Napolitano’s “absurd flight from reality”

Charles Hurt of the New York Post is correct, of course, but does he understand that having top government officials who are flagrantly out of touch with reality is intrinsic to the function of the modern liberal state? Which is, inter alia, to desensitize the population of a country to insanity in their rulers; to make them feel helpless over the fact that the officials charged with protecting them from enemies are doing the exact opposite; to turn them into a mass of alienated grumblers whose protests against the treasonous powers-that-be never go beyond grumbling; to do, in short, to the American people what the British state has already done to the British people.

Absurd flight from reality
December 28, 2009

WASHINGTON—So, this is your Homeland Security Department working.

A Nigerian man named Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab boards a flight in Amsterdam bound for the United States, despite, according to one passenger, having no passport.

Abdulmutallab, a Muslim, boards the plane despite having been reported to the US Embassy by his own father a few months ago.

The young man may be plotting an attack against the US, the father had implored.

He gets on the flight despite having raised the suspicion of US intelligence officials.

When he takes his seat—after passing through every layer of security—Abdulmutallab is still wearing a bomb made with highly explosive powder.

And 20 minutes from landing, just a few thousand feet above US soil, Abdulmutallab ignites his bomb and very nearly pulls off the first terror bombing attack inside the US since 9/11.

In the aftermath yesterday, Big Sis—Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano—informs us that the system worked.

It worked?

If by working, Napolitano means she has extended the government’s policy of porous borders to the skies, she is certainly correct.

If by working, she means that someone named Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab was spared the indignity of a body search, then she has hit a home run.

If by working, she means that quick-thinking passengers once again sprang into action and bravely carried out the duties that she utterly failed to do, then, yeah, everything is working.

Adding insult to this very scary injury is to think of the thousands of honest Americans who boarded airplanes during the holidays and endured so much more intrusive security than Abdulmutallab.

Sure as the sun rose, grandmothers were groped. Mothers were jerked aside and forced to take a swig of their baby’s milk to ensure neither they nor their infant had terroristic motives in flying from Akron to Chicago.

But a sketchy Muslim from Nigeria who has been reported dangerous? Welcome aboard! And welcome to a country where only your dignity will be protected at all costs.

churt@nypost.com

I don’t know what Hurt means by that last line. Here are comments by Post readers:

gommygoomy

12/28/2009 8:53 AM

Everybody’s getting all over Napalitanos’ case, about this guy not being on a NO FLY LIST. Buy why WOULD he be? He gave no indication that he was gonna be a Terrorist. Not to her, anyway.

He wasn’t WHITE. He didn’t drive a PICKUP TRUCK. And since he didn’t drive a Pickup Truck, he couldn’t possibly have a GUN RACK in the back window, or any ANTI-OBAMA BUMPER STICKERS on the bumper. The guy’s a MUSLIM, so he wasn’t GOING TO CHURCH EVERY SUNDAY. He didn’t belong to any ‘GROUPS’, like the NRA, or the ELKS, or any MOOSE LODGE, that I know of. I don’t think that he was FLYING THE AMERICAN FLAG outside his house. And I KNOW, that he wasn’t one of those PSYCHO TROOPS, returning home from IRAQ or AFGHANISTAN. So why would this guy be on her radar? He didn’t fit the PROFILE at all.

He was just a nice young man, who went to ISLAMIC SCHOOL, and faced MECCA five times a day, in his prayers to ALLAH. Just like BARAK OBAMA used to.

doctorfixit

12/28/2009 8:50 AM

The reason Napolitano, our fuzzy Janet Reno impersonator,was chosen to mismanage Homeland Insecurity was because she was demonstrably soft on border control as governor of Arizona (this moron was a governor!) Plus her obvious incompetence and stupidity.

Ziggyballz

12/28/2009 8:39 AM

Will she even admit that this was an attepmted TERRORIST attack? nObama and his ilk in power have got to go. This empty suit of a president is destroying the country and congress and MSM (Katy Couric et al) are just going along with it, closing eyses and ears to anything this moron president does or says.

JulianusRex

12/28/2009 8:26 AM

Napolitano is incompetent and not fit for the job. Obama’s too arrogant to admit mistakes. If he lets her stay in this position, one bomb goes off and he’s through.

Red Dwart

12/28/2009 7:31 AM

All we need now is for D’bama to put his arm around her and announce, “You’re doing a great job Nappy.”

wiley

12/28/2009 7:28 AM

It WORKED? Cmon Charles I heard what really happened at this press conference was that when asked about airline security she put fingers in both ears and was humming and saying”cant hear you,cant hear you!!!

Posted by Lawrence Auster at December 28, 2009 09:27 AM | Send