Putting the Justice Department on the Case

Yesterday evening, I read a brief headline on The Drudge Report. The gist of the headline was that Jean Francois Kerry, along with several of his liberal friends in the United States Congress, had contacted the United States Justice Department to ask for an investigation into "illegal coordination" between the Bush Campaign and the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth.

Now many people will comment on the hypocritical nature of this request coming from the Democrats. But I think there is a much more salient, and much more subtle point to be made here.

Over the past several weeks, the John Ashcroft's Justice Department has been very visible. Why? Because they have recently had a series of arrests/indictments of individuals/organizations located in the United States who are actively engaged in terrorist cells. In other words, the Justice Department is kicking butt domestically on the war on terror.

In fact, the press conferences have been so frequent, that many on the left (Yes, Josh Marshall and Oliver Willis, I'm talking to you) have made an issue of "questioning the timing/motivation" behind all of the public attention that the Justice Department has been receiving.

But even as the Justice Department continues to kick butt, the left has been making a seperate critique on the War on Terror: That Bush needlessly and recklessly diverted precious resources away from the War on Terror when he made the decision to commit troops to the liberation of Iraq.

Which leaves us with an interesting question: Isn't the request that the Democrats/Kerry have made to have the Justice Department investigate "criminal wrongdoing" in the Swift Boat ads a diversion of resources away from the War on Terror? After all, what would most Americans rather see: a federal prosecutor busting Al Qaeda cells in the US, or that same prosecutor assigned to investigate why Republican contributors are inclined to support an anti-Kerry group?

What conclusion, then can one draw from this episode?

That in their desperate pursuit for power, the liberals are more than willing to weaken the Justice Departments anti-terrorism efforts by diverting precious resources.

And they wonder why Americans don't trust them on National Security matters.

I yield the floor.