Pre-9/11 Intel and Patrick Fitzgerald

Liberals and Democrats all think that Patrick Fitzgerald botched the single most important investigation he was tasked with. That would be the Rove case in which "Fitzmas" never arrived.

Interestingly, that was not the biggest case he was tasked with. The Ali Mohamed case was far, far more important (except to liberals to whom nothing was more important than getting Karl Rove):

Mohamed worked his triple-cross as U.S. authorities were -- Lance argues -- distracted with inner-politics, their own lives, the mob and even a horiffic murder. But more than he does with anyone else, Lance points an accusing finger at celebrated U.S. attorney Patrick Fitzgerald, who directed the FBI's elite bin Laden squad, which, Lance argues, allowed Mohamed to remain an active al-Qaida agent.

Lance writes Fitzgerald and other top officials ignored important al-Qaida-related evidence, including proof in 1996 of a liquid-based airliner bomb -- a precursor to last August's plot revealed by British intelligence.

Lance pinpoints how, in 1991, the FBI, knowing of a New Jersey mail box store with direct links to al-Qaida, failed to keep it under watch. Just six years later, two of the 9/11 hijackers got their fake IDs at the same location.

Read it all as they say. Here's more background on Mohamed.