Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano conceded Monday that airline security failed in allowing a Nigerian on a terror watch list and allegedly armed with explosives onto a Detroit-bound flight, a turnaround from her declaration a day day earlier that "the system worked."Napolitano is fighting for her job right now. A number of high level people in Congress have called not only for an investigation but for her resignation for being so dense as to try and defend the indefensible.
The secretary's comment Sunday was widely criticized, given that suspect Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab was foiled because his explosive mixture did not properly detonate and he was stopped in his tracks by vigilant passengers.
The suspect, who carried the explosive in his underwear, passed through security at two airports -- in Nigeria and Amsterdam, Netherlands. Plus he was not on any "no-fly" list, even though he was on a massive federal database of people with suspected ties to terrorists and his father apparently had warned U.S. embassy officials in Nigeria about his son.
"Here, clearly, something went awry. We want to fix that problem," Napolitano told Fox News on Monday.
She said officials are doing a complete review to determine what needs to change to prevent such a passenger from clearing security in the future.
"No secretary of homeland security would sit here and say that a system worked prior to this incident which allowed this individual to get on this plane," Napolitano said.
Her comments marked a change in tone from the day before, when she lauded security officials' handling of the affair.
"I think the important thing to recognize here is that once this incident occurred, everything happened that should have," she said on ABC's "This Week" on Sunday. "We trained for this. We planned for this."
On CNN's "State of the Union," she said: "One thing I'd like to point out is that the system worked."
I doubt she'll be tossed, but she clearly isn't suited for the job.
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