Cat Stevens: Terrorist?

Anyone questioning whether the U.S. government has lost its collective mind on the topic of "homeland security" has one less reason to doubt it. It turns out the feds consider Cat Stevens a likely terrorist. A plane he was riding in from London to Washington was diverted to land in Maine "on national security grounds" when they discovered he was on it. The plane sat there for three hours before it was allowed to proceed without him.

After all, despite recording a bunch of feel-good pop tunes in bygone days, and currently running Small Kindness, a charity that provides humanitarian aid to widows and orphans of war (primarily in the Balkans), he's... well... he's a Muslim, and goes by the name Yusuf Islam now. Plus, that trim little beard he used to wear back in the hippy days is now long and looks a little bit like Osama's.

Even if the U.S. government considers him unwelcome here, grounding the plane in Bangor is an hysterical overreaction. Just let the plane land where it was supposed to, then have some jackbooted thugs board it when it reaches the gate to escort him into custody, and let the other passengers go on with their business in D.C. Or did they seriously think there was a chance that he and his daughter (who was allowed into the country without him) were going to hijack the plane and fly it into the White House? If so, they need to get back on their meds, pronto.

In somewhat related news, the Transportation Security Administration has demanded that airlines turn over a bunch of information about passengers on their planes in the month of June. Among the information they'll be turning over will be people's credit card numbers and their meal preferences (which could be handy in identifying Muslims who don't eat pork). As it happens, my first airplane ride in quite a while was in June. I guess they noticed.