Blinding justice.

ITEM: "There has been a lot of talk about whether there was urgency or lack of urgency. We really don't care about the names, we care about what actions were taken," September 11 commission member Jamie Gorelick, a former Justice Department official, commented on NBC's Today show on April 12. "There is a major game of finger-pointing going on here. Our job is to get to the bottom of it."

BETWEEN THE LINES: Jamie Gorelick, who served as deputy attorney general under Janet Reno, is hardly unbiased. Her appointment to the 9-11 commission was, by any realistic definition, a conflict of interest. Indeed, there is evidence that she was, at the very least, culpable in the Justice Department's negligence that helped lead to the terrorism being investigated.

Yes, there is plenty of blame to go around. Nevertheless, having Gorelick sit in judgment on her colleagues and former boss is akin to having the proverbial fox guard the henhouse. A Gorelick directive, declassified by Attorney General John Ashcroft, is widely blamed for strengthening a "wall" that stopped counterterrorism agents from communicating with federal prosecutors. As she wrote in the 1995 memo, the FBI and federal prosecutors should, for the sake of appearance, "go beyond what is legally required," lest the alleged rights of terrorists be infringed upon.

While finger-pointing continues about past failures to prevent terrorism, invitations are still being handed out to terrorists who could commit future crimes. Consider the 11 to 12 million illegal immigrants in this country. At least 300,000 such illegals have deportation orders pending, according to the Federation for American Immigration Reform. They can't be found! This includes about 6,000 illegals from terrorism-supporting nations.