What started out as a report of someone setting off fireworks on a flight from Amsterdam has turned out to be an act of terrorism. Fortunately, poor execution by this terrorist and quick action by the passengers averted a disaster.
But what is going on here? This Nigerian, Umar Farouk Abdulmatallah, managed to get on the plane to the United States, even though his name was supposedly on the terrorist watch list. He also managed to get past security in spite of carrying both solid and liquid elements for his explosives. Millions of passengers have had to go through the indignities of the screening process since the 9/11 attacks, and yet those with intent can still beat the system. The end result of this incident is likely the further indignity of being groped. The terrorists win.
But there may be an even more nefarious aspect at play here. Now we are finding out that he was a student in London and son of the former chairman of the First Bank of Nigeria. The guy knows about money! It is only one short step to our favorite spam: The Nigerian Prince scam. While this may sound cliche, is it at least remotely possible that this scam is being used to finance terrorism? How many of us are inadvertently financing terrorism? Could our best defense against Al Qaeda be a better spam filter? Everything else seems futile.
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He probably paid the security screeners to get thru. The security guards at the airport are not well paid and there you have it! A prince charm paid them, we the rest have to bear the sreening and search and not to carry our babies bottle!