In separate venues Wednesday, two high-level government officials defended the U.S. record against terrorism, saying the government has been highly successful at preventing terrorist attacks and putting terrorists in prison.

Deputy Attorney General Paul J. McNulty went to the American Enterprise Institute where he said that the Department of Justice had secured 253 convictions against 435 defendants in terrorism-related cases, but admitted that they were harder to prosecute, saying, “This higher risk of acquittals is one we acknowledge and accept.”

McNulty said prosecutors often needed to use minor crimes, such as immigration violations or fraud charges, as a way to charge suspects who posed a potential threat. — Washington Post

Homeland Stupidity has previously reported on these so-called terrorism-related cases. Most of them have only the most tenuous links to actual terrorism, and under the rules DOJ set for itself, virtually anything could be a terrorism-related case.

Also on Wednesday, Homeland Security secretary Michael Chertoff met with editors and reporters of theWashington Post and told them that the government has made “a significant amount of progress” in preventing terrorism.

But Chertoff added that it “would be very, very hard to detect” a “lone wolf” terrorist, who trains and plans alone before carrying out an attack.

“The hardest thing to determine is the purely domestic, self-motivated, self-initiating threat from the guy who never talks to anybody, just gets himself wound up over the Internet,” Chertoff said. — Washington Post

Hey, I never talk to anybody, and I get myself wound up over the Internet. Clearly I must be a terrorist and Homeland Security is looking for me. If I disappear suddenly, send lawyers to Guantanamo Bay to look for me.