The "system" was a courageous, take-control young man onboard from the Netherlands.
This needs to be FRONT AND CENTER A GOP/CONSERVATIVE ELECTION ISSUE FOR 2010. Especially after the al Qaeda are eventually successful in taking down one of our birds with hundreds of people aboard, due to lack of security, cavalier Obama attitude, and political correctness gone rampant--which say has a better than even chance in 2010 in the opening months.
The only "system" that I can see so far that works is the "EL-AL" system.
They tell passengers to be alert for "suspicious behavior" but THEY WILL NOT SAY TO BE ON THE ALERT FOR SUSPICIOUS TYPES OF PEOPLE. And in the case of a skilled operator of a PETN bomb, such "suspicious behavior" can be over and done with in a matter of 20 seconds. How in the hell are American citizens on airplanes going to be able to stop a disaster by being alert for that lightning-quick "behavior" while the US Government and system under Obama continues to allow suspected terrorists in addition to any and all young Muslims to ride our nation's airliners?
I'm sorry but for people to keep saying this is wrong. The courageous young man(and he was)acted after the fact. He had know way of knowing the perp was going to set off and bomb and if the bomb had gone off as intended, the passengers would have all been toast.
To keep saying that anything worked to keep this bomb from going off is just playing into the communist talking points. Nothing worked, the guy smuggled explosives onto a plane, he tried to detonate it but due to his stupidity, or a poorly constructed bomb, it didn't go off as intended. The only thing that worked was terrorist incompetence. Napolitano should resign immediately, and so should Bozo the WH clown.