Is it just me or is something fishy going on with the recent airplane bombing attempt over Detroit? Curious to know more, I went online and started sifting through the wreckage. This headline (Reuters) caught my eye:

NiGERIA BOMBER’S HOME TOWN BLAMES FOREIGN SCHOOLING

Apparently the alleged bomber, a 23-year-old Muslim man named Umar Abdulmutallab, had been an engineering student at University College London, but had drifted from his studies – and his multi-million dollar pad – so that he might spend more time in Yemen.

Not sure which foreign school is being referred to here. If by "foreign" we mean England and Yemen, are we to assume that blowing up airplanes is a form of middle ground? Only if we believe an English engineering degree program to be one of the more politically benign forms of education – and that Yemen, as we are told in the North American media (backed up by what the New York Times frequently refers to as “officials”), is a terrorist training centre. Coming from a country where engineering students (Marc Lepine) and faculty (Valery Fabrikant) kill people, I am tempted to add Yemen to my list of vacation destinations.

Here’s a quote from the (Reuters) article:

“Everyone knew the Mutallabs and the father is honest, generous, helpful and above all a prominent banker. I cannot see why his son should be involved in this act,” Funtua resident Ibrahim Bello, 65, said, close to the Mutallab family home.

“[A]bove all a prominent banker”? What I like best about bankers has them level with “honest, generous and helpful.” Anything beyond that feels dishonest, greedy and spiteful.

There’s more from Bello:

“My only advice to the elite is that they allow their children to mingle with the children of the masses so that he will have some of the traditional morals and values that (the elder) Mutallab himself enjoyed.”

(Could “the masses” be any more virtuous than those New York Times “officials”?)

I have my own theory as to why Umar attempted to blow up Northwest Airlines flight 253, and that is the English diet. Cream, gluten, red meat -- these are no substitutes for healthy living! Somebody, get this man a salad.