The Underwear Bomber

First it was the misguided shoe bomber Richard Reid, who with the promise of spending eternity in paradise with seventy-two virgins, attempted to bring down an airliner with explosives packed in his shoes. Now comes the equally confused and delusional Nigerian Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, with an explosive substance packed in his drawers, was intent on bringing down a plane bound for Detroit on Christmas day before the triggering device malfunctioned and fellow passengers intervened to subdue him. All which raises the issue what Abdulmutallab intended to do with the virgins, his genitalia having been destroyed by the explosion. Such considerations apparently do not enter into the minds of religious fanatics utterly certain about the rightness of their cause.