Don’t Take Flight 253

For the second time in three days, a Nigerian man has been arrested on Northwestern Airlines Flight 253 bound from Amsterdam to Detroit, Michigan, although the second incident – which took place Sunday – has been described by federal investigators as “non-serious.”

In the first incident – which took place on Christmas day – alleged Nigerian terrorist Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab injured himself and several other passengers while attempting to detonate a homemade explosive hidden inside his pants (editor’s note: ouch).  Abdulmutallab later said that he was acting on instructions from al Qaeda, although the veracity of that claim is in doubt.

What’s not in doubt is that Abdulmutallab successfully smuggled the chemical explosive PETN (pentaerythritol tetranitrate) onto a flight bound for America, prompting a flood of political hand-wringing over airplane security, which underwent a dramatic transformation following the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001.

Additionally, the father of the alleged terrorist warned the U.S. Embassy in Nigeria of his son’s militant behavior, although these warnings only got Abdulmutallab’s name added to a “watch list” – one that includes more than half a million names.

He wasn’t placed on a smaller “no fly” list of 4,000 names.

The incident involving Abdulmutallab is the second in which the administration of Barack Obama has come under fire.  Last month, a Muslim U.S. Army Major killed  thirteen soldiers at Fort Hood in Killen, Texas.  It was later discovered that the shooter – Major Nidal Malik Hasan – had been corresponding with a radical Islamic cleric, and that the U.S. government had been monitoring those exchanges.

Ever uber-leftist Andrew Sullivan of the liberal rag The Atlantic is urging Obama to “find the people responsible for this negligence and fire them.”

Meanwhile U.S. Sen. Joe Lieberman, an “Independent-Democrat” from Connecticut, has vowed Congressional hearings over the incident when Congress returns in January.

“I am troubled by several aspects of this case, including how the suspect escaped the attention of the State Department and law enforcers when his father apparently reported concerns about his son’s extremist behavior,” Senator Lieberman said in a statement.

In Sunday’s incident, the unidentified Nigerian man had repeatedly gone to the bathroom and failed to respond to flight attendants’ instructions.  He later became “verbally abusive.”

Initial reports indicate the man is a businessman who became ill during the flight, although those reports have yet to be confirmed.