I apologize for the multiple diaries, but some things are time-sensitive. Iran is, and so is this case of the Christmas “knicker-bomber” which is quickly spiraling out of control; from a departmental security slip-up, to a full blown scandal, with criminal, or at least serious legal overtones.

It’s no longer that Obama should fire Eric Holder. The Republican Party should insist on his impeachment, and his case be turned over to either a special prosecutor or his own DOJ. This is no longer a case of incompetence disguised by brash arrogance. There were serious legal and security breaches every step of the way, which, as serious as the bombing attempt was, overshadow it…

…for the fact that one man, outside the normal chain of command in a terrorist event can circumvent that chain, then, later, cover up the level and nature of his involvement, is not just frightening. It is criminal.

This is my belief.

Going back to the January 20 hearing before the Senate committee headed by Lugar, the most stunning admission by adminsitration officials…the “other” Janet, Homeland Security chief, Napolitano, National Security chief Blair, FBI Director Mueller, is that none of them knew that Abdulmuttab had been mirandized, and hushed up. Eric Holder stated the decision was his.

That really isn’t enough, at least for the intrepid investigative reporter. As any of you lawyers know, there is a chain of evidence and a chain of custody, both of which detail every movement of the bomber from the time he was wrestled down on the aircraft over Detroit, to the time he was marched in front of judge and arraigned….and every shred of evidence taken in that process.

To say “the FBI” did all this misses the point entirely. The FBI has a boss that stands between them and the Attorney General. The FBI didn’t get involved until the plane landed, which means the pilot had radio’d ahead and agents had been dispatched. Those agents had names. Jones, Smith. And those agents had marching orders, from a superior…who wasn’t skiing at Aspen. There is a chain there, too…who told who what, and when? And how?

For if Eric Holder is being truthful in saying that this was his call, alone, and Napolitano, Blair and Mueller all say they weren’t consulted, then how did a mid-level FBI field agent in Detroit manage to totally circumvent his own chain of command and pass the ball off to some one in DOJ, or perhaps Holder directly? I am fairly certain that agent-in-charge in Detroit does not have Holder’s personal number in his Rolodex.

I don’t know about you, but if I were Napolitano or Blair, both of who are co-equals in government with Holder (or nearly so) I’d have kicked Holder’s door in within 24 hours. And Mueller should have done it even quicker, firing on the spot the agent(s) who circumvented the chain of command and his authority. Or, is FBI working under some internal marching orders no one knows about?

The idea that agents on the ground either winged it, or immediate supervisors winged it, is not an option here. This is not, and was not ever a case of mistaken “crimes”, i.e., a simple felony versus a terrorist act.

There are already lies aplenty here, and those lies began spewing only hours after the bomber’s arrest. Only who’s telling them and why?

I didn’t follow the senate hearings closely, but from the sound bytes, while revealing, they were as investigatively deep as the proverbial pool of warm horse urine. I wasn’t whispering in M’Cain’s ear (I’d have bitten it) or Sessions, but the devil is in the details here, and the people with the details hadn’t even been asked to testify. Nor is the Senate asking the right questions, in my view.

Of course, since those original 20 January hearings it has been revealed that the bomber is singing like a bird, (I doubt it) along with the usual deflections that this is the way Bush handled the shoe bomber too (nyah, nyah)…so everything is working out anyway, almost as if we’d treated him like a terrorist from the git-go. See where the White House and MSM want to redirect public angst and anger…hey, no harm, no real foul? Just as soon as we give KSM a fair trial before hanging him, we’ll convict this guy, too, depending on the deal he cut, then send off to Spandau where no one can ever talk to him again.

But without fully understanding the chain of custody…who cuffed him, who transported him and on whose orders, and where did those orders come from? By phone? Email? Fax?…this is all deflection. For the criminal analyst recreating this chain of events, then filling in the blanks, it can be a thing of beauty.

The Congress should have asked these questions from the outset, and no, there should have been no reason to wait a month for an internal review (It was close to month when the Senate opened hearings anyway.) Considering how he was screwed over by DOJ and his own subordinates, Mueller should have (probably did) instigated one the next day, and could have had a full report on his desk the day after that.

Seriously, all this can be known inside a day, just by sitting the people down, taking theit statements, and begin connecting the dots on the chain of custody and time line. Those original after-action reports have all probably disappeared, or been edited, but It wonn’t do to allow the agencies with the culpability, the most to hide, to do their own internal review as to why a man with so much to tell, and so wanting to tell it, is talking to his lawyer and not trained interrogators. That’s why Congressional oversight is there in the first place.

Either Eric Holder called this, or he is ‘covering”, at a great price, for someone else.

In either case, “the people” have no standing to intervene in this case, and investigate it more thoroughly, except through the auspices of their elected representatives. Both Boehner and Jeff Sessions should know, that if we do win back one of the Houses in November this case is coming back on-line, in all its former glory.

Just one more reason we should win. Putting Holder in jail is just one more bumper sticker I’d like to see this fall.

(Oh, if I’ve misstated any facts here, please correct me.)