“Shampoo, iPods and Starbucks lattes have suddenly become security threats. Terrorists could easily slip a few apparently innocuous items past airport security and assemble them into a lethal explosive once aloft, security experts said,” Matt Crenson reports for The Associated Press.
Crenson reports, “Some envision a group of two or three terrorists mixing up explosives in an airplane bathroom, perhaps even using commonplace materials such as hydrogen peroxide and detonating their bomb with the battery from a cellphone or some other small electronic device.”
“‘In mid-flight you could go into the toilet, attach the mobile phone to the explosives and, as the plane makes a final approach over a densely populated urban area, you detonate it,’ said Irish security analyst Tom Clonan. To puncture an aircraft’s fuselage would require an explosive charge ‘half the size of a cigarette packet,’ he said,” Crenson reports.
Full article here.
Related iPodDailyNews article:
Terrorist plot said to have involved Apple iPod as detonator – August 10, 2006
The final solution:
AIR GUANTANAMO
Every passenger in handcuffs and chains, no baggage, no service at all – that will do it.
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OK, so you say that we are right 98% of the time if we choose to scan only arab looking muslims. We miss 2% of the time. So in your opinion, you think we should let the whiteys walk on through, and strip search every person that is of Arab descent? If that’s the case, we are letting through (by your count) 2% of the terrorists. But that is OK, right? That’s bad logic, my friend. If you are so set on giving up “our” freedoms for your safety, it had better include your freedoms, not just those of the arabs. You either think that the added security measures at the airports are good, or you don’t. You don’t pick and choose them like a salad bar because they are slowing you down. (BTW, I am all for the added security, so that’s not my argument).
Thorin, I was choosing a wide variety of people that dislike America for one reason or another. Whether it’s because they are Al Qaida, redneck, insane, dumb, mad, or any combination of the above, when they hit a boiling point, there is nothing to say that they are not going to find a way to attack us. That next hijacker could be white, black, arab, native america, asian – no one knows for sure. So profiling just doesn’t work to save lives; it only works to save you time. Oh, and to make you feel self rightous about being white.
Jimbo-
You’re wrong. Like it or not history and the facts don’t support that the next highjacker or suicide bomber is just as likely to be a redneck, black or Native American.
Cite me the info that says there have been just as many non Muslim blacks involved in suicide bombings…
I’ll go farther…cite me the statistics that show there have been as many non Muslim black, Native American, redneck and Asian suicide attacks combined to equal Islamic fundamentalist suicide attacks in the last 50 years.
So if most (if not all) suicide bombers are Muslim, and of course not all Muslims are suicide bombers, does it make you non racist to ignore that group…no, it makes you stupid.
Don’t you think its about time we as people start standing up for ourselves and stop letting the gov bend us over all the time without saying a word. Why is it that what ever the Gov says we have to do it with out question.
Jimbo-
And all the other we’re not sure who does the most suicide attacks folk.
If as you say, that it is just as likely for a redneck or any other non Arab non Muslim to perform the next suicide attack or airline hijack…why do each and every one of you cite the same single event from 10 years ago? I’d think that if whites, blacks and Asians are running around blowing stuff up all the time, as you pose, you could give another example or two.
I can cite about 8 suicide attacks or near attacks in the last two weeks performed by Muslims.
Do others do it…yes. A religious cult in Japan killed several people in an attack on the Tokyo subway. Of course we all know about Oklahoma City, that’s the ONE you all mention as proof that non Muslims bomb just as much as the Muslim groups. But that’s one or two in the last 10 years. And I don’t include high school students going nuts and shooting up their school. Those are isolated and unrelated incidents. We are discussing a concerted effort by a group here.
Jerry T, it doesn’t matter if they are a tight knit organized group, or if they are lone bombers. If they are going to blow up a plane or a building or anything else, we need to be wary of them. What that means to me is set up guidelines and follow those guidelines across the board. If we are going to prohibit liquids on planes to prevent this, prohibit them for all – not just Arabs. If we have 10% of the people go through an extra check at the airport, that is 10% of ALL people, not just Arabs.
You may remember that over the last 5 years, we’ve seen Al Qaida members from many different countries. We’ve seen white people from USA that joined forces to fight with them. Remember that kid from USA that was caught fighting for the other side? We didn’t know whether to treat him as an enemy combatant or a US citizen. You get a handful of them on your side and send them through security because they are not dark skinned, and they blow up a plane or 2 or 10.
I said before, I have no problem with strict airport screenings. I think we should have it for everyone. You seem to think it should only be for Arabs. So, whose idea of security is more secure? Mine would catch anyone that has explosives. Yours would only catch Arabs with explosives. Mine would catch a Terry Nichols. Yours would not.
Jimbo-
We both agree that these measures should be enacted across the board. I never said don’t screen white people. Where did you get that idea? When I get on a plane I want every single passenger AND crew screened not just a random 10%.
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My point mostly concerned the people who feel the need to be PC and say we don’t know who most of the terrorist are that bring down planes or night clubs or hotels. They could be any one of us. And it simply isn’t true, we do know most of the time. After the fact unfortunately. That’s why people that try to be PC only cite the same one or two cases over the last decade. Because it’s that rare for a non radical Muslim to do something like that. We have had 8 suicide successes or near successes in the last two weeks alone. 24 people have been arrested in the UK over this latest failed attempt. Guess what? None of them were Native American, poor disgruntled blacks or rednecks. To ignore that fact is negligence.
Your very own assertion that the next suicide attack is just as likely to be Native Americans as it is to be Radical Muslims is just wrong and sounds foolish. No one seems, including you, to be able to cite any of these events. I know that the media are biased, but I just can’t see how they could cover up all of these Native American suicide attacks you mention. Some how somewhere the story would get out.
So in the end we agree on the measures, screen everyone. Especially when I’m traveling. But you know stating facts don’t make you racist. We all might get along better if we just call a spade a spade occasionally.
Jimbo-
Scary…I just went to Aljazeera.net minutes after my last post. There has been another suicide bombing near Najaf. 35 people are dead with more than 40 wounded.
The identity of the bomber is not yet known. But Native Americans are not suspected. We will hopefully know later today if it was the rednecks.
Come on Jerry, you are talking about Iraq here, not attacks in other parts of the world. You’re also talking about people strapping on bombs and walking into a cafe, or filling their cars full of TNT and driving into a crowded place. How many Native Americans are over in Iraq that are not part of our military? I’m guessing less than 10. It’s obvious that if you have suicide bombings in a war zone, it’s most likely the suicide bombers are going to be from that area. To count the suicide bombings in Iraq in your tallies of attacks in recent years is to bend the facts something fierce.
I am glad to see that your original statement has been further defined. I thought that initially you were saying that we know that there’s a good chance the attackers will be Arabs, so we should only screen them. We both disagree with that approach. My thought is that we don’t need to put a special screening on Arabs if we do a thorough screening on all.
I do agree that in these days and times, it’s more likely that an Arab will be the next attacker. I’m trying to point out that there are many different reasons that people have for hating America. Whatever the reason may be, I’d prefer that we prepare for an attack in general, not an attack from just an Arab.
Sounds like we found common ground on this topic, so I’m not going to follow it in this thread anymore. Thanks for the discussion.
Jerry T –
Jimbo has the right idea. So as you say, let’s call a spade a spade, shall we?
You do know that the most populous Muslim country is Indonesia, right? Now, they don’t exactly look like Arabs, do they? Like most religions, Islam has followers from all ethnic groups. When it comes to security policy you can’t ever narrow your focus. The minute you single out one group of people to give extra scrutiny, a smart terrorist organization will shift their efforts to a group you’re *not* focusing on. So if you focus on Middle Eastern Muslim men today, I guarantee you’ll have attacks from women, or Asian Muslims, or white Muslims (remember Bosnia?) or African Muslims tomorrow. Or Christians for that matter. Or someone else who has a political statement to make. You want to take the easy route and focus on the attacker of the moment, and that’s bad security policy.
This isn’t being PC. That term is meaningless anyway, and it only gets used by lazy people who want to put the ideas of others into an easily dismissable box without the effort of actual thought. Like “liberal” and “conservative” it’s a polemic and nothing more.
Nice of you to cite the suicide bombing in Najaf, but that’s a symptom of the Iraq civil war. When you have a Muslim country at war with itself it’s going to skew the statistics a bit, don’t you think?
Now, let’s get back to discussing Macs.
We need to screen Arabs first and foremost, then move down the line. That’s the sad, real, truth. Old ladies aren’t blowing up things. Yes Indonesians are Muslims too and they start bombing Western areas we’ll have to hone in on them too, then your average home grown terrorists. That’s the world fanatical muslims have created. What a great bunch???? F them!