Comments on: Obama to fix Security Flaws; but Could he Please Fix Stupid Racial Profiling?

By: Samuel

Samuel — Fri, 08 Jan 2010 06:03:23 +0000

As an American, I agree with post #1, Nigerian, taking issue with the statement that families protect their own "in that part of the world" — what the fact… the fact is, families protect their own in every part of the world, obviously, and for the author to write a couple graphs down, "You can't catch terrorists by casting a broad net" is laughable.

How ironic that a blogger calls for better technology to solve a global political and sociological issue when in fact the blog demonstrates the failure of human intelligence — aka an editor.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Thu, 07 Jan 2010 07:01:43 +0000

Mr. Cole,

that little "incident" of the Lebanese Government "jumping" on an alledged Al Quida cell, was actually a case of the Lebanese Army and Security Fortces jumping all over a US-Saudi funded and trained "counterbalance" to Hezbuallah, that kinda went "rogue", we are assured.

By: Peter Attwood

Peter Attwood — Thu, 07 Jan 2010 06:40:18 +0000

Hasan, you miss the Professor's point, I think. It is a fact that people who study in the US tend to view it more favorably or at least with more understanding, although exceptions like Sayyid Qutb abound.

It's also true that studying in China, or Russia, or in Europe has similar effects. Although related, how well these societies integrate visitors is a different issue.

Who can dispute that American hatred of foreigners, especially Muslims, is hurting the Unitted States economically and culturally, as Juan argues? Hatred often hurts itself.

By: sherm

sherm — Thu, 07 Jan 2010 03:53:12 +0000

If al Qaeda was using the Christmas 09 event the same way it used 9/11, namely to leverage a few meager resources to do serious structural harm to the US, it has succeeded.

As amply commented, Obama's 14 nation strategy will do great harm to US interests, and provide less security than we had prior.

Ben Laden has climbed right into our nervous system with his very small collection of electrodes, aka airline bombers. He figured that our self destructive paranoia needed a little boost, and it wouldn't hurt if Obama ended up tying himself in a knot. And, of course, ben Laden knew that the mass media and the fire breathing partisans would do their best to increase his leverage enormously.

Why is it so easy for al Qaeda to connect our dots, and so hard for us to connect theirs?

By: Jimbo

Jimbo — Thu, 07 Jan 2010 03:00:54 +0000

As someone who has been working in the Muslim world much of my career, agree with your analysis. Re: Egypt, in addition to the security relationship and the millions of tourists (most of whom are not American) there is also the volatile and delicate relationship with the Gaza border and both North and South Sinai.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Wed, 06 Jan 2010 22:04:13 +0000

IMHO, putting Cuba on this list is insane. We have given refuge to a terrorist that Cuba desperately would like to have. What a great country this is!!!

By: fedora1978

fedora1978 — Wed, 06 Jan 2010 20:06:20 +0000

You can huff and puff all you want … but the truth is, this makes a lot of sense politically. Obama is covering the right cheek of his ass, which may give him cover with some of those swing voters who seem to be abandoning the Democrats in droves.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Wed, 06 Jan 2010 19:56:40 +0000

"But there have been no plots against US airliners by Syrian Baathists (secular Arab nationalists, the ruling party), nor will there be. States don't commit that kind of terror, since it can be traced back to them– it has a 'return address'."

I'd qualify these two statements, but otherwise a good post.