Rep. Delahunt Happy to Make Administration Official Al Qaeda Target
Al Qaeda, David Addington, Democrats, Politics, War on Terror, William Delahunt
The poisonous politics of Washington turned even more toxic yesterday, when William Delahunt, democrat congressman from Massachusetts’ 10th District (Martha’s Vinyard, Nantucket, Cape Cod, and the South Shore) expressed satisfaction that Congressional Hearings on treatment of illegal combatant detainees had made Vice Presidential Chief of Staff David Addington visible to al Qaeda.
Addington declined to discuss in open hearings conversations within the administration about interrogation techniques and associated legalities, alluding to other statements by himself and by the President expressing the inadvisability of public exposure of the secret deliberations of the US Government to the enemy in time of war. “Al Qaeda may watch C-Span,” Addington concluded.
To which Delahunt responded:
“I’m sure they [al Qaeda] are watching, and I’m glad they finally have a chance to see you, Mr. Addington, given your penchant for being unobtrusive.”
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Mr. Delahunt’s disapproval of the Bush Administration’s treatment of illegal combatant prisoners, captured bearing arms against the United States or conspiring to attempt the mass murder of American civilians, is so great that he wishes for al Qaeda to avenge itself on an Administration official.
Democrats have a long record of criminalizing policy differences. The expression of an implicit invitation to foreign enemies in time of war to kill policy opponents represents a new level and a new kind of politics.