Oh Steve, I love your faux naivete!

IOKIYAR!!!

Thanks, librullll media!

steve, if obama took terrorism seriously, we'd be invading iraq already....

Good luck trying to make this argument to Matalin or Perrino. After all, Bush both inherited the 9/11 attacks from Clinton, AND there were no terrorist attacks on America during the Bush years.

You can't put new data into Read-Only Memory.

I keep wondering if Bush deserves any slack because the shoe bomber was first.

I hate the stupid security systems that just pretend to make us safe. However, forcing me to take off my shoes does make me safe from shoe bombers. Bush learned.

I assume the final answer to the underwear bomber will be full body scans where TSA employees can see all our private parts. That will keep us safe from underwear bombs.

I am just shocked at the stupidity of the no-fly list. A friend of my father was 59 and has the same name as a terrorist who was 22. It shouldn't take too long to figure out that a man with a US passport who was almost 60 was not a foreign national who was 22. However, it took him hours to get onto some flights because the match was caught only some of the time. It took him over 4 years to get identification which allows him to board a plane fairly easily. The system is insane.

However, Bush reacted to the shoe bomber and made us a little safer even though the system wastes gobs of time and money. I hope Obama can make us safer without stupid regulations that basically purchase a small amount of safety for a ton of time and money.

Don't confuse the issue, Steve. In Real America everyone knows Obama is a far-left Muslim socialist fascist. But a BVD-bomber on his watch? Just proves Obama is a perv.

this also necessarily means that the Republicans' favorite talking point -- other than 9/11, Bush/Cheney stopped terror attacks in the U.S. -- isn't true.

Well it was never true even on its own terms. As Duncan Black needs to keep reminding us - ANTHRAX!

If we took our shoes off to be scanned after Richard Reid, do we take our "delicates" off after Abdulmutallab and his exploding underwear and walk through airport security naked?

Eeegad, the thought of being behind Rush Limbaugh in the security line is frightening. I would rather take my chances with German Shepherd sniffing my crotch.

You have to hand it to al Qaeda's clever back room boys. When Americans say they won't tolerate outlines of our bodies being visualized on TSA's scanners the bomb makers jump right in. Next up: exploding sanitary napkins! What will we do then?

Must admit I'm surprised the village keeps talking about this one. This is one of those political loop things where people "in politics" keep scoring points against one another on an issue few outside of politics actually are talking or thinking about. I'd imagine the only non-beltway people who actually give a rats arse are those flying - most of whom, I suspect, are just pissed at the extra restrictions.

And in the end, that's good. The purpose of terrorism is terror. This was an attempted act of terrorism not because the plane didn't fall, but because nobody is in the least bit fearful, despite the effort of insincere Republicans to pretend they really are pissing their pants over this.

It's a failure to deal with shades-o-gray. Absolute safety is not possible; in the limit, there's lightning, meteors, and your old imperfect body. It's all a numbers game -- if you have a basic metal detector, and scanned shoes, you've already made it harder for the bad guys. Add reinforced doors (inability to take control of airplane, reduces its utility as a weapon) and the demonstrated ability of alert passengers to stop things as they unfold, and it is harder yet.

But, sooner or later, someone will succeed.

We are clearly not safer under Barack: I have yet to hear how the terror threat index has moved to a scarier color! I feel so much safer when the government tells me to be fearful.

BTW, shouldn't he be saber-rattling about how we'll send young Americans over to attack some country "because we can"? A real president would expose tens of thousands of American soldiers to roadside bombs to protect scared old me from the underwear of doom.

Let's take a moment and compare Life in America on September 10th, 2001 to Life in America, New Year's Eve, 2009.

Folks, the 'terrorists' have won. . .

I think the Shoe Bomber is a fair comparison between the two administrations. It looks like both will mainly respond with TSA Theater.

The best criticism of the current administration on this directly compares the two and points out a few things,

1) The shoe bomber was a mere 3 months after 9/11. Whatever the Bush administrations security plan might eventually become, it had hardly gotten off the ground at that point.

2) There was no similar followup attack during the Bush years.

3) Here we are, 8 years later. And under the current administration we appear to be back to square one.

Is this a fair criticism? Hard to say since our security is essentially like an iceberg with most of the data needed to assess success hidden from our view.

So we cannot definitively say if electing President Obama has changed our security level, but what we can say definitively is that it hasn't changed what the jihadists think of us, or want to do to us.

Anyone who has studied organizational theory can understand that risk can never be reduced to zero. You can reduce it down to a small percentage fairly easily, but the cost and difficulty of control increases exponentially as you approach the 100 percent effectiveness figure. Those last little gray areas are the hardest and most expensive to get at. That's why every organization writes a certain percentage of loss into its costs of doing business.

At a level of large society we make calculations like this all this time. For example, we know that 40,000 to 50,000 people will die in car accidents next year. We consider this an acceptable risk for the benefits of private automobile transportation. We could take steps to reduce it (lower speed limits, for example) but have decided that they are not worth the cost. Lowering the risk to zero would be monstrously expensive.

The not very smart Gwen Eiffel made a comment to a panel on the News Hour that the American people don't expect 100 percent effectiveness but might be satisfied with 75 percent. Okay, so one in every four planes gets blown up. I think that might have a dampening effect on air travel.

As it happens, with the tens of thousands of commercial flights every day, and two attempts in an eight-year period, we've reduced the risk to a miniscule level. We'll never get it to zero, no matter who's President, no matter how much money we throw at it.

here,s my question: is Rush's emergency hospital visit an attempted assasination by Obama, or an assasination by Obama?

The fRight wing strikes again. Keep 'em scared, keep 'em angry, keep 'em insecure, keep 'em believing that their fellow Americans are the enemy, and then name-call anyone who isn't willing to take the low-road with them a commie, pinko, fag, socialist, Marxist, fascist, "terrorist sympathizer" or any other emotionally laden, historically pejorative term. These are supposedly grown men and women? Yes, now I see why Carrie Prejan and Sarah Phalin ARE the perfect spokespersons for them. Appropriate to the core.

You know, one of the curious things about al Qaeda is their ideology is stuck in the pre-Enlightment era when it comes to religion and individual rights but they have no problem applying the latest telecommunications technology, science and chemistry to communicate in secret, grow harmful crops and kill people.

What is it about al Qaeda's ideology that encourages their sciences and engineering to so far outpace their humanities? A culture that gives rise to exploding BVDs could make remarkable advances if it turned its inventiveness to the good.

Jesus what happened to the supposed backbones of repulsicans? One guy sets his balls on fire and they turn into a bunch of pants pissin pussies. Your more likely to get hit by lightning and killed then you are to even be hurt by a terrorist for gods sakes.
This never ending bullshit has got to stop. These republicans are like whirling dervishes of nonsense.

Uh, Richard Reid wasn't already on a terrorist watch-list? His father didn't warn us about him in advance? The government didn't lie to us about whether it notified pilots, as the pilots' union now says it did?

The attack wasn't Obama's fault. The government's stupid handling of the whole thing was -- a lot like FEMA after Katrina. Heckuva job, Barry.

I believe that I can largely keep myself safe from jihadi bomb plots.
What I'm more concerned about is being murdered by a rogue american cop with an itchy trigger finger.

Where were these outraged, OUTRAGED I tell you, repigs when Bush was in office?

1. The Bush Administration constantly hyped fake (or ludicrous) and supposedly aborted terrorist plots for political reasons. Why did these same repigs not scream and jump and name call at bush/cheney?
2. The worst terrorist attack in American history happened under the Bush Administration's watch, even AFTER Bush/cheney were warned...,in writing. Um, repig anger, disgust, whining? Where were you?
3. The response to said attack was to go to war with a country that had nothing to do with the attack. Hello, repigs, were you out there? Where was your outrage people?
4. Republicans mocked the notion that law enforcement techniques were a more effective way to fight the terrorist threat, yet used law enforcement and the Justice Department to prosecute the shoe bomber, Moussaoui, and others. Hello, screaming republicans? Anyone home?
5. After losing power former Bush Administration officials said that Obama would not be able to keep us safe because his administration went away from Bush policies. Hmm, lets see. Bush/cheney gave us 9/11, the anthrax attacks, the DC sniper, Ralph Reed, the constant terrorization of our own People by the administration with suspiciously timed threat level increases, and almost 5,000 men and women dead in Iraq over non-existent WMDs. Kept us safe? Bush/cheney? Really? Obama's watch has one aborted Christmas day underwear bomb attempt that cost zero lives. Oh, and a pep-talk to kids about the value of staying in school which the repigs labeled as "terrorizing our kids with Commie mind control and indoctrination."

Repigs, ya got nu'thin! And you are as transparent as Alberto Gonzalez claiming "I can't recall" for the 67th time while under oath. (The head of our Legal System LYING and undercutting the system that he heads. Perfect, bush/cheney-esque to the core. REpigs, you got NUTHIN!!

it is a national tragedy that so much time and energy has to go into responding to republican idiocy (as if there are any actual pressing problems, like say figuring out why the attempted terrorist attack almost succeeded without even touching on joblessness, health care, financial industry atrocities, global warming, etc.)

republicans intentionally work to thwart people's will. they did it to great success during Clinton's presidency, and it is obviously their strategy for obama's presidency. republicans' need to be called out on their anti-American effort to thwart the people's will by tying up every democratic presidency with nonsense. What they do is not opposition or in anyway addressing the people's problems. What republicans do is pure obstruction for obstructions sake.

There are plenty of rational conservative arguments to make for every problem (they're wrong, but easy enough to make and can be rational). But republicans don't make any of those arguments, they just spew nonsense exclusively.

Well, actually critics can say why there is some blame for Obama: he admits that the security posture was not in good enough shape to use the information about Abdulmutallab, share it, so the Nigerian terrorist could be intercepted (albeit in Holland.) What matters: Obama at least can admit shortcomings, unlike BushCo.

What matters: Obama at least can admit shortcomings, unlike BushCo.

And you can't take steps to improve the situation without first recognizing the need for improvement. That's something that was lost on the Decider, since he can't admit to making mistakes. Hmm. Alcoholics and drug addicts have that problem, too.

The attack wasn't Obama's fault. The government's stupid handling of the whole thing was -- a lot like FEMA after Katrina. Heckuva job, Barry. Posted by: Somebody on December 31, 2009 at 12:56 PM | PERMALINK

Yes, if only the government security measures had completely failed and the plane exploded or the terrorist taken control and driven it into landmark buildings killing thousands of people and damaging the economy. THEN we could all have rallied around Barack Obama and lauded him with a 90% approval rating.

As it is, the failed attack makes him an utter failure as an executive. If only he were a powerful protector like Bush.

"...Folks, the 'terrorists' have won." DAY @ 11:53 AM.

McCain won?
Seriously, if you are equating the Republicans to Al Qaeda (and I admit there ARE similarities), then I must respectfully disagree; no, they haven't won. The present Republican Party HAS made it more difficult to move forward towards what this country stands for: "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness" for everyone and our ongoing efforts to "form a more perfect union"; but no, they haven't won.
Unless, and until, we let them.
Al-Qaeda-style terrorists are basically people looking around their countries, asking why the problems they encounter aren't being solved, and coming up with the wrong answer: the US. Until some form of democratically-elected, responsible government emerges in Muslim countries, the Middle East especially, we will have to face continued attacks.
The assault on our civil liberties commenced long before 9/11 and will continue as long as there are people in this country who value power for its' own sake. That is why it is essential that we treat acts of terrorism as a crime requiring the employment of regular law enformcement techniques and not as some kind of never-seen-before event forcing the government to assume super-secret powers and methods (ie; torture, warrentless eavesdropping, etc.) that won't be any more valuable combatting terrorists, but will SOUND effective (see, Republicans).
Right now we seem to have an administration that views terrorism as it should be: criminal acts by criminals that will be handled by regular law-enforcement methods. Hopefully that will survive the next terrorist attempt/attack.
Anyway, Happy 2010!

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