Holder: "I am determined to defeat our enemies." I wonder how he defines "our enemies"? Eric runs home to his leftist Mommy.

Running home to mommy.

"Holder: lawmakers endangering war on terror."

In an earlier related story, "Eric Holder tacks left at DOJ," Gerstein writes:

Attorney General Eric Holder is finding his voice again, staking out traditionally liberal positions in public and behind closed doors despite a series of highly publicized setbacks, most notably the White House’s rejection of his plan to try September 11 suspects in civilian courts.

Since the beginning of the year, Holder has convinced President Barack Obama to abandon legal defense of the law barring federal recognition of same-sex marriages, embraced the politically sensitive notion of giving retroactive sentence reductions to some convicted crack cocaine dealers and encouraged the White House to issue its first terror-related veto threat against Republican legislation aimed at forcing terrorism prosecutions out of civilian court and into military commissions.

Holder will showcase many of those left-leaning positions Thursday night as he delivers the keynote address to the nation’s most prominent liberal lawyers’ group, the American Constitution Society, aides say.

But he appears to face an uphill battle to convince liberal attorneys and activists that the Justice Department is headed in a dramatically different direction than it was under President George W. Bush.

Holder’s department continues to pursue investigations that are deeply troubling to some of the administration’s liberal supporters. Many are irked by a flurry of prosecutions against alleged leakers of classified information. Some complain that the administration is blocking disclosures about intrusive Patriot Act surveillance and that prosecutors and the FBI are using tactics in terrorism cases that amount to entrapment.

“If you ask any civil libertarian, you’re going to get the same answer. That is: there’s been precious little change from the Obama administration after the Bush administration,” said Jonathan Turley, a law professor at George Washington University. “On the war on drugs: very little change. On criminal justice generally, there’s not a piece of paper that can be put between the position of the Bush and Obama administrations.”

“I was actually surprised [the lawyers’ group] asked Holder, because he has not been a particularly adventurous or bold attorney general,” said one prominent civil rights lawyer, who asked not to be named. “Certainly, with the Khalid Sheikh Mohammed trial [Holder] did try and did so with great earnestness and commitment. … Sometimes he feels like he’s trying to do his best and gets knocked down by politicos in the White House who only have reelection on their mind.”

. . . Some of Holder’s most vocal critics on the left were outside a federal courthouse in Alexandria, Va., on Wednesday. They were protesting a grand jury calling Wikileaks supporters to testify in a federal investigation that could result in a prosecution of the Web site’s founder, Julian Assange, for receiving and publishing thousands of classified military reports and diplomatic cables. The computer files appear to have originated with Army Pvt. Bradley Manning, who is facing a possible court martial that could put him in prison for life.

“They really want to get Assange. They do not want WikiLeaks to be the model for future media because they can’t control it. That’s very scary to them,” said Kevin Zeese, a Washington attorney who helped organize Wednesday’s demonstration. “It’s pretty obvious [the administration] is sending a message to whistleblowers: If you blow the whistle, you’ll be treated harshly.”

. . . Whatever Holder has to offer Thursday, it is doubtful he’ll offer the red meat he served up to the group at its 2008 convention, held in the midst of Obama’s presidential campaign. He railed against warrantless wiretapping and the “disastrous course” of the Bush administration.

“We owe the American people a reckoning,” Holder declared then.

I think we can promise Eric a reckoning all right. It is interesting to note that Holder, under severe pressure in the Gunwalker scandal, is running home to his leftist Mommy. Already under criticism from the few remaining Blue Dogs over the Gunwalker scandal, I guess he figures the only friends he can count on are on the left. It may also be that he is "finding his voice again" in this legacy hunting because he knows his days are numbered.