Wednesday, September 01, 2010

The Pepto-Bismol Bombers

Every attempted terror attack in the United States eventually develops a shorthand designation — its own personal nickname, if you will. Richard Reid immediately became “The Shoe Bomber”. John Allen Muhammad and Lee Boyd Malvo are known as “The Beltway Snipers”. José Padilla is usually referred to as “The Dirty Bomber”. Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab is “The Underwear Bomber”.

Nidal Malik Hasan hasn’t really settled out yet — “The (alleged) Fort Hood Killer” seems to be the commonest designation. I prefer “The Killer Shrink of Fort Hood”, but for some reason that moniker hasn’t caught on in the media yet. And I prefer “The Lap Bomber” for Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab — it has fewer syllables. But “underwear” won the day on TV and in the blogs.

Now we have two American Muslims, Ahmed Mohamed Nasser al Soofi and Hezem al Murisi (Note: a Mohammed Coefficient of 50%), who seem to have executed a dry run for a terror attack on a flight from Chicago to Schiphol Airport in Amsterdam. Al-Soofi started out in Alabama, where security screeners stopped him because of his “bulky clothing”. It turned out he had a mobile phone taped to a Pepto-Bismol bottle, three other mobile phones taped together and several watches taped together, plus $7,000 in cash.

So what did TSA do? They let him proceed with his flight, of course, since he was carrying no actual explosives. Any other course would have been racist and made them liable for “profiling” him. The Dutch, however, were less fastidious, and the two men were arrested at Schiphol:


For the time being I’ll call these guys the “Pepto-Bismol Bombers”, but I doubt it will catch on in the media. Nor will Procter and Gamble take kindly to the use of their product trademark in such a fashion.

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Our Flemish correspondent VH, who sent the link for the above video, has translated some material from the Dutch media about the Amsterdam end of the incident. He includes this note:

The Dutch public prosecutor thinks they were up to something, but “the Americans see no indications to suspect the two of terror plans.”

First, from Elsevier:

Arrested Yemenites no terrorists

by Robin van der Kloor

[August 31, 2010] In the case of two Yemenis who were arrested in the Netherlands at Schiphol airport, one should not jump to conclusions too easily. That is what the U.S. authorities warned on Tuesday. The Americans see no indications to suspect the two of terror plans.

U.S. officials say the men are probably not part of a terrorist plot.

Researchers do not think the Yemenis, who live in the United States, wanted to test the American aviation security. According to the Department of Homeland Security, there are no indications the men knew each other.

The FBI reports that the two missed a connecting flight in Chicago, which went to Washington. This probably explains how the luggage of Ahmed Mohamed Nasser al-Soofi (48) ended up on the plane.

The two men, Ahmed Mohamed Nasser al-Soofi and Hezem al Murisi (37) already aroused suspicion in America due to their strange baggage and unclear flight schedule. They were in transit to Yemen.

The Yemenis were arrested at Schiphol. According to the Dutch public prosecutor, the two are suspected of preparing a terrorist attack.

Also from Elsevier:
- - - - - - - - -
Pepto-Bismol bombers #1[Photo: according to Elsevier this is what they carried in their luggage]

The two smuggled “fake bombs” in their luggage, says a U.S. source to ABC news. The trip would have been a test for the actual commission of an attack.

Thus, one of the defendants carried $ 7,000 in cash with him. In his luggage while he was still in America a mobile phone was found that was attached to an empty medicine bottle, and also three mobile phones that were bound together with tape, three large knives, and several watches taped to an empty shampoo bottle. However, no explosives were found.

Pepto-Bismol bombers #2[Photo: one of the two during the arrest at Schiphol]

The arrested suspects are Ahmed Mohamed Nasser al Soofi and Hezem al Murisi. They are of Yemeni descent and lived in Detroit, the region in America with the most Muslims.


I see that someone who commented on a letter to the editor of The City Paper of Nashville has independently designated these two men as “The Pepto-Bismol Bombers”. Great minds think alike.

8 comments:

Anonymous said...

The lefties are absolutely beside themselves with fury over this, you know! They can't deal with the facts that not only did the big evil 'Murricans let them by once, but twice (the FBI said there was nothing suspicious !) THEN, the peaceful, drug-loving, socialist European Dutch arrested them!

Honestly, the poor progressives just can't figger out which way to turn!

Anonymous said...

This is un-f*****g-believable. Plenty of people (presumably culturally Christian Whites) have been arrested, and convicted, just for stupidly joking "I have a bomb" to a security officer in an airport.

And this muslim dude, headed for Yemen, who actually carries a fake bomb, is cleared to fly by American security in an American airport ?

How must have it felt to fly next to him over the Atlantic ? Last time I flew, I grew uneasy just watching a traveller read a pocket Koran.

Do we now have to expect European security to be better than American security ?

dienw said...

They will probably be called the "Antacid Bombers".

Consider: not only has the Airline security been tested, the Obama regime has been tested psychologically: there is a deliberated blinding and refusal to consider evidence of Islam's was against the infidel - against the United States.

Zenster said...

This is so surreal that it makes Salvador Dali look like Jean-François Millet.

It is also a classic example of what happens when people are "just following orders". The TSA inspectors who caught this probe of airport security know damn well what it represented.

Those who issued the guidelines forcing the release of individuals perpetrating this security test need to be hauled up on charges of malfeasance. The TSA employees who did not object to such lax security are a more complex issue but one that still evokes the classic Nazi cop-out of "I was just following orders".

Many of those at Nuremerg who used that now-famous excuse still ended up on the scaffold.

Baron Bodissey said...

Zenster --

Remember the Flying Imams. No one -- right up to the Secretary of DHS -- can say boo to Muslim airline passengers without risking a career-ending prosecution or lawsuit.

We can thank the courts for this situation. Federal judges would be better candidates for the sedition trials both you and I would love to see.

Zenster said...

Baron Bodissey: Remember the Flying Imams.

When this incident first happened and it was revealed that the Flying Imams intended to file "John Doe" lawsuits against the, till then, unnamed witnesses, I personally telephoned Gerry Nolting − whose Minnesota law firm Faegre & Benson LLP offered pro bono defense of said witnesses − in order to encourage his work and thank him for standing up to Islamic intimidation.

Let's just say that Counselor Nolting came across as one helluva standup guy.

Federal judges would be better candidates for the sedition trials both you and I would love to see.

Author! Author!

Sean O'Brian said...

This is un-f*****g-believable. Plenty of people (presumably culturally Christian Whites) have been arrested, and convicted, just for stupidly joking "I have a bomb" to a security officer in an airport.

It all has a sort of grim logic to it. We know that profiling at airports must be done on all passengers (or none) without taking into consideration their race, sex or outward appearance (religious garb etc.) However in order to be truly non-discriminatory we must extend an extra benefit of the doubt to people who face a higher risk of being unfairly stereotyped. This is, I believe, what has happened in this case and it has the same internal consistency as affirmative action.

So to sum up: the more somebody fits the stereotypical profile of a terrorist the more wrong it is to assume that they are a terrorist and, consequently, take measures to stop them from committing acts of terrorism. The fact that there was strong evidence that this guy was planning to blow up the plane only increased the need to let him go. This is how a Yemeni man could get away with potentially life-threatening actions that you or I could not.

Zenster said...

Sean O'Brian: So to sum up: the more somebody fits the stereotypical profile of a terrorist the more wrong it is to assume that they are a terrorist and, consequently, take measures to stop them from committing acts of terrorism. The fact that there was strong evidence that this guy was planning to blow up the plane only increased the need to let him go. This is how a Yemeni man could get away with potentially life-threatening actions that you or I could not.

An excellent summary and one that belongs on the tombstone of Western civilization or, preferrably, the scaffold from which shall dangle those who wrote and implemented these suicidal policies.

IT IS AS IF MORAL INVERSION HAS BECOME A VIRTUE.