According to a report from the Homeland Security Department.
Archive for the 'Terrorism' Category
John Yoo’s memo giving the administration an escape clause for illegal acts in the war in terror has been released. If you look at it, his other work, and the interviews he has given its stunningly clear that he has no idea what the hell he’s doing (nor does Cheney’s legal guy, David Addington). It’s not that I disagree with the conservatism of it, it’s that his basic argument boils down to “if the president does it, it must be legal”. As Richard Nixon can testify, that assertion is without any grounding - legal, moral, or otherwise.
Yet, at least when the president is conservative (they would give no such latitude to Barack Obama or Hillary Clinton), the right will always err on the side of executive discretion.
If there is a crackpot theory about Iraq to be pushed, you can be sure Glenn Reynolds will be on the front lines of it. This go-around is about some study showing a correlation between terrorist emboldenment and access to the western press. But you know what really emboldens terrorists?
Stupid presidents, other moronic leaders who initiate and encourage retarded policies and encourage illegal wiretapping and surveillance contrary to 200+ years of U.S. moral authority… and the right-wing pundits, spinners, writers and media “analysts” who get down on their knees and provide comfort.
Islamic terrorism has had no greater friend to its growth and lethality than the Republican party, the conservative movement, and their policies.
The right - Fox News, NY Post, etc. - is pushing this bogus story about FISA laws hindering finding a missing soldier, but as Think Progress clearly documents the one to blame is the Bush administration and Alberto Gonzales, for running an incompetent shop.
Once again, law enforcement and police action continue their trend of stopping and capturing terrorists and would-be terrorists.
>> “Terror” Plot Disrupted By Law Enforcement, Again
>> FBI Disrupts Possible Terror Attack
>> Fighting Terror As Police Action
Doesn’t the conviction of Jose Padilla today prove, once again, that the existing criminal justice system can work against terrorists? The administration wanted to hold Padilla, a U.S. citizen, as an enemy combatant in the military system - but then when they turned him over to the DOJ they got a trial and a conviction.
The jury in the Jose Padilla terror trial has found the American guilty of conspiracy to support Islamic terrorism overseas.
Padilla was originally arrested on accusations that he planned to set off radioactive “dirty bombs” in the United States. Thursday’s convictions are not related to those accusations, and prosecutors did not present the “dirty bomb” plot to the jury.
Bad guy ridiculed with music. The modern version of Disney’s “Der Fuhrer’s Face”.
The Bush administration had Al Qaeda #2 Ayman al-Zawahiri in their sights, but let him go. Why would anyone trust a Republican to catch a terrorist? They have a horrible record on fighting terror.
Somehow we’re to believe that this gang of incompetent jackals is keeping us safe.
I happen to have a bridge in New York available, cheap!
You might think that if we had evidence of terroristic threats in the UK, we should give our closest allies a heads up. But not with this gang of idiots.
When I see attacks like the one in Glasgow today, I can’t help but to think we’re living on borrowed time here. These acts are not hard to commit, require little to no sophistication and there are more than enough willing terrorists out there. So why the relative silence? I can only guess that Al Qaeda and their sympathizers see more value in a huge attack on the scale of 9/11 than a relatively small one. But we’re on borrowed time and we aren’t remotely ready for it.
Here we go again.
The Bush administration cannot legally detain a U.S. resident it suspects of being an al-Qaida sleeper agent without charging him, a divided federal appeals court ruled Monday.
“To sanction such presidential authority to order the military to seize and indefinitely detain civilians, even if the President calls them ‘enemy combatants,’ would have disastrous consequences for the constitution and the country,” the court panel said.
In the 2-1 decision, the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals panel found that the federal Military Commissions Act doesn’t strip Ali al-Marri, a legal U.S. resident, of his constitutional rights to challenge his accusers in court.
It ruled the government must allow al-Marri to be released from military detention.
It’s why I use quotes around “terror” in instances like this that happen a lot under Bush and why Michael Bloomberg is right, much to the consternation of more than a few conservative idiots.
Credibility of JFK terror case questioned.
When U.S. Attorney Roslynn Mauskopf described the alleged terror plot to blow up Kennedy Airport as “one of the most chilling plots imaginable,” which might have caused “unthinkable” devastation, one law enforcement official said he cringed.
The plot, he knew, was never operational. The public had never been at risk. And the notion of blowing up the airport, let alone the borough of Queens, by exploding a fuel tank was in all likelihood a technical impossibility.
And now, with a portrait emerging of alleged mastermind Russell Defreitas as hapless and episodically homeless, and of co-conspirator Abdel Nur as a drug addict, Mauskopf’s initial characterizations seem more questionable — some go so far as to say hyped.
“I think her comments were over the top,” said Michael Greenberger, director of the Center for Health and Homeland Security at the University of Maryland. “It was a totally overstated characterization that doesn’t comport with the facts.”
Like the “Miami Five”, a terrorist cell that turned out to not be one - at least not a real threat to anyone besides their fevered imaginations.
“There are lots of threats to you in the world. There’s the threat of a heart attack for genetic reasons. You can’t sit there and worry about everything. Get a life,” he said.
That “What, me worry?” attitude pretty much sums up Bloomberg’s advice to New Yorkers on the terror plot. As far as he was concerned, the professionals were on it, so New Yorkers shouldn’t let it tax their brains.
“You have a much greater danger of being hit by lightning than being struck by a terrorist,” he added.
I think Mayor Bloomberg is more or less right here. Yes, terrorism exists and we should all be aware of it in our daily lives (people traveling with me on the DC metro probably a little more than high schoolers in Okoboji, Iowa, but your mileage may vary) but there’s no reason to follow along with the conservative lemmings and lose your shit every time Fox uses the NEWS ALERT graphic. People during WWII lived in a world on fire with a genocidal madman focused on world domination, but from the American homefront to the Brits on the front lines - they worked together to keep themselves sane. No reason we can’t do the same now.
Leave it to Michelle Malkin and company to get their knickers in a twist.
You reap what you sow.
A U.S. war crimes tribunal at Guantanamo came to a screeching halt on Monday when a military judge dropped all the charges against a young Canadian in a ruling that could preclude trying any of the 380 prisoners any time soon.
Army Col. Peter Brownback, the judge, said the military tribunal lacked jurisdiction over Canadian Omar Khadr because he did not meet the strict definition of those subject to trial under a law the U.S. Congress drafted last year.
Hamdan, Bin Laden’s driver, also had his case revoked. For years now the Bush administration has ignored the law in favor of the kind of conservative law taught at places like Regent University that - while it may get you somewhere in conservative circles - has no bearing on the real world.
One need only to look at this interview with John Yoo, former Bush administration former deputy assistant attorney general for the root madness at the heart of this perversion of common sense:
[Q] You said you were one of the first in the Justice Department to recognize this as war as opposed to an isolated attack, a law enforcement problem. What’s the importance of that? What advice did you give the White House?
[A] Well, it was my view at the time, which I wasn’t shy about sharing, that we were at war. I think that is important, because if you’re at war, the powers of the government change; the powers of the president change. They both generally expand. We had, as a nation, under administrations of both political parties, treated terrorism as a criminal justice matter, which primarily meant that we would wait for the crimes to occur, just as we do normally, and then try to piece together the events and hold people responsible after the fact.
When you switch to a footing of war, you are trying to use society’s resources, the military primarily, to stop future attacks, not just hold people responsible and accountable — which is impossible to do with suicide bombers involved — for things that have already happened. So, for example, the surveillance powers of the government, I think, expand. So, for example, in wartime you’re allowed to detain members of the enemy without having a trial; criminal trials are for peacetime and for crime. So powers of government expand once you’re at war.
In the world of Woo, and conservative legal “scholarship”, the President has war power because he said so. Except, he doesn’t. You only get war powers when you declare war.
I knew that, and I didn’t go to law school. I was, however, paying attention in Dr. Monroe’s World History class at Boyd Anderson High School in 9th grade.
Funny how this keeps working out.
Four men have been charged with conspiring to attack John F. Kennedy International Airport by planting explosives to blow up jet fuel supply tanks and a pipeline, officials said.
Homeland Security sources said there is no current threat at the airport and that the attack as planned was "not technically feasible."
Previously:
FBI Disrupts Possible Terror Attack
Fighting Terror As Police Action
Can you look at this nonsense any other way?
A terminal at Los Angeles International Airport was partially evacuated Thursday when an item found in luggage triggered a security alert. The object turned out to be a sprinkler pipe.
A major airport gets shut down over a sprinkler pipe, and I think that sometimes Al Qaeda leaders must read this stuff and laugh their asses off.
The FBI, you say? Law enforcement? Interesting, ain’t it?
The federal government Monday charged six alleged “Islamic radicals” with plotting to kill U.S. soldiers at Fort Dix in New Jersey.
The six were arrested Monday night, the U.S. attorney’s office in New Jersey said in a written statement, and are expected to appear in U.S. District Court in Camden, New Jersey, on Tuesday afternoon.
“Their alleged intention was to conduct an armed assault on the army base and to kill as many soldiers as possible,” the office said.
Former RNC chairman Ed Gillespie said in 2004: “Terrorism is not a law enforcement matter, as John Kerry repeatedly says.” Increasingly, like much of the right’s talking points, this seems to be less and less true.
It is kind of intriguing that Al Qaeda leaders continually support Republican foreign policy. Then again, when someone makes your job easier, I would suppose you endorse them…
Is this the beginning of a trend?
A 19-year-old LSU student from Shreveport is being held on a $1 million bond, accused of telling a fellow student that he would kill U.S. Sen. Hillary Clinton when she visited Baton Rouge during a campaign stop.
Richard Ryan Wargo, 10301 Evangeline, Shreveport, was booked into Parish Prison on counts of terrorizing, communicating false information of planned arson, simple possession of marijuana and possession of drug paraphernalia.
The Smoking Gun has the warrant.
A reader sent in a link to this detail:
The Secret Service said Obama, who once said, “I’m not an entourage guy,” asked for protection but there was no specific threat.
But white supremacists, appalled that a black candidate may have a viable shot at the presidency, have been spewing venom across the Internet for months.
“Our world will become unbearable with him as President,” wrote a typical poster on a white power Web site. “Maybe there will be someone who would take [a] chance and do a Lincoln on him? Is that our only hope?”
Five members of a self-styled Alabama militia were denied bond Tuesday after a federal agent testified they planned a machine-gun attack on Mexicans. A sixth man accused of having weapons and explosives components in his home was approved for release.
U.S. Magistrate Judge Robert Armstrong said he could not grant bond because of the agent’s testimony and the large number of weapons — including about 200 homemade hand grenades and a launcher — that were seized in raids last Friday.
“I’m going to be worried if I let these individuals go at this time,” the judge said.
The five are charged with conspiring to make a firearm.
Another one in a week.
Simultaneous raids carried out in four Alabama counties Thursday turned up truckloads of explosives and weapons, including 130 grenades, an improvised rocket launcher and 2,500 rounds of ammunition belonging to the small, but mightily armed, Alabama Free Militia.
Six alleged members of the Free Militia also were arrested by federal authorities and are being held without bond.
Investigators said the DeKalb County-based group had not made any specific threats or devised any plots, but was targeted for swift dismantling because of its heavy firepower. The militia, which called itself the Naval Militia at one point, had enough armament to outfit a small army.
“We classify these groups as violent and anti-government,” said Jim Cavanaugh, who supervises the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives operations in portions of the South. “They stockpile things and live off a fear, a paranoia they’re going to need weapons and explosives because some event is going to happen when they will need them.”
“Any time you have a self-appointed colonel or a self-appointed major and they’ve got weapons and explosives, it is a recipe for tragedy,” Cavanaugh said.
Remember that previous to 9/11 the worst act of terror on U.S. soil was from a right wing extremist.
A package left at a clinic that performs abortions contained an explosive device that investigators said Thursday could have been deadly.
The incident came just days after a national abortion group alerted providers around the country to an increased risk of violence.
The device, found in a duffle bag Wednesday, “was configured in such a way to cause serious bodily injury or death,” said David Carter, assistant chief of the Austin Police Department.
The bomb, which was found in the parking lot of the Austin Women’s Health Center, comes on the heels of last week’s U.S. Supreme Court ruling which banned a controversial type of abortion and was viewed as an anti-abortion victory.
