I'm sure this post will seem a little bit contrite in the views of some; how is it at all newsworthy what a random guy who flew out of Washington's National Airport thinks? In light of the bigoted writing of Annie Jacobsen on her flying experience with 14 Syrian musicians (fully debunked on Salon), I thought that it might be interesting to provide another perspective on the issue.

On Saturday morning, I was flying home from National Airport following a couple of months in DC for a summer internship. The hour and a half flight, on a United Airlines Boeing 757, was headed for Chicago's O'Hare Airport. I was asleep from just about the time we took off until about an hour into the flight when I was awakened by a commotion a few aisles back.

Sitting towards the front of the plane, I could see the flight attendants begin to take evasive precautions (i.e. moving the food cart in front of the cockpit to block any possible attempt on the plane) in case the commotion turned ugly. As I began to wake up at this point, I could hear a woman screaming a number of crazy things (that she was Jesus, that somebody had stolen her baby)... it was almost like the Twilight Zone featuring a young William Shatner. Only after 30 minutes--right before we touched down--did the woman calm down, and only then were the flight staff able to move from their cautionary positions.

Before I left the plane, I began speaking to one of the flight attendants--a small blonde woman--and she said the most interesting thing to me. She confided in me that "for all of the precautions we take, it's the small blonde women that we might have the most to fear from!" (or something along these lines)

All of this really got me to thinking about the current status of Homeland Security in our nation. For all of the talk we make about not wanting to go after all Muslims, Americans are unfortunately still hung up on the theory that the next attack will only come from "Middle Eastern-looking men" (Jacobsen is a prime example of this).

The fact of the matter is that we are making ourselves unsafe by placing too much focus on one set of people, even if it is true that many of the world's terrorists fit a given profile. If we are only looking out for one set of people, we might allow a greater threat to sneak through our defenses in the future, even in the form of the aforementioned "small blonde women." What is more, if we begin to believe that we are safe solely because we have taken some strides in preventing future terrorist attacks--if we are content with only stopping the exact same attack as occurred on 9/11 (as we are inclined to do because of human nature)--we will not be safe.

I am not an expert in Homeland Security, nor do I purport to be one. Nevertheless, I am greatly distressed by our single mindedness--bordering on blindness--with which we are prosecuting the War on Terror. If we fail to be original in our thinking, we cannot stop future terrorist acts; if we continue to pursue our current course of action, I am afraid that the consequences will be dire.

We do need new leadership in this endeavor, and this is one of the main reasons I am supporting John Kerry in this election. What is more, we cannot cede this issue to the Right by default; I wholeheartedly believe that they are not correct in their theory of defending America. I hope Kerry and the Democrats heed this message in the coming months, because a Kerry Administration could and would defend America as well (if not better) than the current Administration. When change does come on November 2nd, and we will be safer as a nation.