The Obama Administration Mishandled the Flight 253 Incident

A very interesting point. Thanks for this.

Hi Amy,

Thank you for your read and comments.

The suspect was on the TIDE list, but DHS deemed the elder Mutallab's warning was not valid enough to be added to the TSDB, which is the no-fly list. 

Never mind about the fact that the UK had rejected the suspect's visa application, while the US Embassy in London issued a multiple-entry US visa to the suspect.  The US Embassy in Lagos evidently didn't communicate the elder Mutallab's warning to its colleagues in London.  The visa could have been flagged by US officials in Lagos, and in Amsterdam before Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab boarded the plane.

Leaders should not be buck passers: that should be the first sign that a leader (Napolitano) needs to be fired. The right response should have been: "The system failed: I shall now spend all my waking hours to find out how and why, and I will then report back to you, the people, what I find, and I will also give you a time-specific plan as to how I will remedy this situation."That's what leaders do who are honest and have integrity. By covering your ass like she did, Napolitano proved herself worthy of a mid-level union shop steward job, and that is about it. 

Did Obama Respond Too Late to Terror Plot? Critics Assail President ABC News The Obama administration has come under fire from critics who said the president waited too long to address the nation publicly about the Christmas Day terror plot, and that his administration has not been tough enough on terrorism.

Napolitano yesterday started out by blaming the Bush Administration for the in place rules.  Her interview with FOX a video which is  in  my story yesterday is very telling.  When asked if she had reviewed the policy since she was Secretary of DHS she hummed an hawed about three times making comments as , "I'm aware of it, to a half acknowledgment that she had reviewed it. 

She didn't seem to see the difference of action prior and after the event.  Her highlight was that DHS had been able to notify 128 flights already enroute from Europe.  So what? 

Removal of blankets and not permitting passengers to use the washroom during the last hour must have been an impressive knee jerk reaction. 

Yep Iffy, mid-level shop steward, if that, Obama needs to tell her to resign.

Hello Albertacowpoke,

Thanks for your read and comments. 

Ms. Napolitano's interviews about the incident have been disastrous, and up until yesterday, she was the face of national security on behalf of the Obama administration.  Mr. Gibbs was just a mouthpiece since he repeated everything Ms. Napolitano said.

The administration has fumbled and bumbled its way through this incident so far.  It is not reassuring that the President came out again today, just to say all the things that the public has already known - well, he acknowledged that they've made mistakes.

Thanks for your read and comments, Queenshart.

    www.schneier.com/blog/ --------------------------------------------------- Bruce Schneier is an internationally renowned security technologist and author. Described by The Economist as a "security guru," he is best known as a refreshingly candid and lucid security critic and commentator. When people want to know how security really works, they turn to Schneier. ------------------------------------------------ (He was on Rachel Maddow last night and makes a lot of sense, IMO,    

Yep, when crap hits the fan, it is typical governments will use any idiotic methods to wipe themselves clean of blame.

I saw "O" looking like he was repeating something someone had told him to say! Then he left!

That was it! He fuxked up! If he had added at the end of his brief statement, "And I am going to find someone to blame" it would have had the same impact. After this, he will have to do better than just pull a rabbit out of the hat!

Remember!!!! "When I become Prezudent, every soldier will be home in the US in six months! AND YOU CAN TAKE THAT TO THE BANK!"

Had the plane detonated and plunged to the ground, in a ball of fire! What would the bog "O" have said then? Whom would he have blamed? Or would he have said, "And I am looking for someone to take responsibility!"

The Commander-in-Chief should do as President Reagan was always prompted to do! Do not say anything! Just read the the cards out loud! This young coloured boy from Nigeria has bitten the greatest actor in the world, right in the Az!

Thank you everyone for your read and discussions; and extra thank you to those who recommended my Op-Ed. 

Happy and Safe New Year to everyone.

Shadow of 9/11 Is Cast Again - Scott Shane, New York Times. The finger-pointing began in earnest on Wednesday over who in the alphabet soup of American security agencies knew what and when about the Nigerian man charged with trying to blow up an airliner. But the harshest spotlight fell on the very agency created to make sure intelligence dots were always connected: the National Counterterrorism Center. The crown jewel of intelligence reform after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, the center was the hub whose mission was to unite every scrap of data on threats and suspects, to make sure an extremist like Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, the would-be bomber, would never penetrate the United States’ defenses. “NCTC is supposed to be the nerve center,” said Amy B. Zegart, who studies intelligence at the University of California, Los Angeles. “It’s the fusion center of all fusion centers. So if something was missed, that’s where the blame is going to go.” Officials at the counterterrorism center - a small agency in a modern glass building in suburban Virginia - maintained a stoic silence on Wednesday, noting that the review ordered by President Obama was still under way. But those who led the major studies of how the United States government failed to prevent the Sept. 11 attacks watched the unfolding story of the Christmas Day attack with growing dismay.

Abdelmutalib's Act of War

from Counterterrorism Blog by Walid Phares

U.S. Will 'Find And Fix' System's Vulnerabilities -- Janet Napolitano, USA Today

Friday's attempted terrorist attack against Northwest Flight 253 near Detroit is a powerful illustration that terrorists will go to great lengths to try to defeat the security measures that have been put in place since September 11, 2001.

While we took swift action immediately following last week's incident at airports around the country and throughout the world, our defenses should never have allowed this individual to board a plane bound for the United States. The administration is determined to find and fix the vulnerabilities in our systems that allowed this breach to happen.

Read more

More News On Homeland Security

Obama on Napolitano: Official: POTUS has full confidence -- Politico
US will 'find and fix' vital security gaps: Napolitano -- AFP
Homeland chief Napolitano says airline security system failed -- USA Today
Napolitano Reverses Course, Says Air Security Did NOT Work -- Wall Street Journal
Fingerpointing Begins in Aftermath of Failed Terror Attack -- FOX News
Who Should Be Held Responsible for Security Failures in the Christmas Day Bomb Attempt? -- ABC News
Burton calls for Napolitano's scalp -- The Politico
National Post editorial board: Napolitano must go -- National Post
You're Doing a Heck of a Job, Janet -- Richard Grenell, Huffington Post
Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano is not fit for position, recent events prove -- Michael Daly, New York Daily News
Protect us from Homeland Security? -- Ballard J. Powell, Chicago Tribune

EDITORIAL: While Terrorists Plot, The FAA Parties -- Washington Times

The congressional pork barrel comes before public safety.

While a terrorist was plotting to kill Americans over the Christmas holidays, what was the Federal Aviation Administration doing? Why, spending $5 million on a three-week-long Christmas party, of course.

A series of seminars in Atlanta officially were aimed at training managers on a new air-traffic-controller contract but degenerated into one big bash. According to ABC News, the seminars didn't even cover half of the 100 new provisions in a contract that went into effect two months ago.

Read more ....

Cartoonist Michael Ramirez comments on the failed Christmas bombing of Flight 253.

A Guide to the Blame Game Following Failed Terror Attack
A Guide To The Blame Game Following Failed Terror Attack -- Wall Street Journal

Keeping track of who is blaming whom for the failures in U.S. intelligence that allowed Nigerian national Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab to almost blow up a U.S. airliner last week can be confusing, so Washington Wire compiled a guide in an attempt to make some sense of the Washington blame game starting with President Barack Obama.

According to the president, it was the whole system that failed. “But what’s also clear is this: When our government has information on a known extremist and that information is not shared and acted upon as it should have been, so that this extremist boards a plane with dangerous explosives that could cost nearly 300 lives, a systemic failure has occurred. And I consider that totally unacceptable,” Obama said Tuesday from Hawaii, where he is vacationing with his family.

Read more ....

Shifting the blame from the security folks at the airports to "Obama", maybe we can blame Obama for all the world's problems - that way folks don't have to deal with issues