|
From the NYT today: Reports That Led to Terror Alert Were Years Old, Officials Say
So which is more troubling? That these buildings went unprotected for so long (and not just when I visited)? Or that they are now clarted with troops despite Al Qaeda's intelligence being years old and out of date? How long is this newly heightened state of alert supposed to last exactly?
Maybe it all makes sense if you think of the troops not as a panicky security response, but as a signalling activity, both to Al Qaeda and us, of the risks involved in proceeding as intended — and lets not forget that in the case of any eventual future attack against these buildings, officials won't have to say in the post-disaster hearings that they knew of such plans but did nothing; much better to flay flailing about visibly a bit now.
I'm not clear why anyone's surprised. If these monster attacks take years to plan, which largely seems to be the case, then some of the planning would ipso facto date back years. What am I missing?
Posted by: Matthew on August 3, 2004 01:46 PMSarcasm is the lowest form of humor, "Matthew". you're pretence at being in idiocy, really trying to insult the safeguarders of america, is disgusting.
Posted by: anonymous on August 4, 2004 07:08 AMOh Eurof. How low have you sunk. Do you now have holes in your head just like the cheese? "In idiocy"? What kind of words are these?
Posted by: Matthew on August 4, 2004 01:51 PMGod you're unbelieeeeevably stupid. I was wrote badly ON PURPOSE so you wouldn't know it was me. How much more embarrassing for you that you didn't notice the other, more egregious mistakes. Am I to understand that you think the misspelling and misplaced apostrophe in "you're" is acceptable? Or the clumpish inelegance of "really trying to insult the safeguarders of america" is OK?? Ha ha, and the phrase you actually pick on, "in idiocy", while I meant it to sound wrong, taken by itself has quite an attractive faux-naif ring to it; it sort of works. Why can't you be "in idiocy"? If anybody is, it's you.
You have the linguistic refinement of a chimpanzee. How ironic that you should be a journalist.