SWEDISH MEATBALLS – AT 8:27  A.M. ET:  We are fascinated to watch Sweden reacting to a terrorist attack.  Once considered a paradise by the meatball left, Sweden has run into a buzz saw of troubles, while continuing to lecture the U.S. and the rest of the world on our obligations. 

Let's face the painful truth:  The only time we notice Sweden is when IKEA runs out of spare door handles.  So let's give a bit of time to see how they're handling the outrage.  From The New York Times:

STOCKHOLM — A day after two explosions struck central Stockholm, killing the man suspected of being a suicide bomber and wounding two other people, investigators began to focus on the possibility that the person responsible was a disaffected Iraqi-born Swede who had attended college in Britain.

Disaffected in Sweden?  Why, how could that be?

Reports in British and Swedish newspapers, citing government sources, identified the man as Taimour al-Abdaly, a 28-year-old Sunni Muslim whose family moved to Sweden from Baghdad in 1992. Attempts by The New York Times to confirm the reports independently were not immediately successful, and Swedish officials declined to comment, saying the bomber’s identity was part of the investigation.

Yikes.  The Times used the M word.  Does that mean they have to go before some multicultural crimes board?

But the suspect’s possible link to Britain was reinforced Sunday night when the Metropolitan Police in London said officers were searching a property at an address in Bedfordshire, the county in which Mr. Abdaly is believed to have attended college. A spokesman said the search was made “in connection with the incidents in Stockholm.”

Sweden’s prime minister, Fredrik Reinfeldt, told reporters at a news conference that an investigation led by the Swedish intelligence agency Sapo was still working to establish links among the two explosions, the dead man found with blast wounds to his abdomen and the threatening messages sent to the Swedish news agency Tidningarnas Telegrambyra shortly before the explosions.

Mr. Reinfeldt, leader of a center-right coalition, said the police were “treating this as a terrorist action,” but he appealed to Swedes not to jump to “the wrong conclusions” or allow preliminary reports about the explosions to stir fresh tensions over Sweden’s growing immigrant population, including about 450,000 Muslims. Sweden’s “openness is worth giving ourselves the time to get to the bottom of this,” he said.

Same old pacifiers.  We must not think bad thoughts.  But plenty of Swedes have been thinking them for years, as a militant immigrant population refuses to integrate. 

We hope that now the Swedish government will understand why others around the world take terrorism so seriously.  Sweden might send some military and police people to the U.S. to learn the ropes.

December 13, 2010