Austin, Tex., building where 200 Internal Revenue Service employees worked. In minutes they had the name of the American kamikaze pilot and quotes from the rambling suicide note he left on the internet.

Andrew Joseph Stack III also set fire to the home he shared with his wife and 12-year-old daughter, who recently split because he had been acting strangely of late.
Stack, who worked free-lance in computer technology, had …

On a dark winter’s night so snowy
Who wouldn’t go to a poetry showy?
Hosted by McHenry County College
Showcasing terrorist’s emotions and knowledge
Be prepared  to be charmed when you go
to hear Marc Falkoff present “Poems from Guantanamo”
And hear the tales and lore
at 7 p.m. Feb. 4
If it is a mullah’s wisdom that you seek
Come hear the former detainees speak

From the White House
Sec. 3. Closure of Detention Facilities at Guantánamo. The detention facilities at Guantánamo for individuals covered by this order shall be closed as soon as practicable, and no later than 1 year from the date of this order. If any individuals covered by this order remain in detention at Guantánamo at the time of closure of those detention facilities, they shall be returned to their home country, released, transferred to a third country, or transferred to another United States detention facility in a manner consistent with law and the national security and foreign policy interests of the …

I have just discovered the newest Republican strategy. Possibly it is even larger than a strategy. It may be a belief system.
I speak here of the magical power of incantation.

Soon after the underpants bomber proved himself no more skilled than the shoe bomber of yore, the recent ex-vice-president snarled with his most ferocious, fang-baring snarl that Barack Obama has made us less safe because he never uses the ex-v-p’s favorite phrase, “the war on terror.”
Quickly the right-wing echo-chamber was bubbling and seething with the sentiment. Congresspersons, broadcasters, tea-sippers and …

The State Department says it has revoked the U.S. visa of the Nigerian man suspected of trying to blow up a Northwest Airlines flight over Detroit on Christmas Day.
Spokesman P.J. Crowley said Tuesday that Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab’s visa was one of several the agency has revoked since the Dec. 25 incident as the result of a review into security procedures ordered by President Barack Obama. Crowley would not say when the decision on Abdulmutallab’s visa was made or how many others had been withdrawn.
HT James Taranto

For longer than many people have been alive, David Broder, 80, originally of Chicago Heights, Illinois and Bloom township high school, has been referred to as the Dean of the Washington press corps. I’ve known Broder of The Washington Post for four decades but always reserved my leaks to Bob Novak because (a) Novak would know what to do with a juicy tidbit and (b) Broder specializes in Deep, Deep thumb-sucking opinion pieces that make fresh news bytes seem oddly tacky and inappropriate.

Broder’s deep-set intellectual’s eyes range far-far away from …

At least a dozen former Guantánamo Bay inmates have rejoined al-Qaeda to fight in Yemen, The Times has learnt, amid growing concern over the ability of the country’s Government to accept almost 100 more former inmates from the detention centre.
The Obama Administration promised to close the Guantánamo facility by January 22, a deadline that it will be unable to meet. The 91 Yemeni prisoners in Guantánamo make up the largest national contingent among the 198 being held.
Read more at the London Times
Read more about Thomson Prison

“We will not rest until we find all who were involved and hold them accountable.” — Pres. Obama, discussing NWA 253, December 28, 2009.
Photo: Pres. Obama waves to the crowd after his game of golf in Hawaii, Dec. 31, 2009. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)
More at Newsbusters

Republicans won’t win back Illinois by demagoguing the possible transfer of Guantanamo Bay detainees to a largely vacant state prison in northwestern Illinois.
They’ve got too many winning issues — the bollixed state of Illinois, corruption and malfeasance, the cosmic health care legislation, President Barack Obama’s foreign policy weaknesses — to spend their time whining about the supposed dangers of depositing suspected terrorists in the Thomson Correctional Center. It’s as if Republicans were desperate for something to club Democrats with, so they settled on the most emotional issue they could find.
Read …

A state legislator wants to fast-track hearings on the possible sale of a northwestern Illinois prison to the U.S. government so federal authorities could eventually use the complex to house Guantanamo Bay detainees.
State Sen. Jeff Schoenberg, who co-chairs a panel that reviews state facility closings before any sale, said he’ll act “with all deliberate speed” and try to launch hearings on the Thomson Correctional Center by the end of December.
“The area’s desperate for jobs, and this would appear to be a responsible way to boost the local economy,” said the …