Danger, Danger
The “Homeland Security” issues that troubled us most prior to relocating here were the constant threat level announcements. Often contradictory – an hysterical announcement from that idiot Ashcroft at Justice being immediately followed by a press conference with that blockhead Tom Ridge to say there wasn’t any new threat – the announcements were always little more than blatant attempts to manipulate public perception. It worked, too; alarming already alarmed citizens or further reinforcing the blasé sang froid of those inclined to ignore the message to begin with. One thing we all knew was that each time a message was issued, it was the learned response of the government following September 11 to actual changes in intelligence gathering results. We were kept uninformed of what was happening, what was being done about it, what was going to be done, once before, and the Bush administration determined not to do that again, because too many people got too upset about it. Now, however, with the elections looming, it turns out they’re recycling old data - three, even four years old, for that matter – and putting troops on the subways and in front of the banks and financial headquarters on the basis of information that is questionably relevant at best. Although al Qaeda has evidently conducted surveillance of these companies, we’ve all known for three years nearly that these could be potential targets. There is nothing new in the data to suggest an increased threat level actually exists, and that’s how most people are treating the original announcement. How manipulated do you feel?