the streets of bellfast and derry. so there he is not passing blame, saying they re just casual what is basically a military campaign. i know all these arts, you know them, neil. it is a war. what did you make of his decision to do something which i find appalling, to cast this giant net it is joe mccarthy, like everybody in the state department is corrupt, every intellectual. my mother used to talk like this occasionally, i know how it goes. your thoughts. i think it s a huge mistake, one thing that i learned from northern ireland is you cannot demonize an entire group of people. they were often called a terrorist community, and people took an stream view. within that community there were 90% of the people who wanted a peaceful path and when that path presented itself, they took it and created one of the great peace proses in the 20th century. pete knew that. pete was on the ground.
world where it is draw on that section of the world? the threat is worldwide and we can t assume that we don t have the threat here. times square, the underwear bomber, they might be saying what is going on over there in the united states? the fact of the matter is that the terrorist movement is not only worldwide but it is continuing. and we have a culture which expects things to be resolved immediately, television culture which expects a program to last 30 minutes with four commercial breaks and then there to be a resolution. the terrorist community is part of an inner generational culture. they say if we don t get it done our grand children will get it done. if they don t get it done their grand children will get it done. we need to be on guard defending freedom for the long haul and understand it is a threat around the world and not just something we can defend there or over here. we have to be defensive and cooperate in the defense of freedoms of other nations
53 hours, eric holder and white house officials touting that s all it took to inhabit times square suspect. here now former u.s. attorney general john ashcroft. good to have you. what do you make of this? i m grateful this individual was apprehended and even more importantly that the device was disabled before it caused harm. we have serious exposure, it s a serious this is another wakeup call the terrorist community wants to disrupt american freedom and it s our responsibility to do everybody we can to protected it. this guy became a naturalized u.s. citizen which is quite a process and he cleared the bells and whistles. how did that happen? it happened in the normal
that was going on. i was never in any fear that we were in danger of losing him. never in any fear of danger of losing him. that doesn t necessarily mean, shepard, he was known and his whereabouts was known throughout the entire sequence of events. shepard: we gets reports of increased chatter in the terrorist community as we describe it any reports like that now? the white house will not acknowledge publicly that there is an increase in the number of or severity, potential severity of terrorist attacks. but this has been heavy period, shepard. let s think about it. there has been a real number of high profile cases. one remembered based in chicago. david was arrested for traveling to india and possibly putting together a plot similar to the one in mumbai here in america. then, of course, there is umar faruq abdulmutallab the christmas day failed bomber and naji bullah zazi who had that
that they were those names had to be released. those names immediately went into the terrorist community and when the terrorist community knows what you know and who you have been surveilling, they change their conduct, change their behavior, and it i am pairs your ability to monitor things. so there are risks associated with certain kind of trials, risks that flow to the question of national security. megyn: let me pose this to you. two former bush administration lawyers who womb of whom worked underd one of whom worked under you. and jack goldsmith who was an assistant attorney general came out with an interesting piece defending eric holder and president obama on this decision. they spoke to the point up just raised saying in terrorist trials over the past 15 years federal prosecutors and judges are gained extensive experience