Everyone in involved in the British bombing plots seemed to have the same employer:

Eight people arrested in connection with failed car bombings in Glasgow and London all have links with the National Health Service, the BBC has learned.

Mark Steyn and Stanley Kurtz have thoughts on the implications.

[Early afternoon update]

Iain Murray makes another relevant point about the NHS:

The high proportion of foreign physicians is indeed down to a lack of British Doctors – not just from lack of students, but also because many trained Doctors choose to pursue other careers. Life in the NHS is not a rewarding experience. A family member of mine who is so highly regarded as a Doctor that she has won a prize carrying a substantial annual stipend for the rest of her life has withdrawn from clinical treatment because she was constantly asked to make life-or-death decisions based on the rationing of resources (you won’t hear that story in Sicko). The socialization of medicine in the UK is responsible for a lot of problems. The importation of terrorists is just one of them.

[Update at 2 PM EDT]

Dr. Sanity has some thoughts on doctors as terrorists.

[Evening update]

More thoughts on Doctors Evil, from Michael Ledeen:

I think it has something to do with what Mel Brooks once referred to as “that total indifference to pain and suffering” that is necessary to be a good doctor. You have to be “clinical” about all that, because you can’t afford to have your judgment swayed by real sympathy with the sufferer.

Remember after 911, when some of the apologists for the terrorists were saying that they couldn’t have pulled it off, because Arabs are too incompetent and dumb to do anything like that?

Well, here’s some evidence for that proposition:

The calls made on the phones allowed police to trace those behind the failed attacks last Friday, the London daily evening newspaper said, without giving sources.

The phones were meant to set off blasts when they were called, but the devices failed to detonate the mixture of gas canisters and nails in the two Mercedes cars parked in London’s entertainment district.

In a very real sense, this is no doubt part of the reason that we haven’t had more attacks, at least successful ones (remember moron Richard Reid?). The intersection of the sets between people who want to pull something like this off, and people who are capable of it, is fortunately not very large. Unfortunately, though, with advancing technology, it’s going to get easier and easier to do more and more damage.

[Update in the late afternoon]

Were they amateurish by design?

Remember after 911, when some of the apologists for the terrorists were saying that they couldn’t have pulled it off, because Arabs are too incompetent and dumb to do anything like that?

Well, here’s some evidence for that proposition:

The calls made on the phones allowed police to trace those behind the failed attacks last Friday, the London daily evening newspaper said, without giving sources.

The phones were meant to set off blasts when they were called, but the devices failed to detonate the mixture of gas canisters and nails in the two Mercedes cars parked in London’s entertainment district.

In a very real sense, this is no doubt part of the reason that we haven’t had more attacks, at least successful ones (remember moron Richard Reid?). The intersection of the sets between people who want to pull something like this off, and people who are capable of it, is fortunately not very large. Unfortunately, though, with advancing technology, it’s going to get easier and easier to do more and more damage.

[Update in the late afternoon]

Were they amateurish by design?

Remember after 911, when some of the apologists for the terrorists were saying that they couldn’t have pulled it off, because Arabs are too incompetent and dumb to do anything like that?

Well, here’s some evidence for that proposition:

The calls made on the phones allowed police to trace those behind the failed attacks last Friday, the London daily evening newspaper said, without giving sources.

The phones were meant to set off blasts when they were called, but the devices failed to detonate the mixture of gas canisters and nails in the two Mercedes cars parked in London’s entertainment district.

In a very real sense, this is no doubt part of the reason that we haven’t had more attacks, at least successful ones (remember moron Richard Reid?). The intersection of the sets between people who want to pull something like this off, and people who are capable of it, is fortunately not very large. Unfortunately, though, with advancing technology, it’s going to get easier and easier to do more and more damage.

[Update in the late afternoon]

Were they amateurish by design?