JUST WAIT'LL THE NEXT KATRINA:

It's the people, stupid (NY Post, December 31, 2009)

That was quite a revealing -- and understandable -- public tantrum President Obama threw Tuesday.

Understandable, because the president has every right to be livid over the "potentially catastrophic breach of security" that nearly saw a terrorist bring down an airliner with 289 people aboard.

And revealing, because perhaps Obama has come to understand that he does not enjoy as much control over intelligence matters as he might have imagined.

Also, that the Islamist threat to America won't be countered with mere words.

We suspect that Obama's predecessor, George W. Bush -- who also was frustrated by intel shortcomings -- feels sympathy with Obama's frustration. [...]

t's time to refocus America's security efforts when it comes to deadly terrorists on board US aircraft.

Full-body searches and scans, restrictions on hand-held luggage and intensive questioning of passengers all help.

But the Christmas Day incident, which was thwarted only because of alert and courageous passengers, revealed still-gaping holes in airline security.

As the Reason Foundation's Robert Poole puts it on the opposite page, US airline security is "fixated on keeping bad things -- as opposed to bad people -- off of airplanes."

This must change.

And that won't be easy.

It means broadening the "do not fly" list to include many more -- if not all -- of the 550,000 people currently in US databases as possible terrorist suspects.