Nadkor
18-08-2006, 20:06
The four camels of the apocalypse are giving I me the hump. Mass murder on an unprecedent¬ed scale?
This is mass hysteria on an unprecedented scale. Even assuming that the latest alleged Islamic terror plot was real - and remember, the last two turned out to be nonsense - what warranted such an over-the-top security reaction?
Liquids were allowed back in carry-on luggage as soon as the duty-free shops kicked up a stink, which shows just how se¬riously that was taken.
Check-in baggage has report¬edly been ransacked for mobile phones and laptop computers. If it's so easy to sneak electronic devices out of loaded luggage, how hard would it be for the ter¬rorist masterminds supposedly overrunning the country to sneak electronic devices into loaded luggage?
In any case, what chance do four or five young men of "Middle-Eastern origin" have of creeping around a crowd¬ed aircraft cabin assembling a home-made bomb? No hu¬man being is more closely watched than an Arab in the air - and everyone else is un¬der nearly as much suspi¬cious surveillance.
Shoe-bomber Richard Reid was white, English – and punched unconscious by the guy in the next seat as soon as he reached for his laces.
The 9/11 attackers took control of aircraft using nothing more than Stanley knives because regulations told crew to co-op¬erate with hijackers.
Those regulations became obsolete as soon as the Twin Towers were hit. Minutes later, passengers on the fourth hijacked plane started fighting for their lives.
The last al-Qaeda plot to bring down aircraft with liquid explosives was foiled by Filipino police in 1995 because the "terrorist mastermind" responsible prepared himself for martyrdom by getting drunk with half the prostitutes in Manila.
This is the threat we actually face - real no doubt, but also intermittent and almost laughably amateurish, involving a handful of social misfits sending emails to Afghanistan. So why curtail our liberties and bring the economy to a standstill in response? That does far more damage than al-Qaeda ever will. The pointlessness of the airport security crackdown is perfectly illustrated by the lack of a security crackdown after last year's London Underground bombings.
Checking every passenger on the tube would be impractical - so it wasn't done, and life went on, with Londonders united in grief and determination rather than divided by frustration and paranoia.
This is in sharp contrast to the irresponsible rubbish trotted out by politicians and journalists after last week's arrests.
One newspaper even claimed two of the alleged plotters had conceived a baby only to use it as a decoy while boarding a targeted flight.
The front-page headline screamed "Baby Bomb!" unwittingly recalling the IRA dog bomb from 1990s satire show The Day Today. This officially puts the current situation beyond parody.
Meanwhile, in Newry, the worst terrorist attack in Europe since the London bombings caused huge amounts of property damage and serious danger to the travelling public.
What did the Prime Minister, the Home Secretary and the national media have to say about that? Not a single word. You couldn't make it up. But of course, in the "War on Terror", there are plenty of people pre¬pared to make it up for you.
All credit goes to Newton Emerson, writing in the Mirror (unfortunately).
I think it's a great synopsis of the current situation.
(Apologies for any weird characters or spelling mistakes, the OCR programme I used isn't the best)
This is mass hysteria on an unprecedented scale. Even assuming that the latest alleged Islamic terror plot was real - and remember, the last two turned out to be nonsense - what warranted such an over-the-top security reaction?
Liquids were allowed back in carry-on luggage as soon as the duty-free shops kicked up a stink, which shows just how se¬riously that was taken.
Check-in baggage has report¬edly been ransacked for mobile phones and laptop computers. If it's so easy to sneak electronic devices out of loaded luggage, how hard would it be for the ter¬rorist masterminds supposedly overrunning the country to sneak electronic devices into loaded luggage?
In any case, what chance do four or five young men of "Middle-Eastern origin" have of creeping around a crowd¬ed aircraft cabin assembling a home-made bomb? No hu¬man being is more closely watched than an Arab in the air - and everyone else is un¬der nearly as much suspi¬cious surveillance.
Shoe-bomber Richard Reid was white, English – and punched unconscious by the guy in the next seat as soon as he reached for his laces.
The 9/11 attackers took control of aircraft using nothing more than Stanley knives because regulations told crew to co-op¬erate with hijackers.
Those regulations became obsolete as soon as the Twin Towers were hit. Minutes later, passengers on the fourth hijacked plane started fighting for their lives.
The last al-Qaeda plot to bring down aircraft with liquid explosives was foiled by Filipino police in 1995 because the "terrorist mastermind" responsible prepared himself for martyrdom by getting drunk with half the prostitutes in Manila.
This is the threat we actually face - real no doubt, but also intermittent and almost laughably amateurish, involving a handful of social misfits sending emails to Afghanistan. So why curtail our liberties and bring the economy to a standstill in response? That does far more damage than al-Qaeda ever will. The pointlessness of the airport security crackdown is perfectly illustrated by the lack of a security crackdown after last year's London Underground bombings.
Checking every passenger on the tube would be impractical - so it wasn't done, and life went on, with Londonders united in grief and determination rather than divided by frustration and paranoia.
This is in sharp contrast to the irresponsible rubbish trotted out by politicians and journalists after last week's arrests.
One newspaper even claimed two of the alleged plotters had conceived a baby only to use it as a decoy while boarding a targeted flight.
The front-page headline screamed "Baby Bomb!" unwittingly recalling the IRA dog bomb from 1990s satire show The Day Today. This officially puts the current situation beyond parody.
Meanwhile, in Newry, the worst terrorist attack in Europe since the London bombings caused huge amounts of property damage and serious danger to the travelling public.
What did the Prime Minister, the Home Secretary and the national media have to say about that? Not a single word. You couldn't make it up. But of course, in the "War on Terror", there are plenty of people pre¬pared to make it up for you.
All credit goes to Newton Emerson, writing in the Mirror (unfortunately).
I think it's a great synopsis of the current situation.
(Apologies for any weird characters or spelling mistakes, the OCR programme I used isn't the best)