I'm a lifelong New Yorker, and I'm unfortunately used to a certain level of threat. When I was younger, New York had a serious crime problem. Just as the crime went away... well, we all know what happened.
Okay, so now we have to worry about terrorists. Just to fill things in, let's remember that a terrorist is, by definition, someone who employs acts of terror for political ends.
The key to this is that terrorists want us to be frightened--that's their goal. They know they can never kill all of us. So they want us to cower in fear.
So who is making us cower in fear now? Not the terrorists. No, the real fear is being generated by our own government!
Since I'm home today, recovering from my lovely illness, I have plenty of time to catch up on the news. Included in this, of course, is the latest on the orangutan alert issued by the Smirking Chimp and his buddies just this week.
So what was so compelling that made all of us run in fear? The terrorists were "casing" various key buildings in New York City and elsewhere. They also told us that this was as good as information got--it was absolutely solid and reliable.
Now we get to today's news. I was looking at the Associated Press website, and what did I see? THIS! Yes, ladies and gentlemen, much of the "intelligence" that had everyone running scared is three or four years old!!!
Of course, the very circa 1933 Germany-sounding Department of Homeland Security explained that some of it was updated as recently as January. Oooh, wow. Now let me go hide. My favorite quote was Tom Ridge saying, "We don't do politics in the Department of Homeland Security." Spare me. All they do is politics! Well, that and helping out their oil-rich friends.
I'm beginning to think these morons (the terrorist morons, I mean, not the other ones) pulled off one good hit on us. After that, we started bombing the shit out of them--and God bless our troops who truly are fighting to protect us (even if W sent them to the wrong place last year)--and, since then, the terrorists are just trying to hide. Well, good, but these "alerts" are ridiculous.
Some bozo they arrested in Pakistan said whatever they wanted him to--anyone would, given what an arrest in Pakistan leads to. Believe it or not, you're unlikely to hear Miranda warnings over there. So they found documents showing casing of NYC targets from years ago? Big deal! And they were updated in January? Why do I think this is as real as some pimply geek sitting in his dorm room fantasizing about how he's going to nail the supermodel whose poster is on his wall? (Was this "terrorist" even in New York in January or did he doodle some grand schemes in his Pakistani dorm room? Sheesh!)
2 comments:
I read about this in the NYTimes today. I agree with you, Tom Ridge is lying through his teeth by saying that Homeland Security Department is not used for "politics." BS. Tom Ridge is a politician. And if the government has been sitting on this for YEARS, then I am no longer frightened. Now I'm pissed. My granny is right. The first vote was on faith. The second vote would be on gratitude, and George W. Bush has given us nothing for which to be thankful.
Worse than their sitting on it, this information is from somebody the government probably should have tracked down years ago. Instead of pursuing the terrorists with all we have, we've been diverted by a war in Iraq.
Yes, Saddam Hussein is a murdering madman, but the world, sadly, has a large number of those. We didn't need to deal with him now. We needed to focus on the people who are trying to bring the fight to our homes. Instead, W is avenging his daddy and protecting his buddies' oil interests (not to mention Dick Cheney's Halliburton stock).
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