When it comes to homeland security, President Obama’s first year in office was a nightmare. In September, Nidal Malik Hasan, a radicalized Army major, murdered 13 defense department employees at Ft. Hood, Texas. Shortly thereafter, Najibullah Zazi was arrested before he and compatriots were able to carry out an al Qaeda-inspired plot to conduct suicide bombings on the New York subway system. Then, on Christmas Day, Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, at the direction of al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, attempted to kill himself and the 278 passengers aboard a transatlantic flight as it approached Detroit. And to top things off, by the year’s end, nearly four dozen Muslim-Americans had been indicted or arrested in connection with terrorist plots originating in the United States or aimed at targets in the U.S.
If there is any good news for the administration, a recent report by the Triangle Center on Terrorism and Homeland Security has this last number dropping by more than half, to 20, in 2010, and with the number of Muslim-Americans attempting to carry out attacks at home dropping from 18 in 2009 to 10 in 2010.
