<p>I feel safer now. The Dog did his job for a pat on the head and beef thigh bone. The human screeners get to watch the dog, and then board the gray painted plane…to Gitmo, forever.</p>
<p>I’m wondering who was giving the kid a break? I think he was criminally stupid and I don’t buy any of his excuses or those of his equally stupid sounding dad. He wanted a stick of dynamite and he somehow thought he could get away with it.</p>
<p>“I would have big questions about how such an incompetent person could attend Lafayette and get an international internship: These are the same questions that I have about the young man who actually did the actions we’re discussing. The young man, however, who did this stupid act goes to a LAC with an excellent engineering program and also had a job in S. America in which he was working with explosives. He also comes from a very well off city, which indicates that he probably had a very good education. It is very hard for me to imagine that a person who was able to gain admission to Lafayette and obtain an international internship working with explosives is stupid enough to try to bring dynamite on a plane…”</p>
<p>Which suggests to me (pure Occam’s Razor) that he wasn’t stupid (criminally or otherwise), and knew precisely what he was doing. So the real question is “why”?</p>
<p>My opinion doesn’t change if you make him AA or poor. Now if Fish is of Middle Eastern stock and/or happens to be a muslim, would we have a different view of him? I think the authorities and media would.</p>
<p>We know that from Kevin McVeigh - I doubt Homeland Security is spending much time on midwestern white Christian former military men.</p>
<p>I guess my post was a violation of TOS. Try again:</p>
<p>“Why”
Ask Forest Gump.
Because it was there.
Because we like you.
Just because.
Just Do It </p>
<h1>3 on Google’s hit parade for “stupid”</h1>
<p>Maybe I’m missing something…but none of the articles I am pulling up state this kid was on an internship, and AP states he is a psychology student at Lafayette who was travelling in SA. He apparently told a Houston fire official he worked with explosives immediately after the dynamite was found; but I wonder if that is true or if he said this to get out of trouble as in “i’m not a terrorist, i work with explosives”.</p>
<p>Seems like he is a stupid kid who made a stupid mistake that could have killed a bunch of people. Unfortunately, this sort of stupidity is criminal and will most likely require punishment. After a day of watching the Lexington crash on the news and and a day considering the fact that my husband gets on an overseas flight at least once a month, I am really losing my original patience with the ‘didn’t mean any harm’ excuse.</p>
<p>“Seems like he is a stupid kid who made a stupid mistake that could have killed a bunch of people.”</p>
<p>So kid travels to South America where he makes contact with followers of Bin-Laden, and comes up with a simple plan for exploding a stick of dynamite in the hold. Rather like the shoebomber, only he looks more innocent. He can play the “stupid little kid” game, and pull it off because he comes from Old Lyme. Confesses quickly to try to cover up the truth.</p>
<p>I DON’T say that’s what happened. But what I am surprised at is how quickly folks write that (or any number of Timothy McVeigh-like scenarios) off as a possibility.</p>
<p>I don’t disagree with you mini. He needs to get the full treatment, same as anyone else…to determine if he was a threat. But Houston officials, according to today’s Chronicle, were pretty quick to put him in the non-terrorist category. Also according to the Chronicle, what he had in his luggage was a very small fragment of a very old stick of dynamite. Still haven’t resolved the differing stories about how he got it though. Some media states he bought it as a souvenir, some state he actually found it in one of the old mines he was touring. Nothing is weirder than the Connecticut paper’s version in my previous post though.</p>
<p>Hey, my uncle is retired ATF here in Houston…maybe I’ll give him a call and get some inside scoop…find out if authorities put the screws to this kid or not.</p>
<p>The reality is, if this kid were of middle eastern descent, he’d be in the slammer, on his way to Gitmo. No question about it.</p>
<p>“Which suggests to me (pure Occam’s Razor) that he wasn’t stupid (criminally or otherwise), and knew precisely what he was doing. So the real question is “why”?”</p>
<p>Mini, thanks for a great analysis. Could be a test case for terrorism: Find a white,upper class white guy, get so friendly with him that he ends up on the terrorists’ side, have him do something to test the limits of airline security.</p>
<p>Remember, the American young man who voluntarily was with the Bin Laden folks. Wasn’t he not only white, but also upper middle class?</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>This is not true. In fact, no more than two middle-eastern passengers can be pulled out for more thorough screening per flight on US carriers. The US authorities are so afraid of being labeled racist, they are not adequately protecting us. PC nonsense, of course. </p>
<p>I just returned from an international flight yesterday. The screening was intense. Every one of us lilly white, freckled passengers heading out of Dublin had every piece of carry-on hand searched. Every zipper compartment opened. Even my 9 year old’s Gameboy was examined. To say that Muslims are being singled out is ridiculous.</p>
<p>If the person were Middle Eastern and had a stick of dynamite in their luggage, I bet that the FBI wouldn’t have been so quick to decide that the person was NOT a terrorist. The FBI would still be investigating, and in my opinion, that would be appropriate for anyone – including the young man in the story – who was caught with an explosive in their bag.</p>
<p>Speaking of the possibility of home grown terrorists:</p>
<p>"OMAHA, Nebraska (AP) – Robert Henderson was not fired as a state trooper because he belonged to the Ku Klux Klan and another white supremacist group, authorities said.</p>
<p>Instead, he was ousted because he could not uphold public trust while participating in such groups, they said.</p>
<p>An arbitrator disagreed, ordering the State Patrol to reinstate Henderson within 60 days and pay him back wages. The state went to court Friday to keep him off the force…</p>
<p>Arbitrator Paul J. Caffera, a New York lawyer, last week overturned the firing.</p>
<p>He said Henderson was entitled to his First Amendment rights of free speech and that the state violated the troopers’ contract, in part when it fired Henderson “because of his association with … the Ku Klux Klan.”</p>
<p>I agree that intense screening of an elementary school aged child’s “light up” shoes or a contact lens case is absurd.</p>
<p>But let’s all see what happens with this Lehigh kid with the explosive…and compare it to a Middle Easterner even contemplating carrying a shampoo bottle.</p>
<p>my brother inlaw is Irish, but is often mistaken for being Middle Eastern- each and everytime he flies he gets pulled aside and more throughly checked, while my H, more “tradtiomally” Irish ie caucasion looking, goes right through…yeah no profiling going on</p>
<p>I used to worry about packing aerosol hairspray in my luggage, in case it exploded or something. H travels several times a month – I’m just running out of worry energy. Does anyone know if this piece of dynamite would have exploded without some kind of ignition device?</p>
<p>Homeland Security recently confiscated a very nice corkscrew I had stupidly left in my makeup bag after a domestic road trip. When I fly, I usually remember to pack it in my checked baggage along with the rest of my weaponry. </p>
<p>I, too, would like to see the government really crack down on rich preppy WASPs carrying dynamite in their luggage aboard airplanes. Their special white-glove treatment in this particular area has just been going on for way too long. Power to the People…Right On!</p>
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<p>Good one, driver!</p>
<p>Heading out of the US, my d’s violin case was pulled from the x-ray screening as a few anxious screeners gathered round. Tin whistles had raised their suspicions. Guess they looked like some type of homemade handgun.</p>
<p>I cannot claim to be an Irishman with a deep tan, as CGM’s roughed-up brother-in-law, so perhaps it is reasonable that I, as someone who is actually of middle-eastern decent, have never been given anything to get all indignant about. </p>
<p>Perhaps I lack the menacing grin of an Irish rugby player–otherwise, how to account for the obvious disinterest.</p>