Something you guys have always enjoyed, as have I, are the Panel discussions on FNS. Partially because it’s so entertaining to watch Brit Hume smack Juan Williams around a little. Juan just must be a sadist, because he keeps coming back for more. This Sunday, Fred Barnes was in Bill Kristol’s place, so it was a bit different. But thank God Juan was still there.

WALLACE: Just briefly, we should say, this was a docudrama on ABC called “The Path to 9/11.” It was supposedly based on the 9/11 Commission report. It later turned out there were at least three parts of the docudrama that, in fact, had been made up and were directly contradicted by the 9/11 report. And the Clinton team, as you point out, made a big stink about it and got some of it changed.

BARNES: And yet, it was shown all over the world. I know it was shown on BBC, for instance.

And President Clinton, he did one clever thing when he was talking to you, and that is to try to isolate the criticism of himself about bin Laden and terrorism and so on, that it’s just some right- wing neo-cons who are the ones who were doing it. He said that over and over again, and to really dismiss it because it’s a bunch of right-wingers saying that.

JUAN WILLIAMS: Well, he’s mad. He’s mad about the right-wing conspiracy. And he’s particularly mad…

(LAUGHTER)

BARNES: Which one?

WILLIAMS: … at the idea that — neo-cons, he says, in this Bush administration, you know, for all their talk, didn’t do much to go after bin Laden.

So I think that he has a right to say he’s mad at Fox. He somehow sees Fox as part of this conspiracy. And you’re going to make your bones, Chris, on this.

(LAUGHTER)

But he’s…

HUME: Do you agree with that?

WILLIAMS: I don’t think Chris is — I think, in fact, you did a very good job. I thought you held yourself together…

(LAUGHTER)

WALLACE: It wasn’t always easy.

WILLIAMS: … in the force of the gale winds.

(CROSSTALK)

BARNES: … President Clinton didn’t.

And Brit ends the segment on this note:

HUME: Let’s talk a little bit about the political will that existed in the country after 9/11. Bill Clinton didn’t have anything like that behind him when he was trying to do what he tried to do. So what could a president have done?

If you look back at the first World Trade Center bombing, he was president; it was 1993. And he chose to treat that as a law enforcement matter.

And, you know, in retrospect, he could’ve made a different decision. He could have sounded the call and said, “This is a major attack. It requires a major response.” He would’ve had to make a huge deal out of it and use the presidential megaphone to the fullest.

The same is true after the bombings of the embassies. The same is true after the bombing of the Cole. He could’ve elevated those.

The country would’ve swung behind him, as the country always does at times like that. The politicians probably would have, too. And he probably would’ve gotten what he needed to mount — the political effort needed to mount a larger-scale undertaking.

I think it’s fair to say that he and his administration chose not to do that. In retrospect, it looks like bad choices. But, no doubt, he did make some efforts. He’s right about that.

Watch the panel here.