30 December 2009

Maureen Dowd on the anti-terror response

"We seemed to still be behind the curve and reactive, patting down grannies and 5-year-olds, confiscating snow globes and lip glosses.

Instead of modernity, we have airports where security is so retro that taking away pillows and blankies and bathroom breaks counts as a great leap forward.

If we can’t catch a Nigerian with a powerful explosive powder in his oddly feminine-looking underpants and a syringe full of acid, a man whose own father had alerted the U.S. Embassy in Nigeria, a traveler whose ticket was paid for in cash and who didn’t check bags, whose visa renewal had been denied by the British, who had studied Arabic in Al Qaeda sanctuary Yemen, whose name was on a counterterrorism watch list, who can we catch?

We are headed toward the moment when screeners will watch watch-listers sashay through while we have to come to the airport in hospital gowns, flapping open in the back..."

Source.

4 comments:

  1. .
    on the website of the US embassy in Nigeria, this interesting article from march 2008: "U.S. Government Donates Body Scanners To Nigerian Drug Law Enforcement Agency"
    .
    http://nigeria.usembassy.gov/prog_03272008.html
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    "The U.S. Mission has also purchased three other scanners and four new drug/explosives-detecting “Itemizers” for use at Nigeria’s four international airports in Abuja, Kano, Lagos and Port Harcourt."
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    i read this to say there has been a body scanner *and* an explosives detector at all 4 international airports in Nigeria since last march
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    i don't read the newspapers much - is this news?
    .

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  2. I don't know if it is news. It may or may not be relevant; the man came from Nigeria, but he boarded the NWA flight to Detroit in Amsterdam.

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  3. .
    my recollection was he started out from Nigeria -- easily enough checked... yep: "...the flight began in Nigeria and went through Amsterdam en route to Detroit."
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    http://www.freep.com/article/20091225/NEWS05/91225022/0/NEWS07/U.S.-says-attack-on-NWA-flight-to-Detroit-was-a-terrorism-try
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    also saw an article dated today saying: "A Nigerian official says the nation will purchase 3-D, full body scanners..."
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    http://www.freep.com/article/20091230/NEWS07/91230017/0/NEWS07/Nigeria-airports-to-buy-full-body-scanners
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    new scanners? what happened to the scanners the US embassy in Nigeria announced were to be "fully operational at each airport by the end of April" 2008?
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    QED: maybe this *is* news
    .

    ReplyDelete
  4. I stand corrected. The screening fault apparently was in Nigeria.

    ReplyDelete

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