As I alluded to, anyone who is willing to quote Ann Coulter... Well, do the math.

Well this sure is timely:
***************************
CNN

<font size = 4 >Al Qaeda could try to recruit non-Arabs, FBI warns</font>

Bulletin: Terror group might also seek out women

Saturday, July 17, 2004 Posted: 4:10 PM EDT (2010 GMT)

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- The FBI's weekly alert bulletin, sent to 18,000 law enforcement agencies nationwide, focused this week on the possibility of al Qaeda recruiting non-Arabs to carry out attacks in the United States.

"Finding operatives with U.S. [citizenship or legal residency] status would greatly facilitate al Qaeda's ability to carry out an attack within the United States," the bulletin said.

The Department of Homeland Security first mentioned the possibility of such recruitment in December, when it raised the terror alert level from yellow to orange, saying there was intelligence that terrorists could be planning to use chemical, nuclear, biological or radiological weapons.

The new warning comes amid what the administration says is a continuous stream of intelligence indicating that al-Qaeda is determined to strike the United States in the summer or fall.

Neither the FBI bulletin nor intelligence officials have offered any indication of a possible time, place or method of attack, and some officials have said they see no significant increase in so-called "chatter" in the intelligence lines of communication.

Because of its hardline interpretation of Islam, al Qaeda favors using male operatives between 18 and 35, the FBI said.

But women could also be recruited, especially from areas considered more liberal on the subject, such as North and East Africa and the eastern Mediterranean, the FBI notice said.

Despite its warning about recruits from outside the Middle East, the bulletin said police and security personnel should not discount the possibility that Arabs could still be used in a U.S. attack, particularly if they are already in the United States.

Of particular concern are people with ties to Islamic extremist groups in North Africa and parts of Asia outside the Middle East.

Still, the FBI said, almost all al Qaeda operatives in the past have traveled at least once to Asia, particularly Afghanistan and Pakistan, for "consultation and training."

An old saying circulated by paranoid people to justify paranoid actions [img]tongue.gif[/img]
Black Baron lives in Israel, yes, I agree with you on that one. But a question I have for you is who exactly are 'they' that are 'out to get' him?

Well, I can't speak for anyone here but myself, so I'll say that I personally view paranoia regarding 'terrorist' threats to be understandable given past events, but not justifiable, nor acceptable.

Perhaps Donut can field a couple of questions for us: Mr Donut, would you panic or be terribly afraid if you knew you were sharing an airliner with 14 Irishmen, given the history of 'Irish' terrorist bombings on your home city? If so, why so? If not, why not? Do you feel that you have no choice but to be afraid of potential 'threats', and view all 'Irish' strangers with suspicion and thinly-veiled dread?

I travel by air about five times a year. I usually fly out of Logan in Boston because it is only 20 minutes away from me, but I also travel out of Providence on occassion. I have been on airplanes with groups arab-looking men- who traveled together but were seated seperate and who moved around the cabin and used the bathroom. Not once did I find myself in a state of near-panic, nor did I contemplate that any of those Arabs-looking folks were potential terrorists planning the worst.

I also travel by subway around Boston alot, not as much now as when I worked in the city, but often enough. Frequently during rush hour arab-looking men would get on the 'crammed to the brim with commuters' train, ladden with backpacks and other packages. Never once did I think I was about to die at the hands of terrorists, nor did I call 9-11 to say that suspicious looking men with backpacks were on the train becasue just about anyday I would see such a site.

Now am I concerned and aware in situations like this? You bet- I am mister observant. But being cautious and aware does not equal becoming panicked or jumping to the worst possible scenario based on insufficient information. The store I ran in Boston sat directly above a redline subway station. On several occassions I reported unattended packages/bags in and around the subway.

My point? I walk in shoes like those quite often enough and can understand why people are fearful and think the worst- but this doesnt make it okay nor excuse it. I have a small hope that offering the perspective "being fearful is not the only way, there are other ways to reach the same end" that perhaps people will reflect on their own perspectives and consider alternatives.

Living in fear is exactly what the terrorist want out of us and responding with fearful paranoina to percieved threats plays right into their hand.

Break it down, stack it up it all leads this military mind to one single conclusion.

A perfectly planned, executed, and drawn out full gear rehearsal!

Break down one more factor. Air Marshals! I don't recall what the stewardess said, but I recall a plural form. Hmm, more than one? Possible, there are a few. But to calm the fear, she may have intentionaly made it out to be plural. Or, there were other law enforcement officers on the plane.
However, like any other under cover operation, one would not chance his cover for a practical exercise. He would wait until the threat is clear and imminent!

So, in conclusion. A perfect rehearshal, with law enforcement on board.

The media is not privy to all!

actually if you read the part after they landed there were six air marshalls.


http://www.washtimes.com/national/20...1403-1508r.htm

anyway here's some more info.

A second pilot said that, on one of his recent flights, an air marshal forced his way into the lavatory at the front of his plane after a man of Middle Eastern descent locked himself in for a long period.
The marshal found the mirror had been removed and the man was attempting to break through the wall. The cockpit was on the other side.
The second pilot said terrorists are "absolutely" testing security.
"There is a great degree of concern in the airline industry that not only are these dry runs for a terrorist attack, but that there is absolutely no defense capabilities on a vast majority of airlines," the second pilot said.
Dawn Deeks, spokeswoman for the Association of Flight Attendants, said there is no "central clearinghouse" for them to learn of suspicious incidents, and flight crews are not told how issues are resolved.

I would pretty much echo Promtheius' points here. They must have been through security before their first flight, just like everyone else, and really, I just think this woman is too racist for her own good, she doesn't really bring up any good points out of this whole article, and she just really makes her self out as a bit of a nosy egoist.

As said in the first article, current screening practices prevent them from pulling more than 2 people of middle eastern appearance for closer inspection, there have also been cases reported where a more thorough inspection caught people engaged in suspicious activities that weren't on "any known government terror list".

Whatever you think of the first article, at least look at the second, it has many more documented accounts of people testing the in place security measures, such as the bit I posted above Your post RoSs

yeh but doesn't everyone get screened though? Here in Europe everyone does.

I am skeptikal of anomynous sources with extraordinary claims that have never before been reported in the media and this article is full of the same fearmongering and middle-east stereotyping as the other. I would enjoy corroboration of some of the tales told- like the supposedly Arab-looking fellow trying to get into the cockpit by removing the bathroom mirror and clawing through the wall. Regardless- I still wont typecast someone because of their appearance and I remain unafraid.
***********************

On another note:


Here is a lengthy ( and I think funny) response to the article in the OP written by a pilot:
( you'll have to watch an ad for a free pass if you are not a subscriber)
http://www.salon.com/tech/col/smith/.../index_np.html


July 21, 2004 | In this space was supposed to be installment No. 6 of my multiweek dissertation on airports and terminals. The topic is being usurped by one of those nagging, Web-borne issues of the moment, in this case a reactionary scare story making the cyber-rounds during the past week.

The piece in question, "Terror in the Skies, Again?" is the work of Annie Jacobsen, a writer for WomensWallStreet.com. Jacobsen shares the account of the emotional meltdown she and her fellow passengers experienced when, aboard a Northwest Airlines flight from Detroit to Los Angeles, a group of Middle Eastern passengers proceeded to act "suspiciously." I'll invite you to experience "Terror" yourself, but be warned it's quite long. It needs to be, I suppose, since ultimately it's a story about nothing, puffed and aggrandized to appear important.

The editors get the drama cooking with some foreboding music: "You are about to read an account of what happened," counsels a 70-word preamble. "The WWS Editorial Team debated long and hard about how to handle this information and ultimately we decided it was something that should be shared ... Here is Annie's story" [insert lower-octave piano chord here].

What follows are six pages of the worst grade-school prose, spring-loaded with mindless hysterics and bigoted provocation.

Fourteen dark-skinned men from Syria board Northwest's flight 327, seated in two separate groups. Some are carrying oddly shaped bags and wearing track suits with Arabic script across the back. During the flight the men socialize, gesture to one another, move about the cabin with pieces of their luggage, and, most ominous of all, repeatedly make trips to the bathroom. The author links the men's apparently irritable bladders to a report published in the Observer (U.K.) warning of terrorist plots to smuggle bomb components onto airplanes one piece at a time, to be secretly assembled in lavatories.

"What I experienced during that flight," breathes Jacobsen, "has caused me to question whether the United States of America can realistically uphold the civil liberties of every individual, even non-citizens, and protect its citizens from terrorist threats."

Intriguing, no? I, for one, fully admit that certain acts of airborne crime and treachery may indeed open the channels to a debate on civil liberties. Pray tell, what happened? Gunfight at 37,000 feet? Valiant passengers wrestle a grenade from a suicidal operative? Hero pilots beat back a cockpit takeover?

Well, no. As a matter of fact, nothing happened. Turns out the Syrians are part of a musical ensemble hired to play at a hotel. The men talk to one another. They glance around. They pee.

That's it?

That's it.

Now, in fairness to Jacobsen, I'll admit that in-flight jitters over the conspicuous presence of a group of young Arabs is neither unexpected nor, necessarily, irrational. She speaks of seven of the men standing in unison, a moment that, if unembellished, would have even the most culturally open-minded of us wide-eyed and grabbing our armrest. As everybody knows, it was not a gaggle of Canadian potato farmers who commandeered those jetliners on Sept. 11. See also the legacy of air crimes over the past several decades, from Pan Am 103 to the UTA bombing to the failed schemings of Ramzi Yousef, the culprits each time being young Arab males.

Air crews and passengers alike are thus prone to jumpiness should a certain template of race and behavior be filled. Jacobsen's folly is in not being able to step back from that jumpiness -- neither during the flight itself, at which point her worry and behavior are at least excusable, nor well after touching down safely. Speaking as a pilot, air travel columnist, and American, I find Jacobsen's 3,000-word ghost story of Arab boogeymen among the most overwrought and inflammatory tracts I've encountered in some time.

Most disturbing of all has been the pickup from Internet bloggers and news sources, including ABC, CNN, MSNBC and the New York Times. The writer hops a flight to California on which absolutely nothing of danger occurs, and the following are among the citations:

"Harrowing piece"
"The frightening true story"
"Disturbing account"
"Riveting article"
"An absolute must-read"


"Read all about the breaking Northwest airlines scare," advertises TheLosAngelesNews.com, suggesting perhaps a narrowly averted crash, a bomb defused during flight or a thwarted skyjacking. Click on over to hear instead about the toilet habits of a group of Syrian minstrels and one middle-aged woman's alarmist reaction to them. No matter; over the past week or so Jacobsen has found herself linked and excerpted in every last crevice of the Web. Those of you not convinced of just how paranoid and xenophobic Americans can be, look no further than the following online posts, which, along with thousands like them, have emerged in direct response to this story:

"You will never, ever, catch me on an airplane again!"
"My advice would be to de-plane as soon as I counted 14 Arabs as passengers. "

"Soon after 9/11 we were in a local McDonald's and a group of Middle Eastern men came in and got carry-out. They sat in their van for a while then headed North. I felt scared out of my wits. I wrote down a description of the vehicle and license, but never did anything with it. Guess next time I won't be so stupid."

Jacobsen spins her experience into a not-so-veiled call for racial profiling of airline passengers. Help me out with this one: If only those musicians had been interrogated prior to boarding, it would have been revealed they were, in fact ... musicians. (They had, of course, endured the same concourse X-ray and metal detector rigmarole as everyone else, and were in possession of valid passports and visas.)

My own feelings on passenger profiling are mixed, and I'm not as liberal on the issue as you might expect. However, I do think singling out a specific ethnicity for extra screening is less a racist idea than a wasteful and ineffective one. Does it not occur to people that Muslim radicals come in all complexions and from many nations -- from the heart of black Africa to the archipelagoes of Southeast Asia? (Many Syrians, no less, are fair-haired and light-skinned.) Does it not occur to people that terrorists are clever, resourceful and, in the end, bound to outwit such obvious snares? The notion that 14 saboteurs, replete with silk-screened track suits effectively advertising themselves as such, would obviously and boisterously proceed in and out of an airplane lavatory, taking turns to construct a bomb, is so over-the-top ludicrous it deserves its own comedy sketch. Indeed, Jacobsen is trying to portray a scene of angst and fear, but she inadvertently scripts out a parody. I half-expected her to tell me that one of the men wore a cardboard sign labeled "TERRORIST."

On Tuesday morning I appeared as a guest on a conservative, drive-time radio show in Philadelphia, and Jacobsen was the hot issue. The host, without much else to go on, proposed the Syrians had choreographed a "dry run" for a future attack. (At one point he referred to the involved carrier, Northwest Airlines, as "Northeastern.") When I dared express doubt, and noted that investigators from the Transportation Security Administration and the FBI had confirmed the men's identities and motives, I was mocked, ridiculed and eventually hung up on. The very suggestion that the men could have been innocent musicians seemed, in the eyes of the host and callers, preposterous. They had to be terrorists. Disagreeing got me called "a frickin' idiot," and a caller demanded to know which airline I worked for so he could be certain never to ride on a plane with a traitor like me at the controls.

Stop the presses: A sequel to "Terror in the Skies, Again?" has now been posted on WomensWallStreet.com, in which Jacobsen reinfects the conversation with a fresh dose of mongering. "And I now have another important question," she writes. "Is there a link between my experience ... and the arrest of Ali Mohamed Almosaleh by Customs agents at the Minneapolis Airport on July 7?" Almosaleh, a Syrian, was allegedly carrying a suicide note and "anti-American material."

Jacobsen's hint at conspiracy, however, is based exclusively on the coincidence that Almosaleh and the musicians happen to all be Syrian citizens. I see. That a supposition this groundless and stupid can make it into print and entice the likes of major news networks should outrage any clear-thinking American. How about we seek out all Syrians and put their names on airline blacklists?

Jacobsen's sequel is peppered with incendiary quotes from industry sources. Says an airline pilot: "The terrorists are probing us all the time." Another confides a maddeningly baseless belief that Jacobsen had been "likely on a dry run," while another states, "The incident you wrote about, and incidents like it, occur more than you like to think. It is a 'dirty little secret' that all of us, as crew members, have known about for quite some time."

Which dirty little secret, exactly, are we talking about? That foreigners ride on airplanes?

In a moment of truly ghastly philosophizing, Jacobsen includes a manipulative passage in which she is smitten with anguish as she recollects a photograph taken during the Sept. 11 attacks. She gives us this: "Political correctness has become a major road block for airline safety ... I think about the meaning of 'dry run.' And then I think about what it means to be politically correct. And I keep coming up blank."

So do I.

Aside from matters of politics and general opinion, is Jacobsen playing fast and loose with the facts? There appear to be embellishments in her original tale.

Aboard flight 327, as she, her husband and several passengers and crew are having their nervous breakdowns, comes this instance of B-movie tension: "[The flight attendant] leaned over and quietly told my husband there were federal air marshals sitting all around us. She asked him not to tell anyone and explained that she could be in trouble for giving out that information. She then continued serving drinks."
Are we to believe not only that an airline professional was unwise enough to reveal such a thing, but that a group of marshals -- not one, not two, but several -- having gotten word that a covey of Arabs were flying to LAX, were on hand to trail and observe them? That's some tight logistical planning. Are we following Middle Easterners through airports now? If so, how does that work at Kennedy International, I wonder, where foreign airliners carrying thousands of passengers arrive daily from Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Egypt, Morocco, the UAE and elsewhere? That's a lot of dry runs, and there's no love lost, after all, between Muslim radicals and the governments who own and operate these airlines -- Pakistan International, Saudi Arabian, EgyptAir, Royal Jordanian, etc. Such subtleties are lost on that segment of the public who'd prefer a more digestible cock-and-bull yarn from high above the American heartland. As for those wacky airlines from abroad, why not simply ban them from American airspace?


Clearly I'm in a fit of envy over Jacobsen's cheap grab at notoriety. I've got a book out and could use some publicity. Here, let me give it a try.

Late last summer I boarded a nonstop flight from Dubai, United Arab Emirates, to Newark, N.J. After taking my seat, I noticed that well over a hundred of my fellow passengers looked to be Muslims! Yes, that's the same faith adhered to by those dastardly perpetrators who knocked down our Trade Center and demolished part of the Pentagon. Not only that, but our aircraft, a Malaysia Airlines Boeing 777, was registered and maintained by a company headquartered in a predominantly Muslim nation! What if the cargo holds had been stuffed full of anthrax or TNT by unscrupulous terrorists back in Kuala Lumpur!

Several passengers wore conservative Islamic dress -- men in white dishdashas; women concealed in full black burqa. Our plane contained a Muslim prayer enclave (for possible use by terrorists preparing for the throes of martydrom), and the seatback video displayed a graphic of the qibla, showing real-time distance and heading to Mecca. En route toward New York, dozens of Muslim passengers were seen socializing and using the lavatories, in some cases blatantly ignoring the illuminated seat-belt sign!

To my relief and utter astonishment, we landed safely (and on time).

Jacobsen simmers her own account in gratuitous detail and melodrama. It plays like a Hollywood disaster film -- the young child, the would-be villain who smiles innocently in a moment of spooky foreshadowing. We're waiting for the gunshots, the fireball from the lavatory, the marshals jumping up to yell, "Hit the floor!"

That her story concludes in such a painfully boring anticlimax ought to be the very point, and in the final few pages she still has time for a constructive moral, the clear lesson being not the potentials of global terror, but the dangers of our own preconceptions and imagination. Instead, she pulls a vile U-turn and chooses to bait us with racist innuendo and fearmongering. Nothing happened, but something might have happened, and so it serves us to remain frightened and draconian at all costs, furthering our nation's pathetic embrace of maximum paranoia.

Jacobsen's kicker: "So the question is ... Do I think these men were musicians? I'll let you decide. But I wonder, if 19 terrorists can learn to fly airplanes into buildings, couldn't 14 terrorists learn to play instruments?"

Excuse me? She concludes, as did the radio host Tuesday morning, by insinuating that the men were terrorists, despite every shred of evidence, not to mention common sense, arguing to the contrary. And with that her article, and her credibility with it, plummets from merely sensationalist to inexcusably offensive

Ha! Now that's an interesting read. Thanks for posting it, Chewie. [img]smile.gif[/img]

I sent it to my mother, who, ten minutes ago, expressed her horror at the original article's implications.

I wonder how she'll react.

Great read Chewbacca, I totally agree with that. After about the second page of the article I thought it was gona be over, but no, she dragged it out to the bitter end. Even continuing for weeks after they had left the plane. I think this woman really needs to get a life.

yeah - what those last few post said [img]smile.gif[/img] - gerat post Chewie, and like the writer of your article I also find Ms Jacobsen's article "inexcusably offensive".

Right RevRuby - if it ever happens in my country I'll understand concerns about terrorism!!!

:rolleyes:

An interesting thought! I'm flying to Dublin next week - I'll let you know if I make it back.

Actually that's a slightly unfair question because the IRA never indulged in suicide attacks.

I don't think it unrreasonable to be concerned about a group of Arabs behaving 'unusually' on a plane. Make your concerns known to the airline staff and let them deal with it. In fact - be aware of ANYONE behaving unusually on a plane.

A women I once worked with told me of the day in October 1981 when she was in a toilet in a fast food restaurant in Oxford Street in London. She heard a women with an Irish accent say something along the lines of "I can't set the last one.!" Later that day a series of bombs exploded in London's West End. Policeman Kenneth Howarth was killed trying to defuse a bomb in another fast food restaurant in Oxford Street.

My 2c: I think the fears are not unreasonable, but the manner in which this was reported was clearly done so as to elicit an emotional response, which it clearly accomplished...

Agree with Memnoch.

Being reasonable, I note that behavior such as carrying a McD's bag to the loo would be suspicious, as would many of the other activities thes passengers were conducting. I think that no matter how white your skin were, such activities would be suspect. I also note that, whether or not you might admit it, such activities by Arab men would likely arouse your suspicions if it were on your flight and it were you life at risk.

As with all things, the authorities should investigate and "get to the bottom" of matters, as apparently was done here.

Even Snopes has picked this story up:

http://www.snopes.com/politics/crime/skyterror.asp


One of their sources is this article:


AIR MARSHALS SAY PASSENGER OVERREACTED
By ERIC LEONARD
KFI NEWS

LOS ANGELES | July 22, 2004 – Undercover federal air marshals on board a June 29 Northwest airlines flight from Detroit to LAX identified themselves after a passenger, “overreacted,” to a group of middle-eastern men on board, federal officials and sources have told KFI NEWS.

The passenger, later identified as Annie Jacobsen, was in danger of panicking other passengers and creating a larger problem on the plane, according to a source close to the secretive federal protective service.

Jacobsen, a self-described freelance writer, has published two stories about her experience at womenswallstreet.com, a business advice web site designed for women.

“The lady was overreacting,” said the source. “A flight attendant was told to tell the passenger to calm down; that there were air marshals on the plane.”

The middle eastern men were identified by federal agents as a group of touring musicians travelling to a concert date at a casino, said Air Marshals spokesman Dave Adams.

Jacobsen wrote she became alarmed when the men made frequent trips to the lavatory, repeatedly opened and closed the overhead luggage compartments, and appeared to be signaling each other.

“Initially it was brought to [the air marshals] attention by a passenger,” Adams said, adding the agents had been watching the men and chose to stay undercover.

Jacobsen and her husband had a number of conversations with the flight attendants and gestured towards the men several times, the source said.

“In concert with the flight crew, the decision was made to keep [the men] under surveillance since no terrorist or criminal acts were being perpetrated aboard the aircraft; they didn’t interfere with the flight crew,” Adams said.

The air marshals did, however, check the bathrooms after the middle-eastern men had spent time inside, Adams said.

FBI agents met the plane when it landed in Los Angeles and the men were questioned, and Los Angeles field office spokeswoman Cathy Viray said it’s significant the alarm on the flight came from a passenger.

“We have to take all calls seriously, but the passenger was worried, not the flight crew or the federal air marshals,” she said. “The complaint did not stem from the flight crew.”

Several people were questioned, she said, but no one was detained.

Jacobsen’s husband Kevin told KFI NEWS he approached a man he thought was an air marshal after the flight had landed.

“You made me nervous,” Kevin said the air marshal told him.

“I was freaking out,” Kevin replied.

“We don’t freak out in situations like this,” the air marshal responded.

Federal agents later verified the musicians’ story.

“We followed up with the casino,” Adams said. A supervisor verified they were playing a concert. A second federal law enforcement source said the concert itself was monitored by an agent.

“We also went to the hotel, determined they had checked into the hotel,” Adams said. Each of the men were checked through a series of databases and watch-lists with negative results, he said.

The source said the air marshals on the flight were partially concerned Jacobsen’s actions could have been an effort by terrorists or attackers to create a disturbance on the plane to force the agents to identify themselves.

Air marshals’ only tactical advantage on a flight is their anonymity, the source said, and Jacobsen could have put the entire flight in danger.

“They have to be very cognizant of their surroundings,” spokesman Adams confirmed, “to make sure it isn’t a ruse to try and pull them out of their cover.”

Which begs the question-

What type of mindsets or behaviors can having this type of emotional response lead to?

With emotionalism in the picture, particularly panic or fear, and the related symptoms ( hysteria, delusions, fight or flight reactions, ect.) one could possibly act out in error and lose control of mental faculties- just about any situation can begin to "look" suspicious. Due to the emotional state of the author I now have my doubts if events actually unfolded as reported. I do have a wonder just how much of it was imagined in a mind gripped with escalating fear.

I actually saw the story yesterday in the News Review magazine in the Sunday Post. Im glad I got a chance to read these other articles though Chewbacca, as they really just about sum everything up. This woman just really made a big mess out of nothing, which probably offended the men when they were questioned, and really served no purpose. And if there had been a threat, this sort of panic would only make things worse. It could spread to other passengers and flights in which people are panicing are not nice to be on.

Which begs the question-

What type of mindsets or behaviors can having this type of emotional response lead to?

With emotionalism in the picture, particularly panic or fear, and the related symptoms ( hysteria, delusions, fight or flight reactions, ect.) one could possibly act out in error and lose control of mental faculties- just about any situation can begin to "look" suspicious. Due to the emotional state of the author I now have my doubts if events actually unfolded as reported. I do have a wonder just how much of it was imagined in a mind gripped with escalating fear. </font>[/QUOTE]Well, paranoia can make people do strange things. I reckon my mum would have felt the same way as Annie Jacobsen had - 1+1 = 3 and all that. Though I don't think she would have written a long, rambling fear-mongering article about it. She'd have taken her Frissium pills to control her high blood pressure and that would have been the end of it.

But then again my mum isn't a freelance writer, like Annie Jacobson is. ;)

Anyway, Annie's got more:

<font color="gray">
--------------------
Part II: Terror in the Skies, Again?
By Annie Jacobsen

A WWS Exclusive Opinion Piece

Last Tuesday morning, WomensWallStreet.com (WWS) published my first-person account of a recent Northwest Airlines flight that I took from Detroit to Los Angeles called "Terror in the Skies, Again?" A heads up about this article went out in our Daily Cents email -- our subscriber newsletter which primarily features financial tips and information for women.

On Wednesday morning, the WWS page views were unusually high, something like 10 times the normal amount. Apparently our readers had been emailing the article to their friends, family and colleagues and everyone was reading it.

By Thursday morning, that number had again multiplied ten-fold. It felt like the shampoo commercial from my youth: they told two friends, then they told two friends, then they told two friends. We sat in the WWS offices reading through your emails, taking stock of what you had to say. As the afternoon went on, the number of people reading the article continued to increase and the telephone was ringing off the hook.

And then a powerful thing happened. The mainstream media started calling.

The following statement was made by Daniel Drezner, an Assistant Professor of Political Science at the University of Chicago, on his website danieldrezner.com:

"I received a mass email linking to this disturbing first-person account by Annie Jacobsen... I can say that the e-mail sent to me and other bloggers was cc-ed to movers and shakers in the mediaspere -- Bill Keller, David Ignatius, George Will, Anne Applebaum, and Nicholas D. Kristoff. So they're certainly aware of the story... I'd like to see real journalists dig deeper into this."

Dig they did. NBC was the first major news outlet to contact WomensWallStreet. The producer I spoke with on the telephone said the FBI had confirmed that 14 Syrians were on the flight, they confirmed the details about what happened upon landing in Los Angeles, and they said that the accounts from the flight attendants regarding what happened during the flight matched the accounts given by me and my husband to the FBI after we landed.

Then I spoke with a producer from ABC. She explained that she could not get Dave Adams, Head of Public Affairs of the Federal Air Marshal Services (FAM), on the phone. So she asked me some of the questions that she had wanted to ask him: Where exactly did this band of 14 musicians play? What was the name of the band? Who booked the band and what kind of music did they play? Did anyone follow up and actually witness these 14 men performing at their desert casino gig? I had none of the answers, even though I had asked Adams these exact questions myself when we spoke last week. The ABC producer also asked me other questions which had crossed my mind after hanging up with Adams. Did I know anything about their return flight on JetBlue? Did the men go back to Syria? Did I believe FAM's story?

And I now have another important question... Is there a link between my experience on flight #327 and the arrest of Ali Mohamed Almosaleh by customs agents at the Minneapolis Airport on July 7 (approximately one week after my flight)? Almosaleh was traveling from Damascus, Syria, to Minneapolis on KLM/Northwest Airlines. According to CNN.com, "Agents found Almosaleh to be carrying what they described as a suicide note and DVDs containing anti-American material."

It was initially reported by CNN.com that the man "is not known to the intelligence community, and that his name was not on any terrorist watch list." The following day, on TwinCities.com, the St. Paul Pioneer Press reported that Almosaleh "had something with him indicating a connection with at least one known terrorist." So, did a more thorough check of the man reveal this critical new information? Remember, according to Adams, FAM checked the 14 Syrian men on my flight against the terrorist watch lists. They found no match, so they let them go. I wonder what might have happened if the 14 Syrians on my flight had been looked into more thoroughly?

Since publishing the first article, I have received dozens of emails from people in the airline industry, including flight attendants, captains and pilots, some of whom I have also spoken with on the telephone. As of Sunday morning, to my knowledge, WWS had received no emails from anyone in the airline industry suggesting that the incident described in my first article did not happen. Here is what some of them are saying, all of it on the record.

Jeanne M. Elliott, Security Coordinator for the Professional Flight Attendants Association (PFAA), which represents the flight attendants of Northwest Airlines, said, "By the uneducated eye, and to those who don't walk in our shoes, it may have been perceived that we were doing nothing, when indeed we were putting the safety and security of those passengers as our first priority."

In a letter sent to WWS, she also states, "…the needs of this nation's flight attendants to adequately perform aviation security functions have been delayed and/or ignored." (Click here to read Elliot's letter in its entirety.)

Gary Boettcher, Member, Board of Directors, Allied Pilots Association, said, "Folks, I am a Captain with a major airline. I was very involved with the Arming Pilots effort. Your reprint of this airborne event is not a singular nor isolated experience. The terrorists are probing us all the time."

During a later phone conversation I had with Boettcher, he told me that based on his experience, it was his opinion that I was likely on a dry run. He said he's had many of these experiences and so have many of his fellow captains. They've been trying to speak out about this but so far their words have been falling on deaf ears.

According to Mark Bogosian, B-757/767 pilot for American Airlines, "The incident you wrote about, and incidents like it, occur more than you like to think. It is a â€ËÅ"dirty little secret' that all of us, as crew members, have known about for quite some time."

Rand K. Peck, captain for a major U.S. airline, sent the following email: "I just finished reading Annie Jacobsen's article, TERROR IN THE SKIES, AGAIN? I only wish that it had been written by a reporter from The Washington Post or The New York Times. My response would have been one of shock as to how insensitive of them to dare write such a piece. After all, citizens or not, don't these people have rights too?

But the piece was in The [Wall Street] Journal, a publication that I admire and read daily. I'm deeply bothered by the inconsistencies that I observe at TSA. I've observed matronly looking grandmothers, practically disrobed at security check points and five-year-old blonde boys turned inside out, while Middle Eastern males sail through undetained.

We have little to fear from grandmothers and little boys. But Middle Eastern males are protected, not by our Constitution, but from our current popular policy of political correctness and a desire to offend no one at any cost, regardless of how many airplanes and bodies litter the landscape. This is my personal opinion, formed by my experiences and observations."

This brings us to the heart of the matter -- political correctness. Political correctness has become a major road block for airline safety. From what I've now learned from the many emails and phone calls that I have had with airline industry personnel, it is political correctness that will eventually cause us to stand there wondering, "How did we let 9/11 happen again?"

During a follow-up phone conversation, one flight attendant told me that it is her airline's policy not to refer to people as "Middle Eastern men." In addition, many emails have come in calling me a racist for referring to 14 men with Syrian passports as Middle Eastern men. For the record, the Middle East is a geographical region called just that: The Middle East. If you refer to people who come from countries in this region (including Syria, Jordan, Israel, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Lebanon, Yemen, Oman, United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Bahrain, Kuwait, Iran, Iraq) as "Middle Easterners," you are being geographically correct. We call people Americans and Canadians and English and French. I call my relatives who live in Norway Norwegians. So really, what is the hang up?

The fact that I quoted Ann Coulter seems to have many people up in arms. I want to be clear -- there is no political agenda here. I quoted Ann Coulter for the information she had, not for who she is. Read the quote again and pretend Joe or Jane Doe wrote it. She states the facts. The facts she states are that 10 days after 9/11, Secretary of Transportation Norman Mineta sternly reminded airlines that it was illegal to discriminate against passengers based on their race, color, national or ethnic origin or religion.


Perhaps the title of Michael Smerconish's new book sums it up: "Flying Blind. How Political Correctness Continues to Compromise Airline Safety Post 9/11." On June 24, Smerconish testified before the U.S. Senate about the role political correctness plays in protecting airline security in a post-9/11 world. Click here to read his full testimony.

I keep thinking back to a photograph I saw in the Los Angeles Times called "Falling" by Pulitzer Prize winning AP photographer Richard Drew. It's a photograph of a man, his body is stretched out, one knee at a right angle, as if he's lying on a couch, watching television in the living room, relaxing and enjoying life. But he's not. It's a photograph of a man falling from one of the top floors of the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001. This man jumped to his death, most likely because it seemed a less painful way to die than being engulfed in flames.

This picture is haunting. For a long time I kept it in my office. I still think about this picture and I wonder about this man --- his daily life, what he did for work, what he did for play, what his thoughts were about the world. I think about this person. I think about the meaning of "dry run." And then I think about what it means to be politically correct. And I keep coming up blank.

The above article is based on the opinions of the author and does not necessarily reflect the opinions of womenswallstreet.com

Source: www.womenswallstreet.com

Original can be found HERE
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http://michellemalkin.com/archives/000265.htm

the article is dated July 23rd, so if you want verification from WNBC check out their archives from 2 days ago:

WNBC investigative reporter Scott Weinberger reported on Joe Scarborough's MSNBC show tonight that the 14 Syrians on Northwest Flight 327 ALL had expired visas. He said his sources told him that law enforcement officials xeroxed the men's paperwork without looking at the dates. The visas had expired nearly a month earlier, according to Weinberger.

This does not give me much confidence in the background checks that the Joint Terrorism Task Force, FBI, and LAPD may or may not have conducted on the men before letting them walk away. Would you trust the terrorism investigation of officials who apparently neglected to verify whether these men--coming from a designated state sponsor of terrorism, flying on a day on which Department of Homeland Security officials had issued a warning about a possible terrorist attack--WERE EVEN IN THE COUNTRY LEGALLY?!?!?!

There's more in the linked article, but I thought this was to the point.

Ha! Thanks for posting that link, Morgeruat, one of the responses there provided a wholly different perspective. ;)

AIR MARSHALS SAY PASSENGER OVERREACTED

LOS ANGELES | July 22, 2004 – Undercover federal air marshals on board a June 29 Northwest airlines flight from Detroit to LAX identified themselves after a passenger, “overreacted,” to a group of middle-eastern men on board, federal officials and sources have told KFI NEWS.

The passenger, later identified as Annie Jacobsen, was in danger of panicking other passengers and creating a larger problem on the plane, according to a source close to the secretive federal protective service.

Jacobsen, a self-described freelance writer, has published two stories about her experience at womenswallstreet.com, a business advice web site designed for women.

“The lady was overreacting,” said the source. “A flight attendant was told to tell the passenger to calm down; that there were air marshals on the plane.”

The middle eastern men were identified by federal agents as a group of touring musicians travelling to a concert date at a casino, said Air Marshals spokesman Dave Adams.

Jacobsen wrote she became alarmed when the men made frequent trips to the lavatory, repeatedly opened and closed the overhead luggage compartments, and appeared to be signaling each other.

“Initially it was brought to [the air marshals] attention by a passenger,” Adams said, adding the agents had been watching the men and chose to stay undercover.

Jacobsen and her husband had a number of conversations with the flight attendants and gestured towards the men several times, the source said.

“In concert with the flight crew, the decision was made to keep [the men] under surveillance since no terrorist or criminal acts were being perpetrated aboard the aircraft; they didn’t interfere with the flight crew,” Adams said.

The air marshals did, however, check the bathrooms after the middle-eastern men had spent time inside, Adams said.

FBI agents met the plane when it landed in Los Angeles and the men were questioned, and Los Angeles field office spokeswoman Cathy Viray said it’s significant the alarm on the flight came from a passenger.

“We have to take all calls seriously, but the passenger was worried, not the flight crew or the federal air marshals,” she said. “The complaint did not stem from the flight crew.”

Several people were questioned, she said, but no one was detained.

Jacobsen’s husband Kevin told KFI NEWS he approached a man he thought was an air marshal after the flight had landed.

“You made me nervous,” Kevin said the air marshal told him.

“I was freaking out,” Kevin replied.

“We don’t freak out in situations like this,” the air marshal responded.

Federal agents later verified the musicians’ story.

“We followed up with the casino,” Adams said. A supervisor verified they were playing a concert. A second federal law enforcement source said the concert itself was monitored by an agent.

“We also went to the hotel, determined they had checked into the hotel,” Adams said. Each of the men were checked through a series of databases and watch-lists with negative results, he said.

The source said the air marshals on the flight were partially concerned Jacobsen’s actions could have been an effort by terrorists or attackers to create a disturbance on the plane to force the agents to identify themselves.

Air marshals’ only tactical advantage on a flight is their anonymity, the source said, and Jacobsen could have put the entire flight in danger.

“They have to be very cognizant of their surroundings,” spokesman Adams confirmed, “to make sure it isn’t a ruse to try and pull them out of their cover.”

KFI reporter Jessica Rosenthal contributed to this report.

Copyright 2004 KFI NEWS. All rights reserved.

http://www.kfi640.com/ericleonard.html


Oh, and the fact that those visas were expired actually makes me doubt the "omg they're terrorists!" scenario even more - if you were a terrorist, would you run the risk of not even being allowed on the plane (and ruin months of careful preparation) over something as vital as an expired visa? Especially considering the increased level of airport security (and racial profiling) in effect since 9/11.

[ 07-26-2004, 10:49 AM: Message edited by: Grojlach ]

I read that 2nd article Memsie - I congratulate Annie on cashing in on her "15 minutes of fame" while it still lasts.

Strangely enough, I was just about to post a "15 minutes of fame" comment as well.

Groj, you just reposted the article that Chewbacca posted... [img]graemlins/wow.gif[/img] ...don't you guys read that's been previously posted? ;)

And did you see how many of the original hijackers were in the country illegally? as many of the posters there mentioned INS is swamped and can't control the situation with illegals, and thanks to the ACLU police aren't even allowed to inquire about whether people in the country are legal. To look at the passport and try and do anything about it would invite another federal beurocracy to take over that in all likelihood would have turned them out on the street because they're overworked, understaffed, and have little to no available space to keep them until trial.

Problem with illegal immigrants is even once they are caught, they're let go. It's a farce on the enforcement side. Illegal immigrants show up in court all day everyday all across the country, but there is no directive for the court clerk to pick up the phone and call INS (now part of DHS), nor would INS bother to do anything about it anyway.

I suppose that's exactly why I added "since 9/11" to my statement.

Well, I'll have to take your word for it, then. Though despite the fact that there's a chance their visas won't be checked, there's still a chance that they will be checked - and if you're really trying to prepare a terrorist attack, I reckon you'd want to make sure you can't be thwarted by such an element. Ah well, or perhaps I'm simply overestimating terrorists' cunning in general.

[ 07-26-2004, 04:49 PM: Message edited by: Grojlach ]

My bad - I hadn't read this topic since Chewie's previous article, and resumed reading it from the article you had posted on.

Curiously enough, the updates to this angle on that site puts into question the exact nature of these alleged expired visas:

Update: Avert your eyes if you are allergic, but some immigration law wonkery is necessary here. Some readers have technical questions for Scott Weinberger. For example:

As you must surely know, just because a person's visa has expired doesn't mean they are "out of status." A person is deemed to have "overstayed" when they have exceeded the time allowed him or her to stay in the U.S. by DHS/ICE. This time is put on the alien's I-94 card when they enter the U.S. In fact, if the Syrian musicians entered the U.S. on P-1 visas, as I suspect, the visa, i.e., the stamp in their passport issued by the U.S. Consulate, would have expired the instant it was used. Syrian P-1 visas can only be issued for a single entry...And even if they entered with B-2 visas, which can be issued to Syrians with more than one entry, just because the visa itself has expired doesn't mean they've overstayed. To determine whether the Syrians overstayed we'd have to see their I-94 cards.
Right. In lay parlance, partly because of journalists and politicians trying to avoid bureaucratese, "overstaying a visa" is commonly used interchangeably with overstaying the authorized "duration of stay." I assumed that Weinberger meant the latter and have put in a call asking him for clarification. (See more here for a tutorial on what a visa is and how the visa expiration date differs from the duration of stay date or status determined by DHS at port of entry.)


Update: Still no word back from Scott Weinberger. Meantime, these comments from reader BorderAgent are on point:

Musicians typically have a P-1 visa and without a doubt a Syrian, entering on a P-1 visa would only be allowed a single entry on that visa and the visa would then expire immediately upon entry. The Visa only allows them to enter, while the I-94 allows them to stay here for the duration, whatever that might be, of the I-94.
As Michelle said earlier, in lay parlance, "overstaying a visa" could also mean having an expired I-94. But even then it would not necessarily make them an overstay. You see, you can actually apply for an extension of your I-94 while you are here at an inland office with BCIS. And the funny thing is, when you apply for an extension you are legally allowed to stay, even if you documents expire, until you receive a response, which generally takes longer than 45 days. So basically, you can automatically extend your stay for up to 45 days if you merely receive a peice of paper saying that you are waiting for a response.

Hope that helps clear some things up. A good rule of thumb when dealing with the old INS, now the DHS, is to remember that we have the most strict laws of any agency but have a waiver for everything.


Yeah, that last sentence pretty much sums up our entire immigration (non) policy: A waiver for everything

[ 07-27-2004, 04:02 AM: Message edited by: Chewbacca ]

I suppose that's exactly why I added "since 9/11" to my statement.

Quote:

as many of the posters there mentioned INS is swamped and can't control the situation with illegals, and thanks to the ACLU police aren't even allowed to inquire about whether people in the country are legal. To look at the passport and try and do anything about it would invite another federal beurocracy to take over that in all likelihood would have turned them out on the street because they're overworked, understaffed, and have little to no available space to keep them until trial.

Well, I'll have to take your word for it, then. Though despite the fact that there's a chance their visas won't be checked, there's still a chance that they will be checked - and if you're really trying to prepare a terrorist attack, I reckon you'd want to make sure you can't be thwarted by such an element. Ah well, or perhaps I'm simply overestimating terrorists' cunning in general. </font>[/QUOTE]I think it's rather a case of overestimating the security offered by our gov't, if they were innocent (which current info about the story seems to corroborate), there is still no guarantee that they weren't still doing a dry run, and phoning/faxing/emailing/etc the info back to their friends who do have ties to groups that are interested in how extensive security checks on aircraft are.

The Syrian singer of a band that was detained by the FBI's Terrorism Task Force for suspicious activity during a recent flight to Los Angeles has written about the "glorification" of suicide bombers to liberate Palestine.

Singer Nour Mehana's latest album includes the song "Um El Shaheed," or "Mother of a Martyr," said Aluma Dankowitz of the Middle East Media Research Institute.

The song tells the story of a woman who mourned her son's death until she realized that "he died for a good cause and he should be glorified for what he did," said Miss Dankowitz, who translated the song for The Washington Times.

Mr. Mehana, widely known as the Syrian Wayne Newton, sings to the mother that her son's goals are heroic and she should be happy he is dead.

"The song opens with the depiction of a mother crying over her son. He has said goodbye to his friends and family and is not going to come back. He went with a weapon in one palm and his heart in another palm and he's not going to come back," Miss Dankowitz said. "He went to fight to free Palestine, Golan Heights and South Lebanon."

The song ends with chants of "Allahu akbar," or "God is great," a common Muslim expression. Those were the last words shouted by a September 11 hijacker before the plane crashed into a Pennsylvania field and have been the last words of many suicide bombers in Israel.

http://www.washingtontimes.com/natio...1758-3815r.htm

Isn't it sad that even when our suspicions are overreactionary and paranoid, they're still accurate?

That's hanging evidence is it TL?

Are you honestly telling me that if an Arab doesn't support Israel then he should never be allowed on a plane - gee - if that isn't 100% of them then it is over 90% surely? If you ask me, there is a kind of huge gap between your average Joe Arabia and the sort of extremist that hates US support of Israelii domination of Palestine so much that he hijacks some planes and flies them into buildings. Great - let's all take the Bin Laden is an Arab, therefore all Arabs are Bin Laden approach. Sheesh.

I got news for ya buddy - if your paranoia has convinced you there is no gap then you better close the borders, buckle up on the racial profiling, turn out the lights, and live in fear for the rest of our life. No amount of flexing of the milatary muscle is going to change your view that they are all out to get you.

Interresting if it's true, but I doubt Jacobsen knew about it when she wrote her original article.

Davros, that's a lot to take out of what I said. Being against Israel is one thing -- that I can understand. But if you go singing about the wonderful sacrifice of a suicide bomber, that is another thing entirely. You downplaying what he sang and overplaying what I said by quite a large degree to fabricate a statement about paranoia.