Lightning Round - 010410

It's a rare lunchtime edition of this popular feature!

• This is one of the better examples of counter-intuitive thinking that I've come across in a long time. Norway is having remarkable success treating staph infections, especially the horribly nasty version known as MRSA, by cutting down greatly on the amount of antibiotics that are used in hospitals.
• Speaking of counter-intuitive thinking, check out this column from Willie Brown, best known for his tenure at the helm of the profligate California legislature. He touches on a number of topics, but has a real Nixon-goes-to-China moment when he tells his Bay Area audience the following about the intractable budget crisis in California: "But at some point, someone is going to have to get honest about the fact that 80 percent of the state, county and city budget deficits are due to employee costs." That is a problem, and not just in California, I might add.
• Allahpundit over at Hot Air noticed that top Obama advisors no longer believe the 2007 NIE regarding Iran's nuclear program. They are about 2 1/2 years late to the party, but I'm glad they've finally arrived. Stop by the bar, we'll pour you a drink and there won't be any Kool-Aid in it.
• This probably deserves a separate post, but I'll include it here for now. Our portside friend Rich called to our attention the deep thoughts of John Brennan, who has the often-thankless task of manning the Homeland Security and counterterrorism desk for the Obama administration. Brennan was making the rounds of the talk shows and visited with Chris Wallace of evil Faux News yesterday, where he had this fascinating exchange about the notion of why the Obama administration has decided to use the criminal justice system in dealing with Umar Abdulmullatab, better known these days as the Eunuchbomber:

WALLACE: Perhaps the most controversial step that President Obama took after the Christmas day terror attack was to charge Abdulmutallab as a criminal defendant.

He was cooperating with authorities. He was giving information about his links to Al Qaida. But after he got a criminal lawyer, he reportedly stopped cooperating, stopped talking.

Why not treat him as an enemy combatant, put him in a secret prison, use the interrogation techniques that President Obama has specifically approved, and try to get more information out of him?

BRENNAN: Well, we have an array of tools that we will use, and we want to make sure we maintain flexibility as far as how we deal with these individuals.

Now, let's get the facts on the table. He was arrested on U.S. soil on a plane on -- in the Detroit airplane. He was, in fact, talking to people who were detaining him.

There were people who were arrested during the previous administration -- Richard Reid, the shoe bomber; Zacarias Moussaoui; Padilla; Iyman Faris; others -- all were charged and tried in criminal court and sentenced, some cases to life imprisonment.

Just because somebody is going to be put into the criminal legal process does not mean that they're -- we don't have other opportunities to get information from them.

WALLACE: But wait, wait. Let me ask you specifically. After Abdulmutallab got lawyered up, did he stop cooperating with authorities? Did he stop talking?

BRENNAN: I'm not going to address exactly what he did before or after he was -- talked with his lawyer. We got information. We continue to have opportunities to do that.

As you talk with the lawyers and you talk with the individuals, as they recognize what they're facing as far as the charges, conviction and possible sentence, there are opportunities to continue to talk about it.

FBI has some of the best interrogators and debriefers in the world, and so I'm confident that we're going to continue to be able to work this system and see whether or not...

WALLACE: But once he gets his Miranda rights, he doesn't have to speak at all.

BRENNAN: He doesn't have to, but he knows that there are certain things that are on the table, and if he wants to, in fact, engage with us in a productive manner, there are ways that he can do that.

WALLACE: But why not treat him -- you certainly had the right -- have -- had -- still have the right to treat him as an enemy combatant. Why not do that?

If he has more actionable intelligence about future attacks, and you say there's a real possibility of that, doesn't the president have a responsibility to do everything legal he can to get that information?

BRENNAN: And the president has that responsibility, and the Department of Justice makes these determinations about what's the best tool to use. And in this instance, we felt as though it was the best way to address Mr. Abdulmutallab's case.

We'll continue to look at each of the cases individually and proceed accordingly.

WALLACE: Just briefly, what's the downside of treating him as an enemy combatant?

BRENNAN: There's -- there are no downsides or upsides in particular cases. What we're trying to do is to make sure we apply the right tool in the right instance. In this case, we made a determination that he should be tried in U.S. criminal court.

Emphasis mine. That's called explaining without explaining. There is a reason that the decision was made, but Brennan isn't telling us. Would you like to know the reason? I would. I wish Wallace would have pressed the matter further, but as the transcript indicates, they moved on. The entire transcript is worth reading and it does include the language excoriating Dick Cheney that our Chicago-based correspondent likes so much.