“I think you or I would have a better chance of winning the Powerball lottery, than an Egyptian major in the unit that assassinated Sadat would have getting a visa, getting to California, getting into the Army and getting assigned to a Special Forces unit. That just doesn’t happen.”

Thanks for writing this Mr. Ahmed, I was interested in what you said in the documentary “Zero.”

thanks for all the comments and feedback.

on the issue of whether Abdulmutallab was allowed to do what he did by US authorities.

as most readers of my work will know, any kind of speculation beyond what can be established as fact is not something I do. others are more than welcome to explore possibilities and ideas, but i find that doing so can often lead one up a garden path from which there is no return. that’s just my take.

it’s important to think about these issues from a question of law, the burden of proof, innocent until proven guilty – the values that we are seeing eroded across western liberal democracies in the name of ‘security’. the problem is that blanket assertions of this kind cannot really be proven. we don’t have a paper trail. we only have anecdotal and circumstantial evidence, reported via third-party sources. this is a basis on which to build a reasonably coherent picture, but not to make an incriminating case. what we can establish as fact is that normal security procedures that should have been followed, were not. logically, and in the absence of further detailed evidence, this could be explained in ways other than that the US government allowed Abdulmutallab to do what he did. For one thing, when we say “US government” – who exactly do we mean? Obama himself, personally? John Brennan? The CIA? The NSA? The State Department? All of them together? Just one of them? Or a cross-agency network inside all of them? And if any/all of these are responsible, then how can we prove this?

The fact that we cannot even remotely answer this question illustrates the problem with coming to a blanket conclusion. We can identify, in an extremly rough way, where some specific agencies or authorities seem to have lapsed. We can demonstrate that the nature of the lapse cannot be explained in the conventional way. This points to the politicization and corruption of the intelligence system at the very least, but does not automatically prove more than that. We will be stronger if we focus on what we know, rather than what involves speculation, demanding answers and accountability, not getting bogged down in the ever-growing multiplicity of competing theories and narratives.

I’m getting ready to post Part II. It should be up in an hour or less. It gets even better:-) Nafeez may be here soon to comment…

Your first section was very strong, with an ending that cut through the crap: “More simply: no one is to blame.” That’s been done so damn many times by the government: spread the blame so wide that nobody gets held responsible.

But the ending of Part 1 peters out. As JamesONeill said, it wasn’t a failure of the system: crotchQaeda “was allowed to” get as far as he did.

Precedent: In the early 1960s, Lee Harvey Oswald was groomed to be a patsy. His return from his “defection” to Russia was all too smooth. His placement in a job in the Book Depository shortly before the multi-shooter assassination was obviously an inside job. Prior to November 22, if Oswald’s mother had told the CIA or FBI of worries about her son, that report would have been suppressed — as was crotchQaeda’s father’s report.

Since the 1960s, the CIA has continued and expanded what works for them. And so we have the boy with the faulty buttbomb allowed to fly. I submit to you that the bomb was purposely faulty, though the boy probably didn’t know that.

That kind of operation is NOT NEW.

Today I see a Reuters story that stinks of being a planted story by CIA.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20100113/wl_nm/us_drugs_security_aviation

Just as the ButtBomber episode helps the current U.S. regime bomb Yemen, the Reuters story helps the current U.S. regime set up some African countries and Venezuela for ObombA-regime crimes. Why? Those countries are upstream-, downstream-, or as-yet-undiscovered oil countries. China has been making good business deals in Africa, so the U.S. is ramping up in reaction.

I can’t stand it. I can’t stand the criminal U.S. regime. So, I’m going to do something about it.

Off-topic, I’d be interested in your take on this story from the Telegraph:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/afghanistan/6967224/Taliban-may-be-descended-from-Jews.html

Although, as Simcha Jacobovici pointed out in his documentary on the subject, the Pushtuns could actually be modern-day Israelites. When his documentary was first aired, I thought of the implications of 16 million Pashtun Israelite Muslims all entitled to the Right Of Return to Israel.

Virtually all media outlets are discussing whether we should be profiling all Arab Muslims; I will in the one-page explain why we don’t need profiling. Over 15 years ago, we at the Center for Aggression Management developed an easily-applied, measurable and culturally-neutral body language and behavior indicators exhibited by people who intend to perpetrate a terrorist act. This unique methodology utilizes proven research from the fields of psychology, medicine and law enforcement which, when joined together, identify clear, easily-used physiologically-based characteristics of individuals who are about to engage in terrorist activities in time to prevent their Moment of Commitment.

The Problem
Since the foiled terrorist attack by Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, the Nigerian national on Northwest Flight 253 to Detroit, the President has repeatedly stated that there has been a systemic failure as he reiterates his commitment to fill this gap in our security. This incident, like the Fort Hood shooting, exemplifies why our government must apply every valid preventative approach to identify a potential terrorist.

The myriad methods to identify a terrorist, whether “no-fly list,” “explosive and weapons detection,” mental illness based approaches, “profiling” or “deception detection” – all continue to fail us. Furthermore, the development of deception detection training at Boston Logan Airport demonstrated that the Israeli methods of interrogation will not work in the United States.

All media outlets are discussing the need for profiling of Muslim Arabs, but profiling does not work for the following three reasons:

1. In practice, ethnic profiling tells us that within a certain group of people there is a higher probability for a terrorist; it does not tell us who the next terrorist is!

2. Ethnic profiling is contrary to the value our society places on diversity and freedom from discrimination based on racial, ethnic, religious, age and/or gender based criteria. If we use profiling it will diminish our position among the majority of affected citizens who support us as a beacon of freedom and liberty.

3. By narrowing our field of vision, profiling can lead to the consequence of letting terrorists go undetected, because the terrorist may not be part of any known “profile worthy” group – e.g., the Oklahoma City bomber, Timothy McVeigh

The Solution
Our unique methodology for screening passengers can easily discern (independently of race, ethnicity, religious affiliation, age, and gender) the defining characteristics of human beings who are about to engage in terrorist acts.

The question is when will our government use true “hostile intent” through the “continuum of aggressive behavior” to identify potential terrorists? Only when observers focus specifically on “aggressive behavior” do the objective and culturally neutral signs of “aggression” clearly stand out, providing the opportunity to prevent these violent encounters. This method will not only make all citizens safer, but will also pass the inevitable test of legal defensibility given probable action by the ACLU.

As our Government analyzes what went wrong regarding Abdulmatallab’s entrance into the United States, you can be assured that Al Qaeda is also analyzing how their plans went wrong. Who do you think will figure it out first . . . ?

Visit our blog at http://blog.AggressionManagement.com where we discuss the shooting at Fort Hood and the attempted terrorist act on Flight 253.