Sources say no serious plot for NYC, just hate chatter

[banana republican]

Sources say no serious plot for NYC, just hate chatter

Larisa Alexandrovna
Published: Friday July 7, 2006

One former intelligence field officer says, and two other CIA officials confirm, that the alleged plot by Muslim extremists to bomb the Holland Tunnel in New York City was nothing more than chatter by unaffiliated individuals with no financing or training in an open forum already monitored extensively by the United States Government, RAW STORY has learned.

“The so-called New York tunnel plot was a result of discussions held on an open Jihadi web site,” said Philip Giraldi, a former CIA officer and contributor to American Conservative magazine, in a late Friday afternoon conversation. Although Giraldi acknowledges that the persons involved – “three of whom have already been arrested in Lebanon and elsewhere - are indeed extremists," their online chatter is considerably overblown by allegations of an actual plot.

<snip> And my personal favorite comment....

Two other intelligence officials with experience in the field on extremist operations concurred--and expressed concern that what could have been an operation to eventually track known extremists (should they eventually make actual contact with funds and training,) seems to have been exposed for political gain.

**********************************

The Keystone Kops strike again....

http://www.rawstory.com/news/2006/No_Plot_for_NYC_Just_Hate_0707.html

[Joanne98]

1. It's an election year. TERRA TERRA TERRA!!!!

[Warren Stupidity]

2. I am shocked, SHOCKED I tell ya.

exposed for political gain? They wouldn't dare!

I like the part where it seems blowing up the Holland Tunnel would magically flood wall street. Yes indeed this was a VERY SERIES PLOT, THIS WAS HUGH!!!111!11!

[slackmaster]

3. And if an actual bombing had occurred

Rest assured the same individuals would be getting attention by bemoaning the government's lack of preventive action.

Conspiracy to commit a felony is a real crime.

[Warren Stupidity]

5. Did you read the post?

Idle speculation on a web site is not 'a conspiracy to commit a felony'. Further, it seems that perhaps we simply blew an ongoing investigation in order to get some terra headlines.

This 'conspiracy' may have had less going for it that the TerraBull Miami 7.

Then again I suspect you have no problem with that case either.

[slackmaster]

6. I'd rather err on the side of caution

Fuck the Miami 7. They are too stupid to be allowed to move freely in society, or to breed.

[leesa]

11. Unlike someone plotting to make the Hudson flow uphill to flood Wall Street

Booga. Booga.

[Igel]

14. The story seemed loony, until

they said "PATH".

Breech a PATH tunnel, and you have a real mess. Let's assume it's the southern of the two tunnels. The tunnel floods, and so do the stations; the stations have same-level passages to subway platforms, with (as of the last time I was there) no apparent solid barriers to stop the subways from flooding. They're below water level, IIRC.

The southern of the two PATH tunnels ends at the World Trade Center stop.

[Warren Stupidity]

17. Regardless of that, water level remains water level.

Water is not going to suddenly flow uphill and flood downtown Manhattan. This 'perps' were about as far along in their vile plot as your average lunatic.

[Judi Lynn]

12. What evidence do you have to lead you to entertain such a venomous

scalding hatred of these men?

I read articles which were published at the time, and there was NOTHING in them to encourage bitter rancor toward them.

Any close reading would reveal they were manipulated from the very first by the FBI "informant." Everything known about them came as a result of his approaching them, offering expensive items to them they could in no way afford for themselves.

Their leader had a history of NO criminality, and had spent some of his time as a Guardian Angel, and had also aspired to become a minister, like his dear old dad who had been a minister all the son's life.

[lindisfarne]

16. Caution quickly becomes repression of speech. Arresting * protesters who

are simply publicly criticizing the * admin, well within their legal rights. Secret Service moving * protesters away from the area where * is, but leaving the * supporters in the same area.

Is this the kind of government you want (good thing the Constitution at least in principle prohibits that kind of government).

Does that mean you would advocate arresting Mark Morford? His latest headline is "George W. Bush Is Dead To Me". I'm sure someone within the * Admin. could find a conspiracy theory and incitement to violence in that headline.
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/gate/archive/2006/07/07/notes070706.DTL

[magellan]

8. Then they should also arrest Coulter

And all the hate-spewing RWers who constantly threaten those who don't agree with Lord Bush**. Where does freedom of speech end, really? Or do only the Repugs get to decide where the line is drawn?

[Beetwasher]

13. Heh, You Must Be Omniscient To Know That

"Rest assured the same individuals would be getting attention by bemoaning the government's lack of preventive action." :eyes:

"Conspiracy to commit a felony is a real crime."

You're ready to string them up already, huh? What country do you live in? In the country they were arrested in, they are innocent until proven guilty. Ring a bell?

[Ezlivin]

4. Hatred for Bush may cause others to strike

The FBI is monitoring so-called "hate sites" such as the Democratic Underground. "It's best if we catch these terrorists when they are just in the posting stage," said Dan Jansen, FBI field agent. "If their writings indicate hate or even discomfort with Bush, we don't want to wait until that thought has blossomed into a terrorist plot."

"Considering that we lost 3,000 Americans on 9/11," said Steve Brachi, "We have to stop terrorist plots when they are only thoughts."

We need the Thought Police to save us all.

[rocktivity]

7. Kind of like the Miami Seven and their FBI informant leader, you mean?

I stopped listening when I learned about the chatroom. I just hope the suspect wasn't given any "extra help" confessing.

:headbang:
rocknation

[swag]

9. CBS's "Public Eye" has a very similar story

http://www.cbsnews.com/blogs/2006/07/07/publiceye/entry1784553.shtml


(AP Photo/Jason DeCrow)
"TUNNEL BOMB PLOT" trumpeted the New York Daily News this morning on its cover, the words printed in big bold white letters against a black background. Jihadists, said the paper, had a "serious" plot to flood lower Manhattan by bombing the Holland Tunnel, "to drown the Financial District as New Orleans was by Hurricane Katrina."

Frightening? Sure. "Serious?" Well, the jury is still out. The "largely aspirational" plot never went beyond e-mails, there was no credible link to Al Qaeda, and there was no specific mention of the Holland Tunnel, just the mass transit system more generally; additionally, sources say "no one in the United States ever took part in the Internet conversations and…no one ever purchased any explosives or scouted the transit system."

The plot as the Daily News conceived it seemed absurd enough that one would have thought it would have given editors pause – how does one flood lower Manhattan via the Holland Tunnel, seeing as the island is above the level of the river? But that didn't stop the paper from rushing its inaccurate story into print and trumpeting it with BIG BOLD LETTERS, and it didn't stop other news organizations from turning the alleged plot into a huge story. That's no surprise, of course. When people speak of bias in the press, they tend to talk abut political bias, but the more serious bias is towards sensationalism, which tends to sell better. (It's safe to say the Daily News moved a few more copies this morning than usual.)

The press isn't the only party with an incentive to play up these kinds of stories. Look at the last major terror bust, of a Miami-based group allegedly plotting to take out the Sears Tower in Chicago. The government trumpeted the arrest as evidence of its success in fighting terrorism, and there's no doubt the bust was a good thing. But Andrew Cohen read the indictment, and wrote that "nothing in convinces me that these guys were legitimate terrorist wannabes as opposed to a bunch of angry bozos looking lazily for al Qaeda to hook them up with all sorts of goodies." Cohen cites a series of government charges that turned out to be less than they first appeared -- John Lindh, Zacarias Moussaoui, Yaser Esam Hamdi, Jose Padilla – to explain his cynicism.


. . . more

[CJCRANE]

10. Um...if the FBI

infiltrated the Miami 7 and gave them the idea for their plot, what's to stop the CIA having a plant on that particular message board and helping/coaxing others to come up with plot ideas?

[AliceWonderland]

15. Yes, that fits the pattern, doesn't it?

Allege a huuuuuuuuuuuuuuge terra plot caught to further some political game. Or some grand terra MC captured. Then, over the days and months to follow, contradictory evidence trickles out. In the meantime, in the minds of the 'Murican folks, the incident has solidified as yet more ironclad proof of the War on Terra and How Brown People Are Bad. Meh.

[NorthernSun]

18. As the BFEE was behind 911

I suspect they are planning the next real attack now. This stuff is just chaff to keep us looking the other way.

[uppityperson]

19. Good bolded comment there. "we are a patient people" not.

[catmandu57]

20. I don't think that we'll know of a real threat until it happens

These stories of terraist plotting to destroy parts of America, are easily seen through with our eyes. Without the aid and urging of government agencies these people probably wouldn't have given death to the great satan a second thought.
If we ever are attacked again, I think it's going to be a suprise to all of us.

edit: fat fingers

[bettyellen]

21. hate chatter? so ann coulter's a terrorist too!

coolness!

[ChairmanAgnostic]

22. We really need to take the ramifications seriously. They are deadly.

Idle chatter, thoughts, wishful thinking, and "what iffing" about some act of revolution or protest, or even joking about the untimely death of a sitting president or vice president have become federal terra-ist crimes. How much further will they go? After setting up a bunch of poor, no, destitute members of a prayer club, and get them held without bail, what is to stop the FBI from doing it to you or me? The Liberty Seven are a symptom of the direction of our country. And it ain't pretty.

[lindisfarne]

23. If they're going to go after idle chatter, they better start expanding

their agencies. I'm sure there are easily thousands of examples of idle chatter going on on a daily basis. They'd better learn to be more discriminating, otherwise, they'll end up chasing down idle chatter all the time and ignoring the real risks. (Wouldn't take a genius to figure out the way to defeat the US is to simply deliberately increase idle chatter as a mask for "real" chatter.)