Let's stop playing "terrorball"

Let's stop playing "terrorball"

The pages of the Wall Street Journal are the last place I would expect to find even the merest criticism of anything related to "homeland security", and yet here it is, a sober condemnation of the

inexplicable wave of hysteria that has swept over our government in the wake of the failed attempt by a rather pathetic aspiring terrorist to blow up a plane on Christmas Day.

The author's logic is compelling and his sentiment reminiscent of the quintessentially British attitude of "keep calm and carry on" that sustained the citizens of London through the blitz of 1940, and the IRA bombing campaigns of the 1980s.

However, logic rarely trumps emotion:

Unfortunately, the politics of cowardice [...] make it rational to spend otherwise irrational amounts of resources on further minimizing already minimal risks.