System Analysis

Back from the Witless Protection Program, Secretary of Homeland Security Napolitano is now on the talk show circuit and she is not acquitting herself well. This is a woman who is a personification of the Peter Principle cum laude. She has been promoted well above her level of incompetence.



She apparently believes sincerely that under her management "the system worked." So, Madame Secretary, could you help us see exactly where the system worked?

We've got no-fly lists, watch lists and suspected terrorist lists. Did they stop this guy from getting on board an airplane? We've got cues identified for special treatment such as purchasing a ticket with a large sum in cash...check; buying a one way ticket...check; traveling with little or no luggage on what would obviously be an extended trip...check. System worked?

We've got embassies and people supposedly investigating potential terrorists worldwide. So this guy's father, a prominent Nigerian banker in London, comes forward and tell our embassy, "my kid's a nut job. Watch out for him." and we do nothing? System worked?

We've got visas for entry to the country. The perpetrator got bounced from Great Britain when he tried to extend his visa to attend a non-existant college. Don't we have cross talk between embassies at least at the level of close allies, first world countries that speak our same language? We still issued a visa. System worked?

We've got a grading system for security of third world and Muslim country airports. We just cleared Lago-bloody-Nigeria to the OK bunch? System worked?

We've designed and built body scanning equipment and deployed it to several high traffic US airports in small numbers. Schipol in Amsterdam has more of the scanners than any airport in the US, but we don't have an agreement with the Dutch to get passengers from Muslim countries enroute to the US scanned? System worked?

We've had people talking off their shoes, talking off jackets and belts, emptying pockets and putting laptops in separate bins so we can suffer TSA abuse for seven years now but this guy gets on board with 80 grams of PETN strapped to his Johnson and we've done nothing to thwart such a threat? System worked?

We've had sky marshalls and similar covert security operatives since the 1960s and the rise of Castro sympathizer hijackings but this guy gets stopped by a Dutch TV "producer/director" who hurls his body across the cabin to put out the fire as Abdulmutallah lights his lap? System worked?

We were able to notify a hundred umpty-ump flights in progress within 90 minutes AFTER the event was over of a possible threat? What were they supposed to do? System worked?

We've installed enhanced security procedures? No toilet trips during the last hour of flight? The guy didn't leave his seat. What's the purpose of that? No blankets or pillows for last hour of flight? The guy wasn't sleeping, he was igniting himself! No access to overhead compartments? The guy had the explosive strapped to his package not a package in the bins. Nothing on your lap for the last hour? What is the purpose of all of that except to maximize inconvenience. System worked?

Get this, Madam Secretary, the last hour of flight is no different than any other minute of the flight. You've solved nothing. And your "system" didn't do a damned thing in this episode.

Here's some ways to get the system to work:

1. Profile young males with Arabic names from Muslim countries aggressively.
2. Stop political correct quotas for special treatment at security checks.
3. Scrub the no-fly, suspected terrorist and "watch" lists then use them vigorously.
4. Get the State Department to start denying visas to those in Step 1 until completing a background check with allied nations.
5. Get FBI operating domestically and CIA doing foreign intell gathering like MI-5 and MI-6 in Britain.
6. Slam the door on the ACLU and similar sob-sister organizations.
7. Have the Secretary of Homeland Security resign. Interview Joe Arpiao for the job or maybe some Texas Rangers--not the baseball players.

If Janet Napolitano still has an office in two weeks, we need to start screaming.