January 5, 2010 5:52 PM
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Sarah Palin: Obama's Terrorism Approach "Fatally Flawed"
(AP)
The same day the president met with his national security team to discuss the security reviews he ordered after the alleged attempt to blow up a plane on Christmas Day, Palin posted a note on Facebook criticizing the administration's response to the event.
Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, who allegedly attempted to blow up the plane headed for Detroit, Mich., "is an enemy of the United States, not just another criminal defendant," Palin wrote. Abdulmutallab is currently in federal custody, in which he told U.S. investigators he received training and instructions from al Qaeda operatives in Yemen.
"It simply makes no sense to treat an al Qaeda-trained operative willing to die in the course of massacring hundreds of people as a common criminal," Palin wrote. "Reports indicate that Abdulmutallab stated there were many more like him in Yemen but that he stopped talking once he was read his Miranda rights. President Obama's advisers lamely claim Abdulmutallab might be willing to agree to a plea bargain – pretty doubtful you can cut a deal with a suicide bomber."
Special Report: The Christmas Day Terror Attack
She added, "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."
Palin fails to address the fact that the Bush administration prosecuted "shoe bomber" Richard Reid, an al Qaeda operative, in civilian court, and he is now serving a life term in maximum-security prison.
The former 2008 vice presidential candidate also says that "acts of terrorism are just that, not 'man caused disasters,'" invoking the infamous phrasing from Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano.
"I was totally misinterpreted in a sense of what I was trying to communicate," Napolitano later told the New York Times. "It was just a mistake. In the editing process, that phrase, usually it's 'terrorism or other man-caused disasters.'"
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Stephanie Condon Stephanie Condon is a political reporter for CBSNews.com.
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