OBAMA'S TERROR OUTRAGE – AT 9:11 A.M. ET:  The president will address the nation this week marking the withdrawal of American combat units from Iraq.  If he follows his usual practice, he'll demonstrate a complete lack of class by failing to acknowledge the role played by former President George W. Bush in staying the course, originating the "surge," and seeing it through. 

But there's another outrage being committed – this administration's failure to bring to justice those who've committed horrible acts against us.  The distinguished historian, Arthur Herman, documents just what's happened, putting the blame squarely on the president:

Americans are learning there's one minority group President Obama is never afraid to offend: families of victims of Islamist terror.

First, Attorney General Eric Holder wanted to try Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, mastermind of the 9/11 attack, in lower Manhattan -- which nearly everyone, even Mayor Bloomberg (eventually), realized would be a standing insult to the memory of KSM's victims.

Then came Obama's "I was for it before I was against it" stance on the Ground Zero mosque -- another slap at 9/11 victims' families.

Now, last Friday, we learned that "no charges are either pending or contemplated" against one of the deadliest and most dangerous al Qaeda operatives, Abd al Rahim al Nashiri, mastermind of the October 12, 2000, bombing of USS Cole that killed 17 sailors and officers and wounded dozens more.

And...

After 9/11 Bush and other Americans understood that we were in a war, not a "Law and Order" episode. They understood that such a war required more effective instruments than our civilian courts and the normal legal process. The time-tested, Supreme Court-approved system of military tribunals for trying enemy combatants was one such instrument.

Obama told his political allies on the left that as president he'd turn Bush's War on Terror upside down. The terrorists would now get constitutional protections; and those who fought against them would go to jail as "war criminals."

Now, Obama's popularity is in a tailspin...If he starts even one military trial of an alleged terrorist, even one who attacked a military installation, he loses whatever shred of credibility he still has with his political base.

It is incredible to think that a crowd dominated by Code Pink and modern Jane Fondas may well have more influence over the fate of captured terrorists than the families of victims.

"It seems like nobody really cares," says Gloria Clodfelter, whose 21-year-old son died in the Cole bombing. Like the KSM trial and Obama's stance on the Ground Zero mosque, the decision to suspend the al Nashiri proceedings has nothing to do with justice and a lot to do with politics. The shame is that, once again, those who suffer are the families of those killed by terror, not the terrorists themselves.

Maybe Americans will finally come to realize what we elected in 2008.  And maybe reasonable Democrats will come to realize what's happened to their once-great party.

August 30, 2010