<p>LAX shooter? How did the Duke case get into this thread? It’s infiltrating everywhere!!! ;)</p>
<p>What I want to know is if these guys can’t even afford a lawyer, how were they going to buy enough stuff to blow up the Sears tower?</p>
<p>Hmmm…</p>
<p>I’m not saying these guys didn’t have the POTENTIAL to be dangerous. What I am saying is that they were far from being a terrorist cell at this time. This admnistration will do anything have us live in fear so as to accept the breaking down of our civil liberties, to back a war based on a lie, and to forget the dire mess Bush, et al., have put us in economically, politically and socially. Sorry. I do not feel any safer knowing this “terror cell” was busted nor do I think it is anything but a lame attempt at propaganda.</p>
<p>A couple years ago, when the heat was on Bush for any one of his bumbles and/or lies, the HS would just raise the terra alert. That was one way to keep people nervous. Unfortunately, scaring people that way stopped working; a little too "boy cried wolf"ish.</p>
<p>So, now the Bush administration is savvier. There has been a great deal of attention on the mess in Iraq and so…tada…the newly found “WMD” (read, stuff from pre-Gulf war that even the administration agrees wasn’t a threat when they found it before the invasion) and now this terror plot. Way to go, Rove! Way to deflect! He’s utterly masterful!</p>
<p>This plot may be something, or nothing…but we’d never know, since the “truth” is not in the Bush administration vernacular.</p>
<p>In case you did not notice the 9/11 plot was as real as it gets. You might worry about them listening in to your calls to great-grandma in Outer Slobovia and those checks you wrote to the Sierra Club of India but I don’t and it’s a small price to pay not to have that happen again.</p>
<p>while in Iraq,it is a state of emergency</p>
<p>Read a bit about this group, most of the work done was by the informant, not by the actual people arrested</p>
<p>
If the allegations are true, these people were conspiring to commit criminal acts. We arrest, try, and convict people who conspire to commit criminal acts. The fact that there was an informer involved doesn’t change the fact that the purpose of the conspiracy was to do something illegal. It sounds like you are suggesting these people were minding their own business when this informer came along and entrapped them in a criminal conspiracy. Maybe that’s true but, then again, maybe it’s not.</p>
<p>Whenever the feds (note the complete absence of any local news angle on this story - they’ve been shushed for sure) pull out alleged terrorists, or terror plots, or other fear-inducing news items, I find it to be an especially crucial time to be aware of what ELSE is on the news that PERHAPS they are trying to distract everyone from…now, what could that be…let’s see…hmmm…</p>
<p>My parents lived in a country where a few losers started a conspiracy that no one thought would be so bad. After all, they were just a few losers, and there were just a few of them, they were disorganized, so they couldn’t be a threat, right? Many people felt Hitler wouldn’t be elected, but it grew and grew and grew…</p>
<p>So, no one seems to care about continuing expansion of executive authority? Loss of civil rights is OK with everyone?</p>
<p>Analysis: CIA program expands Bush’s power</p>
<p>By TOM RAUM, Associated Press Writer 2 hours, 13 minutes ago</p>
<p>WASHINGTON - A secret
CIA-Treasury program to track financial records of millions of Americans is the latest installment in an expansion of executive authority in the name of fighting terrorism. The administration doesn’t apologize for President Bush’s aggressive take on presidential powers. Vice President Dick Cheney even boasts about it.</p>
<p>Bush has made broad use of his powers, authorizing warrantless wiretaps, possibly collecting telephone records on millions of Americans, holding suspected terrorists overseas without legal protections and using up to 6,000 National Guard members to help patrol the border with Mexico.</p>
<p>That’s in addition to the vast anti-terrorism powers Congress granted him in the recently extended Patriot Act.</p>
<p>Civil liberties activists, joined by congressional Democrats and some members of Bush’s own party, suggest the president has pushed the envelope too far usurping authority from Congress and abusing individual privacy rights in the process.</p>
<p>So far, the administration has been unapologetic.</p>
<p><a href=“http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060624/ap_on_go_pr_wh/presidential_authority[/url]”>http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060624/ap_on_go_pr_wh/presidential_authority</a></p>
<p>A OK. It’s fine with me if the gov knows as much about me as the credit bureau and the bank. I really don’t call anyone overseas since grandma died and even if I did there is nothing interesting going on.</p>
<p>I just wish people could hold onto their laptops…how many have been “stolen” in resent weeks with a gazziolion peoples data on it?</p>
<p>And the oh so generous free credit watch is helpful</p>
<p>Why are these people leaving laptops in cars with all that data…interesting that</p>
<p><a href=“http://www.thestate.com/mld/thestate/news/nation/15430755.htm[/url]”>http://www.thestate.com/mld/thestate/news/nation/15430755.htm</a></p>
<p>update on “terror plot”</p>
<p>even Gonzales said this group was no danger</p>
<p>the informants were paid, had criminal records, and were seeking asylum</p>
<p>wow, and the informants guided the whole terror plot thing…hmmm…interesting</p>
<p>and with this “informants” record, who knows what is true, we shall see, won’t we…</p>
<p>and yes there were tapes, but how far would these guys have gotten without be lead, guided, totally funded, without their informant leader…we will never know</p>
<p>as I said before, remember the student groups of the 60s</p>
<p>I am glad we caught them before they could get involved wth a more serious group. I bet some of the individual 9/11 hijackers were not all that scary either, early on. It does not take a genius to do great damage. And news flash-- most informants are not Eagle Scouts.</p>
<p>OK, so they if they are not dangerous, I propose that they be set free in San Francisco under the provision that they not be allowed to leave the city.</p>
<p>My my even Gonzalez says they weren’t dangerous, you know better?</p>
<p>I second FF. Send them all to SF and empty Gitmo and send them all to SF too. One way please with monitoring bracelets…</p>
<p>i am just so impressed with your retort…bravo</p>