Osama bin Laden and his cohorts in terrorist mayhem don't have to be competent, since failure often works as well for them as success.

Bin Laden has oft-stated that his aim is to 'bait and provoke' the United States and its Western allies into bleeding wars in the Islamic world. He has also stated that all it takes is one jihadi to raise a piece of cloth and scream 'jihad,' to get us to over-react.

Think about it.

In response to 9/11 we've spent billions of dollars on airline security, gotten mired in Iraq and are now on a jittery path to conflict with Iran. Failed terrorist missions just stir the pot and keep us anxious as well as any successful ones would.

Bin Laden's long-term aim is to seize Saudi Arabia and turn off the spigot of oil. But he's willing to wait.

Good post, but don't say that too often. if you don't support the screaming crazies you will be branded as soft on terrorism.

The truth, being soft is probably better than over reacting. These insane lines at airports where everyone must remove their shoes and throw out their bottled water is exactly what Osma bin laden wanted. That moron who tried to light his shoe has been successful beyond his wildest dreams. He did more to upset airline travel by his stupidity than had he brought down that plane without any clues. In fact he is probably more shrewd than he is given credit for, or at least his handlers were.