Another attack? 100% Certain, sez Intelligence. Discuss.

Great Debates
61

We have absolutely no idea how many terrorists are in North America right now. None. The government has admitted that over half of the terrorists who died in the hijackings were ‘new actors’, meaning that they were not identified in any way as terrorists before that day, nor were they on any ‘watch lists’ that any of the intelligence agencies might have.

We do know that Bin Laden has trained somewhere around 50,000 people in his camps. The vast majority of those would have remained in the Middle East. Another percentage of those would be abroad.

So I think we could put an upper limit on the number of terrorists in the U.S. at maybe a couple of thousand, and a lower limit of maybe 50. That’s a pretty wide range of possibilities. Given that officials have already arrested some 350 people, I’d have to guess that the number is closer to 1000 or more.

62

So, why haven’t they? The most likely moment for a terrorist attack in retribution would have been last Monday, would it not? I’m not asking this in furtherence of my agenda, just why?

63

A few possible (though highly speculative) reasons:

  1. The heightened awareness following the 09/11 attacks has interfered with their plans, or made executing them much more difficult.
    1a) Maybe they’ve tried and have been thwarted.

  2. They over-estimated the U.S. reaction. Perhaps they were all ready to go as soon as the U.S. starting lobbing cruise missiles the day after (“Look! See how the Great Satan lashes out against Islam! We are justified!”). But we didn’t, so they weren’t sure what to do next.
    2a) With world opinion firmly on the side of the U.S., especially in light of the initial restraint shown by the U.S. before acting, to do anything at this time will pretty much show how justified we are in our attacks, rather than show how justified they are in theirs.

  3. They are still waiting for just the “right time”.

64

It could be that they underestimated U.S. law enforcement capabilities, and the U.S. has managed arrest most of them, or at least enough of them to disrupt their plans. Terrorist ‘cells’ are designed so that no individual can compromise a lot of people, but that also limits communications between them. Arrest enough cell leaders, and you can play havoc with the organization, especially if the leadership is hiding in a cave somewhere and out of communication.

Or it could be that the next attack is already underway, and we don’t know it yet. Those three Anthrax cases could be the start, or there could be a bomb waiting to go off somewhere. Some forms of biological warfare could take days or weeks before people start showing up in hospitals. Anthrax has a gestation date of anywhere between 4 and 26 days. There could be thousands of people infected now, and we just don’t know it.

Or, they are waiting for a signal, which they haven’t received. Maybe Bin Laden had a battle plan, and it went awry because he underestimated the resolve of the States or something. So maybe he’s decided that current plans need to be changed. Perhaps he’s realized that killing people just makes us mad, and he’s shifting the attack to economics.

Or there could be dozens of other reasons why another attack hasn’t happened yet. Maybe the quick freezing of assets has left some plans incomplete.

But don’t count on it. The government says there is ‘credible evidence’ that more attacks are coming soon. I believe that.

65

Yes, I expect more attacks.

Probably in California. The Third World doesn’t know there is anyplace in the US except New York and California. I like the suggestion of Disney World. (Although if anything would trigger nuclear strikes, it would be an attack on Mickey Mouse.)

OK, I am kidding. I think.

Probably some kind of truck bomb laced with poisonous chemicals. Not a suicide bomber, though, so we should be able to catch him. I think bin Laden used up most of his personnel who are willing to commit suicide after waiting several years in the US.

As to why the delay, I think it is possible that there are other terrorists who came over here willing to die for Islam, but got a taste of life in the US - and changed their minds.

(“Let’s see, 72 virgins in Paradise, or that hottie down at the 7-11 who sells me my Slurpie. Hmmmmmm…”)

Regards,
Shodan

66

Who else thinks that George Bush is worse than Hitler, Stalin, or Osama?

67

Maybe this has already been mentioned, but today’s alert:

“Certain information, while not specific as to target, gives the government reason to believe that there may be additional terrorist attacks within the United States and against U.S. interests overseas over the next several days. The FBI has again alerted all local law enforcement to be on the highest alert and we call on all people to immediately notify the FBI and local law enforcement of any unusual or suspicious activity.”

http://www.fbi.gov/pressrel/pressrel01/skyfall.htm

Livin’ for today…

68

I agree. The next target has to be something famous enough to be known to an ignorant Muslim peasant in the backcountry. Also 'Vegas is a shrine to fun - and fun is an offense to the Taliban. Why there’s gambling, nekkid ladies, drinking, prosititution over in Pahrump (just down the road)…

Also it has SO much drive-in traffic in and out of it that providing any kind of security is all but impossible. You could get anything into Vegas.

69

Yep, that’s what I said, Scylla. :rolleyes:

70

Yes. It is.
You said:

[quote]

                          *Originally posted by Stoid*

                          I do not say this to be inflammatory, I say it because it is absolutely true: You have described my current
                          dilemma.

Then Blacksheepsmith said:

To which you responded:

That’s twice by my count.

71

Remind me not to hire you to do my taxes… Your reading skills are also severely impaired, apparently. Note the following words * in the original quote I responded to * (underlines mine):

Note further the words I wrote at the top of this very page:

So it is quite obvious that at no point in this thread did I EVER say, imply or mean that Bush was worse than Hitler, Stalin or Bin Laden.

And since this is the second time in a week that you have seen fit to reconfigure my words to pick a fight with me, BOTH TIMES following a post from me politely bowing out of the discussion, it looks a whole lot like you are baiting me.

As I told you last time, I’m not interested in your games. I don’t know why you’ve picked now to play them, but you’ll have to play with someone else.

If you persist in this crap I will ignore you, with just a link to this thread.

Go work it out on someone else.

stoid

72

Stoid, give it up. You’re up against Sam Stone and Scylla, our own Paragons of Perspicacity. They got you dead to rights: you are not sufficiently in awe of Our Leader!

There he is, exuding sincerity and practically dripping with leadership. Never, ever flubbing his lines (well, except for that one time.}

When SS suggested you think about the worse possible etc., you said it described your dilemma. You no doubt thought you meant you were worried that the same thing might happen, but SS knew you really meant that Our Leader is worse than Hitler, Stalin, etc.

Did you honestly think you could escape the glaring probity of Scylla, the stern clarity of Sam Stone. Useless, my dear, utterly useless. I can’t even tell you the number of times they have utterly and scathingly refuted arguments I * didn’t even know I was making!*

These guys are the masters of non sequitar, you’re out of your league.

You really have to understand: when a mediocre student and failed bidnessman is confronted by a major national crisis, if you surround him with flags and firemen he becomes a Leader of Men, simply oozing gravitas. I have no doubt that if it were Dec. 8, 1941, he would do exactly the same thing he’s doing now! Now, go ahead and tell me that bombing Afghanistan wouldn’t have totally confused the Japanese!

I will sleep well tonight, knowing that President Powell is in charge, and that we finally have a National Security Advisor who is hot!.

As a gesture of my unstinting, blind patriotism, I promise to never call Our Leader “Landslide” George again!

73

Conceivably become President, ok.

So, is Bush worse than a serial killer?

Hitler, Osama, and Stalin can be taken figuratively as well as literally.

What if we were to elect an anologue of them? What if we were to elect a Hitler, a Stalin, or a Osama?

I’m sorry I think that I’m attacking you. I’m not. I’ve complimented you in the past when you’ve made good arguments.

Unfortunately, this week you’ve made several wildly insupportable and inflammatory statements. Earlier you had an immutable opinion, and argued the validity of it based on your ignorance of the subject matter.

Here, you make the rather bold statement that Bush is the worst person who could conceivably become President. Either you have a very poor imagination, an irrational hatred of Bush, or you are claiming some special insight into his character that qualifies him as the “worst conceivable.”

You said you were not doing so to be inflammatory, but that was really how you felt.

I simply can’t conceive of such an asinine viewpoint so I’m assuming that as Blacksheepsmith pointed out, you were engaging in a little rhetorical hyperbole to score a cheap shot.

You evaded Blacksheepsmith and chided him, stating that others agreed with you.

If you don’t like having these kinds of debates I will humbly suggest you don’t make post such egregiously partisan and insupportable rubbish.

So, who else agrees with you that Bush is the “worst conceivable” person who could possibly become President?

74

Whe neither Osama, Hitler nor Stalin could possibly be elected in the USA:

Osama: This is an easy one. Osama IS NOT THE LEADER OF AFGHANISTAN. I’m AMAZED noone pointed this out yet. And as for the Talibans - they seized power through bloody revolution. After the civil war had ended, they were the only ones still standing. Fat chance of that happening in the US. And even if that were to miracolously happen, they’d just rewrite the entire Constitution to their liking, so even then it’d be irrelevant to the discussion.

Hitler was elected democratically, yes. However, he was elected in a country torn apart by war. Germany had been run through a cheese grater during WW1, and then forced to pay ridicolous amounts of money to UK and France, primarily. Post-WW1 Germany really puts the cough Great Depression in perspective. Again, I don’t see this happening anytime.

Stalin - well, in Soviet he wasn’t technically elected. However, he could concievably be elected in some other nation, but NEVER in the US. THe US is by far the most rightist and conservative nation in the western world. The anti-communist sentiments over here are just ridicolous sometimes (not because I agree with communism, but because everyone will jump on the “Commie pinko” bandwagon and brand anything bad and leftist “anti-american” (As if anti-free-speech supposedly was the American way)).

Anyway, the criteria for being a president are:

a) Having LOTS of money.
b) Either someone who got to politics from the bottom, or someone who got national fame in another war. I can’t see someone like Osama or Stalin getting to president the hard way. No, it’d have to be like Dubya or Reagan - a public face and a friendly grin - and not a too big focus on what politics you’re really going to have when in the White House.
c) Something that’d convince a majority of the voters that you should be president. Today it’s not hard, as most voters will vote for either the democrat main candidate or the rep main candidate without thinking. The hard thing is becoming the main candidate for one of the parties.

Now, Bush got through these points by freak chance, or so it seems to me.

Now, I can think of worse people in the White House - but I’ll bet for that Bush is the worst the US has had ever, and that he’s the worst it’ll have for at least a hundred more years.

75

Data points in both directions, and maybe y’all will think on this: What if a censorious mind like Lieberman came into office? How about a demagogue like Buchanan?

Either have potential to become President, depending on voter disaffection, apathy, and campaign strategy. Here’s one that ought to scare everyone spitless: What if we get another whacko like that Keebler Elf[sup]tm[/sup], Perot, but this time the SOB has charisma? Those kinds of people, in the White House, armed with the tools that Congress seems bent on handing them?

::shudder::

Those are the thoughts that make me grey.

76

Dryga:

Well that seems to be a defensible (if rather severe) statement of opinion.

Seeing as you do reluctantly concede tha there could be worse, that doesn’t help Stoid support her statements though.

I think if we elected the Antichrist, Rush Limbaugh, Anna Nicole Smith, Pee-Wee Herman, David Duke, Pat Buchanan, Jesse Ventura, Jesse Jackson, JDT, Phaedrus, or Jack Chick President, they would all be worse than Bush, to name but a few out of the thousands.

Stoid’s statemtents (presented “not to be inflammatory,” but simply as her honest assessment,) Seems to be not only is Bush the “worst conceivable” but that other people agree with her.

She has denied making her statement out rhetorical hyperbole, or inflammatory purpose, and seems to be unwavering in her conviction.
I think that’s an incredibly bold statement, and as such needs to be supported (this is GD, you need to defend what you say,) or withdrawn.

77

I think it is Bush’s utter lack of real accomplishment in life, his willingness to do or say anything to get the office, his confidence in himself unsupported by any actual personal accomplishment and his deeply held beliefs formed in an insulated life that frighten me. Your examples are unrealistic, except perhaps for ventura, but who would ever have thought that a man with Bush’s resume could ever have gotten a shot at office.

Like I said in another thread. He makes me thingk we are in some sort of alternate reality where critical thought has been suspended for a large segment of the population.

78

Ned:

Cool. You don’t like him either. The question though isn’t the worst “likely” it’s the worst “conceivable.”

All of my examples are conceivable.

79

I don’t see any of them being able to get the free ride Bush gets. Would you call president antichrist’s 3rd grade performance an impressive piece of statesmanship?

80

Ned:

::Shrug::

Probably not.

I didn’t argue that they would.

The question is if you are in agreement with Stoid that Bush is the worst “conceivable” President.

Do you agree, or can you “conceive” of worse?