We’ve been watching stupid politicians on both sides of the Atlantic for a good few decades, but we’ve never seen one quite as stupid as the US Secretary of Homeland Security, Janet Napolitano. How long will millions of air travelers put up with the time-squandering, inconvenience, bother, and humiliation she is imposing on them?

We like Mark Steyn’s take on the increase of hellishness in international airports. Here he is being interviewed by Hugh Hewitt:

HH: I want to read to you the first paragraph of a story from the Times of London today. “Nigerian opposition politicians are demanding visual proof that the country’s president is still alive and fit to govern, six weeks after he left the country for medical treatment.” My question, Mark, are Nigerians better off than Americans where we do not get six minutes without seeing our president on TV?

MS: (laughing) Yeah, I would love to have six weeks without Barack Obama. In fact, you know, people complain that he had nothing to say about the Christmas Day pantybomber until whatever it was, the 27th or the 28th or the 29th. I mean, that three days, I think, was the longest he’s been off TV since he took office. So I’m up for the Nigerian option, six months without seeing the head of state.

HH: Yeah, I think the Nigerians may not be aware of just how lucky they are. Here are a couple of excerpts from today’s Obamafest, Mark Steyn. Cut number one.

BHO: I am less interested in passing out blame than I am in learning from and correcting these mistake to make us safer. For ultimately, the buck stops with me. As President, I have a solemn responsibility to protect our nation and our people. And when the system fails, it is my responsibility.

HH: What do you think, Mark Steyn? Does he really believe that?

MS: Well, you know, I think there’s a tinny sound to Obama. The more…there’s a very funny thing he does when he has to sort of correct course, when he goes too far to the left and he has to rein himself in. And he gives these great sonorous banalities that I think now ring totally hollow. When you look at what’s actually going on here, he’s…the whole pitch here is far too bureaucratic. The idea that they’re going to institute new systems now so that this guy, who was fingered to the CIA, not just to an embassy official, but to a CIA person at that embassy, by his own father, that didn’t get anywhere. So now we’re going to have a whole department dedicated to examining young jihadists who are leaked to the U.S. Government by their fathers or whatever. The response is always a bureaucratic one. And it’s not going to do anything for Americans.

HH: Here’s a second response from the President today, and it’s…this one is just as risible.

BHO: Here at home, we will strengthen our defenses, but we will not succumb to a siege mentality that sacrifices the open society and liberties and values that we cherish as Americans. [We’re stunned to hear Obama speak respectfully, even though we know he’s only pretending, of  ‘the open society and liberties’! – JB]

HH: Try telling that to the people in the New Jersey terminal the other night, Mark Steyn.

MS: Yeah, that’s the point here. Why do al Qaeda need to blow up planes? Right now, they just have to walk through an airport, or make a phone call, or just like this guy in Miami, some bonehead called Mohammed gets on the Detroit flight Northwest out of Miami, and he says let’s kill all the Jews. So they, he goes bananas, and they take him off the plane, but they make everybody else on that plane go back and be rescreened. So the 87 year old granny, who’s never expressed any desire to kill all the Jews, has to go through and be rescreened. So the President’s thing is a joke, and that joke won’t change until all three hundred million of us are on the no-fly list. That’s my solution now. I think we should all get on the no-fly list, and then they’ll have to start from scratch all over again.

HH: If they stop flying people who express the desire to kill all the Jews, it’s going to cut down on the Middle Eastern air traffic quite a lot, isn’t it?

MS: (laughing) It is. I’m not even sure if that guy wanted to file suit, I’m not even sure that’s a bona fide reason for being thrown off planes these days. But you know what I find interesting about this, Hugh, is I was at the airport the other day. And as you go in, the guy looks at your picture ID, my driver’s license. And he gets out this little thing that jewelers have to examine diamonds. And he’s looking at it to see if it’s a fake driver’s license. Now nobody has ever tried to blow up an American airliner with a fake driver’s license.

HH: (laughing)

MS: The guys on 9/11 all had real Virginia picture ID, which they acquired through the illegal immigrant network, because anyone can get real driver’s licenses now, so why do you need to fake them? But what was interesting is that in the course of all this, he never looked me in the eye. He never looked at me.

HH: Right.

MS: They look at the driver’s license, they look at the bottle of shampoo. So if you’re, say, like a nervous 23 year old student who’s underwear is packed with explosives, I would imagine that’s actually quite a tense situation for you. But nobody in the TSA is ever going to look you in the eye. They avoid looking people in the eye, because they know that three hundred millions despise them. And all they can see when they look in your eye is total contempt for them and their absurd security kabuki.

HH: It’ll be interesting to see how long it lasts, because we are, I do believe, reaching a point where people are going to say no mas, no mas.

May that point be reached very soon!