By Matthew Vadum:

Russian authorities warned the Obama administration repeatedly — not merely once — that Boston Marathon bombing mastermind Tamerlan Tsarnaev could be an Islamic terrorist, but those admonitions went unheeded in Washington, D.C.

It’s a depressingly familiar tale of intelligence failures, official lies, politically correct posturing, and bureaucratic bungles coming from an administration that has little interest in protecting Americans from the Islamic terrorist threat, a danger President Obama refuses even to acknowledge.

Time magazine previously reported that Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB) warned the U.S. government about Tsarnaev a single time two years ago, after he frequented a radical mosque in Makhachkala, the capital of Dagestan, during a six-month visit to that politically unstable, jihadist-friendly Russian republic. The mosque is reportedly a terrorist hangout.

But the Boston Globe now reports there were several such warnings.

On Tuesday, members of the Senate Intelligence Committee were told during a briefing closed to the public that Russia made “multiple contacts” with the United States regarding Tsarnaev, including “at least once since October 2011,’’ Sen. Richard Burr (R-N.C.) told reporters.

The FBI previously acknowledged its investigators interviewed Tsarnaev in early 2011 but did not determine him to be a threat. He was not placed on the “no-fly” list.

As FrontPage reported last September, FBI agents aren’t allowed to treat individuals associated with terrorist groups as potential threats to the nation.

The fact that a terrorism suspect is associated with a terrorist group officially means nothing, according to the FBI document, “Guiding Principles: Touchstone Document on Training.”

After first handcuffing FBI agents investigating terrorism, the “Touchstone” document also invokes the gods of political correctness by making agents afraid of asking useful questions that might produce actionable information.

“Training must emphasize that no investigative or intelligence collection activity may be based solely on race, ethnicity, national origin, or religious affiliation,” the Touchstone document reads, borrowing some language from civil rights legislation.

“Specifically, training must focus on behavioral indicators that have a potential nexus to terrorist or criminal activity, while making clear that religious expression, protest activity, and the espousing of political or ideological beliefs are constitutionally protected activities that must not be equated with terrorism or criminality absent other indicia of such offenses.”

It’s not that much of an exaggeration to say that the FBI could not have done anything about Tsarnaev unless he strapped on a suicide vest in front of them, called them “infidels,” and detailed his abominable plans. Diverting attention away from the Obama White House, the Boston Globe article fatuously editorializes that the new revelation of multiple warnings from the FSB raises “new questions about whether the FBI should have focused more attention on the suspected Boston Marathon bomber.”

There is much more at Front Page