Reuters has the report here:
The Pakistani-American arrested on suspicion of driving a bomb-laden car into New York’s Times Square told U.S. authorities he acted alone, but sceptical investigators are looking into his recent trip to Pakistan, a law enforcement source said on Tuesday.Faisal Shahzad, a naturalized U.S. citizen born in Pakistan, was arrested late on Monday at John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York as he tried to take a flight to Dubai, local and federal officials said.
Shahzad, 30, was due to appear in federal court later on Tuesday to face charges of “driving a car bomb into Times Square on the evening of May 1,” officials said. Had the bomb detonated, many people could have died, experts said.
“He’s admitted to buying the truck, putting the devices together, putting them in the truck, leaving the truck there and leaving the scene,” the law enforcement source told Reuters, speaking on condition of anonymity.
“He’s claimed to have acted alone. He did admit to all the charges, so to speak,” the source said, adding that investigators were still looking into his activities during a recent trip to Pakistan.
It’s particularly interesting to me to see how Shahzad was identified as a suspect, at least if initial press reports are accurate. According to reports, Shahzad bought a Nissan Pathfinder off Craigslist for cash, and then filed off the VIN number that is visible through the windshield. He then drove the Nissan to Times Square and tried to ignite explosives inside it. When the explosives didn’t go off, investigators were able to trace the car to Shahzad because he didn’t realize that the VIN number also appears elsewhere on the car — in this case, on the engine block. The VIN number then led investigators to the registered owner of the car who had sold the car to Shahzad. Cell phone records revealing the pre-purchase calls between the prior owner and Shazad revealed Shahzad’s cell phone number, and his cell phone number led the police to learn Shahzad’s identity.
That’s what seems to be the case so far, at least. Press reports filed this early often have inaccuracies, so we’ll have to watch and see how the picture develops.
UPDATE: This story suggests that the cell phone was a disposable phone, but that the government had some sort of database which allowed them to connect the phone (somehow) to Shahzad. I suspect we’ll be hearing more about this soon.
Joe Gator says:
Did they cross reference his info with Tea Party mailing lists?
May 4, 2010, 11:14 amMark Buehner says:
Apparently he hasn’t had time to read the new health care bill or he’d have no reason to be so angry.
May 4, 2010, 11:20 amAnonsters says:
Good to see the trolls out in force this morning.
In other news, John McCain thinks Mirandizing the dude would have been a serious mistake.
May 4, 2010, 11:25 amSteve says:
Unfortunately we read him his Miranda rights so we’ll actually be able to use the conviction against him in court. How foolish of us!
It’s going to be fun watching know-nothing politicians second-guessing the law enforcement professionals who managed to apprehend this guy within 48 hours. Keystone Kops they ain’t.
May 4, 2010, 11:25 amruuffles says:
But he did have his house foreclosed on, so at best it’s a wash.
Glenn Beck disagrees!
May 4, 2010, 11:29 amhttp://www.eyeblast.tv/public/checker.aspx?v=Xd6UuzSUaG
JB says:
One question I have is whether he really has ties to the Pakistani Taliban, who claimed responsibility.
Either they are so pathetic that the best they can do to us is an amateurish failure to understand how to set off explosives, or they are so pathetic that the best they can do is pretend to have done that. Either way, we are winning. Give credit to whichever political party you like, but be slightly less afraid.
May 4, 2010, 11:31 amMark Buehner says:
God knows convicting him is more important than finding out who his accomplices are.
May 4, 2010, 11:33 amSteve says:
God knows convicting him is more important than finding out who his accomplices are.
Convicting him is pretty important, yes. As for his accomplices, you might have noticed that the Miranda warnings didn’t exactly dissuade him from cooperating, now did they?
May 4, 2010, 11:36 amBleh says:
Yes and god knows that finding his accomplices is more important than civil liberties…
May 4, 2010, 11:38 amKevinM says:
If the case against him is his association with a cellphone number and car purchase — not terrible, but not great either — you might want his confession to be admissible. In my experience as a prosecutor, the main practical effect of Miranda was to insulate confessions from challenge. Most prosecutors I knew were pro-Miranda; the opposition seems to be more political and “movement” driven.
May 4, 2010, 11:39 amMark Buehner says:
Didn’t they? You’re definition of ‘cooperating’ must be different than mine. Taking the bullet, pleading guilty, going to prison while whoever he works with/for walk away might be great for a slam dunk prosecution, but if there is even a nascent car bomb ring… even a bumbling amateur ring being formed here and directed from Pakistan, to me that makes making this guy rot for 40 years seem like small potatoes. If the next bomb takes out 30 people in Manhattan, I suppose some of the current champions of the niceties of law will be the same people trying to lynch this guy in the public square. Tends to work that way.
May 4, 2010, 11:40 amHans says:
Does anyone know what time of day he dropped off his Pathfinder at Times Square on Saturday? I ask because I was there with my wife and son around lunch time and I would be curious to see how close we came to this.
May 4, 2010, 11:41 amBlue Neponset says:
He is an American citizen. Does his right to a fair trial hinge on what type of crime the gov’t accuses him of committing?
May 4, 2010, 11:41 amrj says:
Yep, the law enforcement model of terrorism-fighting is hopelessly inadequate, hundreds of convictions and scores of interrupted plots aside.
No warrantless wiretapping. No land that law forgot in Cuba. No foreign wars. No waterboarding. Just shoe leather and good detective work.
May 4, 2010, 11:43 amQET says:
Apprehending the guy is a win and a huge PR victory, BUT, the only reason we can all focus on the “we win this time” aspect of it is because the guy was so incompetent. Had he been more skilled, his apprehension within seconds of take-off would be discussed in the context of perhaps dozens killed and maimed, and The Media, rather than congratulating the law enforcement establishment, would be demanding to know why said establishment could not have apprehended him before, you know, he set the timer. His incompetence is, like that of the Underpants Bomber, an accident, and one that we cannot continue to rely upon.
May 4, 2010, 11:44 amRichard Nieporent says:
Well maybe not Keystone Kops, but with respect to the “40-year old white male” in the surveillance video, didn’t anyone else (e.g., the police and FBI) wonder why if he were the terrorist, he would change his shirt in public as people were passing him on the street? Did they really think that anyone could be so stupid?
May 4, 2010, 11:44 amneurodoc says:
More from the “STFU” guy who thinks it is not him, but Eugene Volokh who is out of line and this whole business about the attempted Times Square bombing is much ado about little.
May 4, 2010, 11:46 amMark Buehner says:
Snark aside- read him miranda, knock yourselves out. But if they have the goods on him, he ought to go on trial as a traitor in a military tribunal as per Quirin. Instead he’s going to go to a civilian circus trial.
May 4, 2010, 11:48 amAnonsters says:
So you think Mirandizing him was a bad idea, too?
[BTW, does putting EV's name in bold add some kind of talismanic power? Or do you just feel really, really strongly about him?]
May 4, 2010, 11:48 amRichard Nieporent says:
If you think that trying to change the subject will work, it won’t.
May 4, 2010, 11:51 amMark Buehner says:
And a little help from the NSA…
May 4, 2010, 11:53 amAnonsters says:
I’m the one changing the subject?
I point out something about this case. Neurodoc is a child and flings mud related to an entirely different topic in an entirely different thread. And I’m the one changing the subject.
Ok.
May 4, 2010, 11:55 amPhatty says:
The key reason for the failed attempt was the fact that the guy wasn’t willing to die for the cause. If he had manually detonated the bomb instead of relying on an amateur, cheap alarm clock detonation device, there would have been a lot of casualties.
May 4, 2010, 11:57 amTatil says:
How is military tribunal going to help other than giving rise to heated slippery slope arguments? Is he suddenly give you information he would not give otherwise just because he is in front of a military judge? Of course, it may make the president look tough without doing anything beneficial, so that may be counted as an accomplishment.
May 4, 2010, 12:01 pmJMA says:
If I’m ever caught in connection with a plot like this, remind me to make a big point of saying I worked alone! so that the cops will waste time trying to bargain for my co-conspirators while I see how far I can squirm off the hook.
May 4, 2010, 12:03 pmRichard Nieporent says:
I also think that an ad homonym attack on Neurodoc is uncalled for. Try keeping your responses at a higher level than that.
May 4, 2010, 12:04 pmMark Buehner says:
If treatment under military tribunal is no different than civilian, why is everybody up in arms about it? If its not, maybe it gives this guy something to worry about.
Maybe if there is a firing squad at the end of this he will see things a little differently. He didn’t seem to be looking to check out.
May 4, 2010, 12:05 pmAnonsters says:
Damn me and my “ad homonym” attacks.
May 4, 2010, 12:09 pmQET says:
A fair point. Revise to say “incompetent AND non-committed to the cause.” Even so, the heated discussion of whether or not the guy ought to have been Mirandized is a luxury we happily can afford this time.
May 4, 2010, 12:10 pmJust Dropping By says:
A simple Google search for “dumb criminals” reveals dozens of reported instances of bank robbers or other criminals changing their clothes or disguises in public view while fleeing the scene of their crimes (typically leading quickly to their capture). So the answer to your question is not merely “yes,” but “yes, and there’s objective evidence that some criminals really are that stupid.” Also recall that in the 1993 WTC bombing case, one of the conspirators was caught when he tried to get the security deposit back on the rental truck they used in the bombing.
May 4, 2010, 12:10 pmBob from Ohio says:
Good they caught the guy but I am not happy with the quick leaks on methods.
The leaks on the cell phone trace are especially bad. My impression is that criminals/terrorists use these prepaid phones because they think they are safe. Letting them know our capacity to track them seems reckless, driven soley by the desire for the administration/FBI/police to look good.
May 4, 2010, 12:10 pmSuperSkeptic says:
He didn’t know there was more than one VIN #? Well that’s pretty funny…
He’s an American Citizen (apparently) and (allegedly) committed an idiotic and potentially heinous crime on American soil. His ideology (or the fact that we are engaged in some meta-ideological struggle) should not subject him to summary execution – lest we all be subject to such a detour in the criminal justice system based on governmental caprice.
May 4, 2010, 12:16 pmBleh says:
If treatment under civilian tribunal is no different than military, why are you up in arms about it? Your insistance that he be tried by military tribunal as opposed to in a federal district court implies that you, at least, do believe there is some difference. Is the fear of an electric chair at the end of this not good enough? Or do you just want the whole process to be a really fast, showy type of trial?
May 4, 2010, 12:17 pmAnderson says:
Wait, I’m confused. He confessed? Are we still waterboarding after all?
… Re: “he ought to go on trial as a traitor in a military tribunal,” does Mr. Buehner believe that the Rosenbergs ought to’ve been tried before a military commission? Aaron Burr too?
(Admittedly, a military commission, or just about any county judge, would’ve been a better prospect for Ethel Rosenberg.)
May 4, 2010, 12:18 pmrj says:
Phatty says:
Wrong. The fertilizer wasn’t the explosive kind like what was used in the OKC bombing and the propane tanks weren’t even open correctly.
The idea of super-terrorists who are smart enough to escape from a Supermax prison and run wild sewing terror across the Great Plains undetected is just overheated rhetoric from people with a larger agenda to sell. This guy was an idiot and as much a threat to life and limb as a careless utility worker. The underpants bomber failed to detonate a bomb that probably would have only killed himself. The shoe bomber was similarly incompetent and had a plan that would have failed had nobody noticed he was trying to light his shoe on fire. The FBI-infiltrated “cells” that pop up now and then are, in the main, groups of idiots egged on by informants.
They’ve been at war with America for two decades, give or take, and the existential threat they pose to American citizens is about as severe as jet-ski accidents.
Does this mean that the threat isn’t real? Of course not. What it does mean is that it’s time to stop listening to people who whine that Miranda and our civil liberties leave us open to grave “threats” like this latest idiot.
We’re the strongest, most powerful nation in the world. Buck up, ‘fraidey-cats!
May 4, 2010, 12:18 pmneurodoc says:
Questions about some of the details to the extent they have been shared with us or we can reasonably speculate about them…
He bought the car for cash from someone selling through Craigslist because that was the easiest way, other than stealing, to avoid leaving a trail? The seller kept the plates to return to the DMV and the perp had stolen plates with him to put on the vehicle and drive away after the purchase? No trail left but for the VIN number on the engine block that he overlooked? (Was it a VIN or some other identifier that allowed a match up of the Hertz rental truck with McVeigh?)
The cell phone he used to contact the vehicle seller, that’s all that pointed to him? One can’t buy a cell phone without leaving a trail like this?
Were they aware well before take-off time that he was ticketed on that flight or were they running down the concourse to catch up with him? If the plane had taken off before they apprehended him, would the plane have been directed to turn around and land? What carrier and would that be of any consequence, e.g., an American carrier versus a foreign one like Emirates, are far as authority to direct the plane to return if already aloft?
May 4, 2010, 12:18 pmSnaphappy says:
You should have said that Neurodoc’s awful response was to fling offal related to a completely different thread. An ad hominem-homonym attack!
May 4, 2010, 12:20 pmJKB says:
The trail leading to the identity is doable and wouldn’t even require a warrant. The failure of the bomb simply made getting the VIN less dusty and quicker. And if you’re going to use what TV calls a “burn phone” you can’t call anyone else on it. Once they have two or more different calls from the phone they can start triangulating who the people know in common.
What is all this about Mirandizing or not? Of course, you mirandize as soon as a criminal prosecution rules require. You can always take the rights away in a tribunal but you can’t paste the rights notification onto a confession afterward in a criminal prosecution.
May 4, 2010, 12:21 pmSnaphappy says:
Sowing terra!
May 4, 2010, 12:22 pmAnderson says:
The fertilizer wasn’t the explosive kind like what was used in the OKC bombing
We speculated that he bought Miracle-Gro instead of Miracle-Blo.
… Fun fact re: the Rosenberg trial? The egregious judge, Irving Kaufmann, is also the judge who (by now on the 2d Circuit) wrote for the court in Filártiga v. Peña-Irala, 630 F.2d 876 (2d Cir. 1980), a landmark case on the subject of torture:
Among the rights universally proclaimed by all nations, as we have noted, is the right to be free of physical torture. Indeed, for purposes of civil liability, the torturer has become like the pirate and slave trader before him hostis humani generis, an enemy of all mankind.
May 4, 2010, 12:24 pmAnderson says:
The fertilizer wasn’t the explosive kind like what was used in the OKC bombing
We speculated that he bought Miracle-Gro instead of Miracle-Blo.
… Fun fact re: the Rosenberg trial? The egregious judge, Irving Kaufman, is also the judge who (by now on the 2d Circuit) wrote for the court in Filártiga v. Peña-Irala, 630 F.2d 876 (2d Cir. 1980), a landmark case on the subject of torture:
Among the rights universally proclaimed by all nations, as we have noted, is the right to be free of physical torture. Indeed, for purposes of civil liability, the torturer has become like the pirate and slave trader before him hostis humani generis, an enemy of all mankind.
May 4, 2010, 12:25 pmSun Tzu's Nephew says:
Or how they let him buy a ticket, go through screening and get onboard an airplane – that was closed up and pushing back. Great TSA security there….
May 4, 2010, 12:26 pmSammy Finkelman says:
This man was too ready to confess, especially if he was Mirandized. Although they might have waited just a bit to ask him if more bnombs were coming and he said no.
It may be also that he figured saying nothing was not good for him, and saying others were involved was also not good for him, but saying he had no further information about others would cause the FBI to give him his Miranda rights. Which would mean he would be thrust into the civilian criminal justice system, and that they would release him to go to a judge, where he could at least be more sure that his conditions of confinement would be proper and he could object if they were not.
If so the interrogation failed. It doesn’t sound like he was given the right set of inducements and counterinducements.
He probably does have connections but not to the Pakistani Taliban, who don’t even really exist as a separate group, but rather to Pakistan’s rogue military intelligence agency or one of its creations..
Well, first of all it does look like an amateurish failure by a well-established international terrorist group based in Pakistan. This bomb resembles the two one used in Glasgow, Scotland in 2007:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2007_Glasgow_International_Airport_attack
Somebody definitely expected this to work. Somebody prepared a video on April 30 which opened with congratulations to Muslims on the “jaw-breaking blow to Satan’s USA,” and a note saying, “We Tehreek-e-Taliban with all the Pride and Bravery, take full responsibility for the recent attack in the USA.”
They wanted to get this thing out very fast.
Now there is a question: Why would the same dumb mistake be done twice?
The best explanation may be that there is a double agent planted in the terrorist organization(s) and this bomb expert gives the Taliban wrong information as to how really big bombs work, so all the bombs they try in Europe or the United States do not work. But if so, really they should have caught Osama bin Laden by now. This double agent must have been active already in 2007.
(Or perhaps it is that the ISI wants bombs only to work in certain countries)
In either case, however, his handlers probably do not take the United States into their confidence, because I don’t think the Obama Administration would tolerate this thing. If the FBI and/or the New York City Police Department knew about them, they would at least substitute fake explosives. The only fake explosives here was the fertilizer, which was the wrong kind and could come from given the bomb-builders wrong information..
It also could be actually that the Taliban are being run by outsiders who don’t want to destroy them but rather to use them, but the outsiders want them to think they are independent and interested also in terrorism abroad so they set up these bomb plots doomed to failure.
You could also argue maybe the terrorists had a good bomb building expert, and a bad bomb building expert, and the U.S. has been careful NOT to target the incompetent one.
Notice how I cover my bases – but only some bases.
This man just came back recently from a trip to Pakistan.
May 4, 2010, 12:27 pmAnonsters says:
This thread is on a roll. :)
May 4, 2010, 12:27 pmPintler says:
I don’t know – we have a track record from the shoe bomber, the underwear bomber, and now this guy. Is that a track record that would cause you to hire their company as your terror services provider?
They found a VIN after the OK City bombing, and even if this guy had gotten the detonation he was dreaming of, it would still have been still an order of magnitude less boom than the OK City bombing. Thinking that removing the dash VIN plate would even slow the investigation down indicates a serious lack of planning.
May 4, 2010, 12:28 pmMark Buehner says:
No we reserve those for Guantanamo detainees in federal courts. Or is that off again? Either way, their prosecution has been ‘guaranteed’ by the justice department, so apparently show trials can be civilian or military.
I just don’t want to see the next 20 years spent trying to keep this guy locked up while he helps radicalize fellow muslims in prison. I don’t see that as a conducive threat to getting him to talk. A trip to Cuba followed by trial and execution might bring him around.
May 4, 2010, 12:28 pmneurodoc says:
I said nothing at all about Mirandizing him, so what makes you think or speculate that I think Mirandizing him a bad idea? (I think Mirandizing the Nigerian underpants bomber may have been a bad idea, but the facts of that one were different in a number of consequential ways, e.g., foreign national who had not cleared Customs when attempted to blow up plane versus US citizen who acted all the while standing on US soil.)
As for bolding EV, no invocation of some talismanic power, it is the way I always identify others in my posts. Have a look at my many previous posts and you will see it so, with no implication of approval or disapproval.
And note, it is never too late to reconsider nastiness of the “STFU” type and apologize.
May 4, 2010, 12:29 pmMike McDougal says:
If he was able to use Craigslist, he should have been able to use Google to find common VIN locations.
May 4, 2010, 12:30 pmBleh says:
Sure, just watch The Wire.
And what he said:
—————
I imagine that if they were still in our airspace, they could be directed to return, but that’s just supposition
May 4, 2010, 12:31 pmAnonsters says:
To whom? HLS 3Ls and faculty? I think they’ll live.
[Oh, and Richard Nieporent thinks you should stop changing the subject. It won't work, he says.]
May 4, 2010, 12:32 pmMark Buehner says:
Turn it around- should Richard Quirin have gone to a civilian trial? That case has a lot more in common than those others. This man attempted an act of war (indeed a war crime) against America inside America.
May 4, 2010, 12:32 pmrj says:
Questions never answered to my satisfaction:
1) I never understood why terror groups take responsibility or credit for failed attacks. It only makes them look more incompetent than they already are.
2) I’ve been told time and again that civilian trials give terrorists a “platform.” Is there any record of any terrorist claiming he was drawn to the cause by court transcripts or summaries in the next day’s newspaper?
3) When have terror suspects “radicalized” other prisoners? I’m of the impression that they are segregated from the general population. Is this just another fearful fantasy to justify Gitmo?
May 4, 2010, 12:32 pmSteve says:
Taking the bullet, pleading guilty, going to prison while whoever he works with/for walk away might be great for a slam dunk prosecution, but if there is even a nascent car bomb ring… even a bumbling amateur ring being formed here and directed from Pakistan, to me that makes making this guy rot for 40 years seem like small potatoes.
You seem to be under the belief that failing to give a suspect his Miranda rights magically compels him to tell us everything.
Well maybe not Keystone Kops, but with respect to the “40-year old white male” in the surveillance video, didn’t anyone else (e.g., the police and FBI) wonder why if he were the terrorist, he would change his shirt in public as people were passing him on the street? Did they really think that anyone could be so stupid?
We have no idea how seriously they took that guy as a potential suspect, but I’m inclined to defer to the judgment of the people who not only do this stuff for a living but also seem to have caught the actual bad guy within a mere 48 hours. My uninformed speculation, though, is that when you’re desperate for leads it probably makes sense to check out anyone acting suspicious around a crime scene. Would you really have them say “nah, that would be too stupid for a real criminal to do, let’s not even try to check him out”? Now, if they focused on catching that one guy to the exclusion of all other leads, maybe that would be dumb, but obviously they didn’t do that.
May 4, 2010, 12:35 pmSun Tzu's Nephew says:
The VIN appears in several places on vehicles – at least 5 distinct places on US manufactured cars, not sure about others. It was the VIN (on the frame or transmission, IIRC) that allowed the tracing of the Ryder truck to McVeigh
If the plane had taken off, there is little that could have been done to FORCE it to return short of shooting it down, unless the flight crew decided to return. Air Traffic Control is a serious misnomer: They advise, not control. And after taking off from JFK, in a few short minutes the aircraft could be in international airspace.
A foreign carrier might well be far less inclined to return when requested than a US carrier…
And of course, there is nothing at all suspicious about a swarthy looking guy buying a ticket for cash at the last minute, at the airport, to a country that has terrorism links. Which is why the TSA didn’t manage to stop him.
May 4, 2010, 12:35 pmUrso says:
This seems like a far fetched argument to me. What impetus do the “fellow muslims” in prison have to listen to this guy in the first place? If anything I’d imagine the non-terrorists in prison will not look too highly on someone who tried to kill dozens of innocent civilians for no real reason.
People who make this argument tend to presuppose that the arrested terrorists are these charismatic leaders and brilliant communicators with the power to convert slavish followers a la Jim Jones. This guy couldn’t even properly file a VIN off an engine block. I doubt he’s the sharpest tool in the shed.
“Is there any record of any terrorist claiming he was drawn to the cause by court transcripts or summaries in the next day’s newspaper?”
I’d imagine not. If the defendant does start to rant about America, or whatever, the judge can order him to STFU (based, I suppose, on his lack of credentials?) And of course no one except first year associates locked in cubicles actually reads trial transcripts.
May 4, 2010, 12:36 pmneurodoc says:
Yes, neurodoc, conferor of talismanic powers, is the nasty “child” who “flings mud related to an etirely different topic in an entirely different thread” (“STFU” as a response to others in the course of VC threads; “troll” as a response is nothing like “STFU”?; frank rudeness to yet another of the VC) at Anonster with the intended implication of disapproval. Guilty as charged!
May 4, 2010, 12:38 pmMark Buehner says:
I said before- Miranda is immaterial to me, go nuts. The real question is what justice track he is to be put on (we know the answer obviously). We’re giving away most of our leverage. What are you going to induce his cooperation with? Letting him walk? Even in 10 years? Obviously not.
The German-Americans in WW2 were arrested in June, tried in July (and Quirin upheld the military jurisdiction), and executed in August. Staring something like that in the face might make him a bit more cooperative, wouldn’t you say? Or was that a miscarriage of justice too?
May 4, 2010, 12:40 pmAnderson says:
should Richard Quirin have gone to a civilian trial?
Quirin? Or Haupt? Scalia, J., dissenting:
Quirin should’ve been overruled long ago.
May 4, 2010, 12:40 pmneurodoc says:
Thanks, but I’d rather you not discourage Anonster from revealing himself, as he does. (Imagine, this guy is a law student who one day may be advising clients on how to conduct themselves?!)
May 4, 2010, 12:43 pmKevinM says:
“ad homonym attack” (R. Nieporent, above)
May 4, 2010, 12:44 pmExcellent meta-pun! The typo itself being, of course, a homonym for hominem.
QET says:
The mind boggles. Are these serial terrorist failures (a) dupes (or not) used by Al-Q to probe US law enforcement techniques and thereby gather intelligence in advance of “the big one,” or (b) boobish 9/11 wannabes who just want to get in on the martyrdom love? So far you’ve got a 9/11, a 7/11 and a Madrid bombing in the scale against Shoebomber, Underpants Bomber and Times Square. Personally, I don’t feel all that comfortable continuing to assume the incompetence of the would-be terrorists insofar as my long-term response strategy goes.
May 4, 2010, 12:46 pmAnonsters says:
Jesus. Last time I’m going to say anything about this incident. But read my original STFU comment, slowly if it helps:
Who was I addressing the STFU to in that comment? “[O]thers in the course of VC threads?” Sure doesn’t look that way to me. Oh, wait, because it was addressed to Harvard law students and legal academics. And in the context of the post on which I commented, it was specifically addressed to the infamous Harvard 3L e-mailer. But I do apologize to anyone with poor enough reading comprehension not to be able to tell that I wasn’t directing my devastating STFU attack at them.
It’s the only adequate characteriation of the first two comments on this thread.
May 4, 2010, 12:46 pmMark Buehner says:
Was Scalia criticizing the ruling or its execution (so to speak)?
May 4, 2010, 12:46 pmBleh says:
Well said, my friend! All we truly have to do to stop potential terrorists from escaping our jurisdiction is restrict the rights of dark-skinned individuals from engaging in transactions in the free market.
May 4, 2010, 12:48 pmAnonsters says:
There’s neurodoc, taking the moral high ground and staying about the petty “ad homonym” fray….
And my name is Anonsters, not Anonster. Get it right.
May 4, 2010, 12:50 pmneurodoc says:
To the person you directed the “STFU” at, to Eugene Volokh, and to the rest of us. But it was only a suggestion, and you are free to continue in your usual and customary fashion. (BTW, are you a WLC student?)
May 4, 2010, 12:52 pmOrin Kerr says:
Everyone, please be civil to other commenters. Otherwise I’ll just close up the thread.
May 4, 2010, 12:53 pmjccamp says:
It would seem, from published reports, that there is no reason not to Mirandize this suspect and treat the instant case as any other routine criminal investigation and prosecution. Mechanisms exist for continued interrogation of the suspect about other individuals and other possible plots, since it would seem that the suspect is well and truly screwed – from a legal sense – on the charges arising out of the Times Square vehicle.
Much has been made of the relative lack of sophistication of both explosive device and the individual involved. I think we should not confuse unsophisticated, or even stupid, with non-dangerous. It’s easy to say “Big deal” considering the device failed to detonate. But had large numbers of persons been killed or maimed, this one car-bomb might have changed a lot in the urban environment, at least in the short term.
May 4, 2010, 12:54 pmbartman says:
Shahzad’s lucky they authorities didn’t show up 15 minutes later, because then we would have simply asked the Dubai authorities to detain, and that wouldn’t have been much fun for him.
He really should have taken the subway directly from Times Square to JFK, and hopped a flight to Karachi within 2 or 3 hours. He’d have been back in the Punjab before the NYPD had talked to the dude in CT.
I was walking through Times Square about 10 minutes before this happened, on my way from Penn Station up to the Met. It’s a bit freaky knowing I came so close to crossing paths with this event. I had also planned on being at a conference at the WTC hotel on 9/11, but changed my plans because a buddy was getting married the weekend before in Canada.
May 4, 2010, 12:57 pmSteve says:
Was Scalia criticizing the ruling or its execution (so to speak)?
The context of Ex Parte Quirin is that FDR basically told the Court there would be a military trial and execution regardless of what they ruled, so it was up to them whether they wanted to precipitate a constitutional crisis. The Supreme Court capitulated and issued an immediate order allowing the executions to go forward, and the opinion itself wasn’t written and released until the saboteurs were all dead (except the two cooperators, who were ultimately let go after the war).
That’s not to say that the reasoning of Quirin is outrageous, but the Supreme Court basically decided it with a gun to their heads. Relying upon it as iron-clad precedent is dubious.
For my part, I have a problem with summary trial and execution of American citizens. As Scalia wrote in Hamdi, if they join up with the enemy, then try them for treason. I don’t see why this guy should be entitled to less process than Timothy McVeigh.
May 4, 2010, 12:58 pmneurodoc says:
I believe that you have identified yourself as a 3L yourself, possibly at one of the DC law schools (AU?), and I think you show serious deficiencies in comportment. Not a “moral” question.
Your “Good to see the trolls out in force this morning” was the third post in this thread. Was it Joe Gator, Mark Buehner, and/or Orin Kerr that you were calling a “troll”? Was it something one or more of them said here, or were you cross-referencing other threads?
And finally, thanks for the correction as to your nom de plume. I do want to be sure that the duly deserved “credit” goes to the right person, even if we don’t know your true identity. (You might consider starting over under a new nom de plume, but then we wouldn’t know you right away by your past “STFU” and other contributions.)
May 4, 2010, 1:03 pmJasonF says:
There have actually been quite a few more failed plots than the three you mentioned. They don’t get the same publicity because they didn’t involve camera-ready props like a guy trying to set his shoe on fire or a parked car full of propane, but there are a ton of other failed plots that by and large get ignored. Najibullah Zazi’s attmept to bomb the NYC subway six months ago is the most prominent example I can think of, but there are others.
May 4, 2010, 1:06 pmBleh says:
I believe that he was referring to the fact that neither of the first two comments appear to have been made for the purpose of engaging in conversation related to the OP. Instead they were made for the purpose of partisan snark (ostensibly).
May 4, 2010, 1:09 pmAnonsters says:
You’re welcome. And now heeding Orin’s warning, I’m simply going to ignore you. Kthxbai.
[And for clarification, Bleh was right, and I'm pretty sure I would never call Orin a troll.]
May 4, 2010, 1:10 pmSteve says:
Neurodoc, please give it a rest. There are plenty of uncivil comments on the VC every day, and just because Anonsters happened to get called out by EV for saying “STFU” (the horror!) doesn’t make it a useful exercise to harangue him over it until the end of time.
May 4, 2010, 1:11 pmwfjag says:
Because that bought the “Bill Ayres, Build It Yourself Bomb Kit” off eBay?
More seriously — a better question to ask (concerning his motivation to confess so readily and deny the involvement of others) is, where are his wife and kids now? When living in Conn., he had a wife and kids. Apparently, they disappeared a few months ago. If the perp believes that someone who wants him to tell a particular story has his wife and kids, and will express displease with extreme prejudice against them, if he forgets his lines, that would be plenty of motivation both to become an amateur bomb maker, and to readily confess to acting alone and unfinanced. Guess we should see where the facts lead, instead of speculating.
May 4, 2010, 1:14 pmgeokstr says:
Wrong. We know precisely who and how seriously at least one group took this “white male” as the perp – leftists. Take a look at any comment thread about this on most any site prior to the identification of the real jihadist responsible, and you’ll see all the hysterical condemnations of tea partiers, Limbaugh, Beck, Cheney, et al, as violent racist McVeigh wannabes who they just knew were going to do this. And I was only seeing those on conservative blogs supposedly unbiased MSM sites; I can only imagine the slime on HuffPo and DU and Kos.
The disgusting speculation from Bloomberg, the fake Republican, about this being a disgruntled health care takeover opponent is a great example about how badly the left wants to provoke the tea partiers to do something – anything – that they can use to tar them with, given that even lying US congressmen didn’t work out well.
I don’t believe for a second that Holder and Obama worried that they could be giving them a “platform”, or that they might have access to secret information about sources and methods. Those would have been acceptable collateral damage to them. What they really wanted was to satisfy their base, who are rabid about trashing Bush, Cheney, Yoo and others for “torture”. A kangaroo civilian trial in NYC would be an ideal vehicle for them to be able to do so, while claiming that “due process” made them do it.
Please remember that KSM and every one of the other defendants had already indicated their desire to plead guilty to all charges, but Holder still wants to give them the media circus anyway. Why might that be?
May 4, 2010, 1:23 pmSammy Finkelman says:
Orin Kerr>> It’s particularly interesting to me to see how Shahzad was identified as a suspect, at least if initial press reports are accurate. According to reports, Shahzad bought a Nissan Pathfinder off Craigslist for cash,
It has also been advertised on nothingbutcars.net but it was the Craigslist ad that brought him in.
Orrin Kerr>> and then filed off the VIN number that is visible through the windshield.
He also committed car identity theft. Somebody stole some license plates. It is actually quite posisble he took it himself when nobody was looking. Going after the wrong car only moderately delayed the investigation.
Orrin Kerr>> He then drove the Nissan to Times Square and tried to ignite explosives inside it. When the explosives didn’t go off, investigators were able to trace the car to Shahzad because he didn’t realize that the VIN number also appears elsewhere on the car — in this case, on the engine block.
You wonder why he didn’t know that. I guess he didn’t read much true crime.
Anyway this brings out the fact that it is not fooling people into thinking they can’t do something that they can that prevents or solves crime, but fooling people into thinking they can do something that they can’t.
>> The VIN number then led investigators to the registered owner of the car who had sold the car to Shahzad.
It took a while. First they may have traced it to someone in Texas who donated it to a charity in North Carolina, unless that was a different car,.
Another clue was an old sticker (the design hadn’t been used in about 4 years) from Manis Motor Sales in Bridgeport, Connecticut that had been found stuck on the rear exterior of the pathfinder. Tom Manis found two Pathfinders that had been sold in his dealership in 2004, one silver and one gold. But the car in Times Square was painted green so maybe the explanation there was that somebody visited that dealership to fix the car or looking for a place to buy a car or even sell it and pasted it on his car but he didn’t sell it there. I mean if the car had been painted aftyer the sale, the sticker wouldn’t be on it.
Another clue, by the way, was 8 grocery store bags that contained the wrong kind of fertilizer – the police were withholding the name of the store.
Another clue was that the timers apparently were not the kind avaulable in the United States. A good number of leads were being pursued.
Now, VINs are recorded at various points. I think every time is registered the number is recorded.
Anyway, they were able to find the last owner, Peggy Colas, a 19-year black, slightly obese, college student in Bridgeport Connecticut, and talked to her on Sunday.
She lived about 15 minutes from the junkyard where the care whose license plates was stolen was being repaired, so it was all checking out.
Orrin Kerr>> Cell phone records revealing the pre-purchase calls between the prior owner and Shazad revealed Shahzad’s cell phone number, and his cell phone number led the police to learn Shahzad’s identity.
No, it wasn’t the cell phone that led to his identification, although the police tested it and the cell phone number worked. That might mean they knew approximately WHERE he was, if he hadn’t sold or transferred the phone, but not who he was.
It was the e-mail address from which he had mailed his first response to the Craigslist ad that led to his identification.
It may have been secretidentity@yahoo.com, but it wasn’t too much trouble to find out who he really was. He probably hadn’t taken suitable precautions when opening that e-mail account and hadn’t realized he could be traced that way.
It turned out that person who had created that e-mail address, Shahzad Faisal, lived about 20 minutes by car from the seller. It was all checking out.
The car was sold about two weeks ago, for cash.
(Wednesday April 28 was when Peggy Colas updated her Facebook page to say she had bought a new car)
She didn’t remember the name he gave but in case it would have been bogus. She still had his cell phone but that didn’t give his name. But she had his first e-mail message. The transaction was all cash and no papers were made out either.
So by Sunday night they had the name of the buyer of the car and also his cellphone number. But that didn’t result in his getting caught. They went looking for him and spoke to his girlfriend but nobody who knew him had seen him since before Saturday night.
What resulted in his getting caught was his reading the newspapers and listening to the radio and watching TV or the Internet and getting the feeling they were closing in on him – BUT THEY HADN’T YET IDENTIFIED HIM.
So he bought a ticket to Pakistan (under his right name of course – you can’t board without this now) and took his passport to the airport where his name must have been the equivalent of number 1 on the Do Not Fly list.
(more porbabaly it as just simply on the highest category.)
And the Do Not Fly list is secret.
He was arrested aboard the airplane.
He made some calls to Pakistan from the phone in the meantime (perhaps they told him to flee)
These calls may have now led to the arrest of more than half a dozen people in Pakistan.
http://wcbstv.com/topstories/times.square.car.2.1673810.html
NEW YORK (CBS)
Sources tell CBS News that multiple people have been taken into custody for questioning in Pakistan in connection with the Times Square bomb plot.
Authorities are not saying who the potential suspects are or where they are being held, but they say there were raids Monday night and Tuesday morning in different locations. It’s believed between four and eight people are being held, and there are reports that some of them may be related to the suspect arrested overnight in New York.
The Associated Press said that Pakistani authorities have detained at least one man in connection with the Times Square bombing attempt in New York… (but they seem to be arresting everyone connected to him)
May 4, 2010, 1:25 pmCynical says:
The legitimacy of killing unbelievers, sowing terror in the land and taking whatever belongs to any non-Muslim is a good start. Multiple wives are attractive to the sex-starved too. If you want a horrific example of what can happen, see the case of James Larry.
You won’t find anything about this in the MSM, but Jamaat-ul-Fuqra has a number of training camps in the USA. Many of its members are convicted felons, yet they possess and train with guns and aren’t raided by law enforcement. There has been way too much de-policing associated with Muslim criminals and terrorists. The FBI would rather go after Huttaree, because they don’t have well-heeled political donors keeping them out of the news.
May 4, 2010, 1:25 pmAnonsters says:
Since when are trials in federal court automatically “kangaroo civilian trial[s]?” I’ve seen this several times now, but it amounts to no more than saying, “civilian trial = kangaroo trial.” I don’t get it.
May 4, 2010, 1:27 pmSammy Finkelman says:
He must have been on the Do Not Fly list by then. The plane never would have taken off with him on it.
That’s what Ramzi Youssef did.
Maybe his plans were thrown off by the fact that the bomb did not work.
And then there’s Robert Todd Lincoln, who barely missed being present at the assassination of 3 presidents.
http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/presidents_and_first_ladies/89601
“His parents were going to the theater that night, and invited Robert to join them. Robert declined, saying he was very tired and just wanted to get a good night’s sleep.”
“President Garfield had invited Robert to join him on a trip to Elberon, N.J., after which the President was then going to travel to a Williams College reunion. They were to leave from the Baltimore and Potomac railroad station in Washington, D.C. Robert Lincoln was running late, and arrived at the station just as the assassination of Garfield occurred.”
“Twenty years later, on September 6, 1901, President William McKinley invited Robert Lincoln to join him at the Pan American Exposition at Buffalo, New York. Again, Robert Lincoln arrived just as the President was shot.”
May 4, 2010, 1:34 pmneurodoc says:
EV did called out by Anonsters for that one, quite rightly so, and rather than apologize as most here would do, Anonsters objected to EV calling him out for the unwarranted vulgarity. Rather remarkable in itself, because I don’t recall anyone ever personally going at it with EV in similar fashion, though it may have happened some time in the past. Not remarkable, however, in the case of David Bernstein posts, especially those concerning Israel, HRW, and the like, are concerned. In those, Anonsters regularly turns personal toward Professor Bernstein and those who would contradict Anonsters. I don’t for a second imagine that EV, DB, or any of the other VC need me to cover their backs, but I do point this out because I think it warrants reproach by others, no matter their views on the substance of what is discussed in these threads.
Now, having said this, I have no reason to respond further to Anonsters, unless he goes back on his word (“And now heeding Orin’s warning, I’m simply going to ignore you”), not even to ask the meaning of “Kthxbai,” which I wouldn’t be surprised to learn is something fittingly charming.
May 4, 2010, 1:40 pmBleh says:
Talk about a national security threat! =P
May 4, 2010, 1:40 pmSuperSkeptic says:
Do you feel that way about the rest of the New-Deal Court era jurisprudence?
May 4, 2010, 1:42 pmSammy Finkelman says:
http://www.wgntv.com/news/middaynews/middayfix/wgntv-mdf-lastlincoln-033109,0,1640984.story
“Robert was present at three presidential assassinations – those of Lincoln, Garfield and McKinley. Thinking he was cursed, following McKinley’s murder Robert refused to go to the White House or attend any event where a president was present.”
May 4, 2010, 1:44 pmneurodoc says:
If those two comments amount to “trolling,” then they pale as examples of such when compared to a great many posts to VC threads.
May 4, 2010, 1:45 pmgeokstr says:
Oh please.
I never said all “civilian” trials are kangaroo courts, in fact, 99% aren’t. However, this one was a political gambit all along. My comment used “kangaroo” to modify “civilian trial” in this one case, not all.
However, given that KSM already indicated he would plead guilty two years ago, and Holder has guaranteed his conviction in advance (presumption of innocence be damned), makes this particular civilian trial nothing more then a very, very expensive show (kangaroo) trial that must have some purpose other than simple justice as a goal.
What might that have been, do you suppose? A multi-hundred million dollar, years long PR ploy to show the (non-existent) Islamic moderate nations how wonderful we are, and that would make them lay down their arms and sing kumbaya with us around the campfire?
I dunno, you tell me what totally non-political (/sarc) Holder’s real motivations are. You’re the brilliant 3L, and I’m just a CPA in flyover country.
May 4, 2010, 1:55 pmsecond history says:
My, we have gotten far off topic. From the Washington Post:
May 4, 2010, 1:57 pmSammy Finkelman says:
The story you link to in the update says that it was a man who sold the car.
But both the New York Post and the New York Daily News have a picture of Peggy Colas.
http://www.nypost.com/p/news/local/teen_stunned_by_her_terror_sell_0cu1pwPm19eB0VKHZAOU9I
http://www.nydailynews.com/ny_local/2010/05/03/2010-05-03_times_square_car_bomb_square_evidence_points_to_overseas_terrorist_involvement_w.html
See also:
http://www.aolnews.com/nation/article/wild-ride-for-peggy-colas-who-sold-suv-to-car-bomb-suspect/19463920
One story says that she *used* to live 20 minutes away from Shahzad Faisal. Then that would not mean anything since it’s the distance when he bought the car that counts.
May 4, 2010, 1:58 pmneurodoc says:
Judging by some of the comments going up less than 3 hours after the opening of this thread, it seems that some are in possession of more “facts,” or at least think they are, than others. It would be helpful if “facts” beyond those in the OP and/or this morning’s papers, would be stated, so the rest of us might understand more fully.
For example, how close did this guy really come to getting out of the country? Any idea of a timeline leading up to his apprehension? Did everything follow from the VIN (VIN to seller of car, seller of car’s phone to perp’s cell phone, and from cell phone to his identity)? Did fingerprints from the car help identify him before he was apprehended? Do all naturalized citizens have their fingerprints taken? What % of those in the US have their fingerprints on file for one reason or another (mine are because of federal employment and military service)? How was the bomb supposed to detonate and why did it fail to at least set off the gasoline? How much like/unlike was this attempt to the failed and partially failed car bomb ones in London and at the airport in Scotland?
May 4, 2010, 2:00 pmAnonsters says:
John McCain has already said that the recent would-be bomber will get the death penalty. Does that make any process this guy gets simply for show? Politicians making political statements. Color me shocked.
FWIW, I think we should let KSM plead guilty, but as far as I remember (which may not be very far, so grain of salt and all that), he was only willing to do so only on the condition that his sentence be death. But of course we don’t have the death penalty for guilty pleas.
Of course, I think the death penalty itself is an abomination. So. Yeah.
May 4, 2010, 2:01 pmBleh says:
I guess what I don’t understand is why you’re so convinced that Holder’s “guarantee” indicates the trial would just be for show. Sounds like a typical prosecutor hyping up his case to me. Last I checked, the judiciary was an independent branch of the government.
May 4, 2010, 2:03 pmhet says:
“that makes making this guy rot for 40 years seem like small potatoes. If the next bomb takes out 30 people in Manhattan, I suppose some of the current champions of the niceties of law will be the same people trying to lynch this guy in the public square. Tends to work that way.”
Mark – just guessing here – are you kind of a pudgy middle aged guy? Do you have a bag of cheetos within arm’s reach right now?
May 4, 2010, 2:05 pmSammy Finkelman says:
Naturalized last April.
More about Shazad:
He lived in Bridgeport, Connecticut, for about three years with his wife, Huma Mian, and two children,
but they moved out last year. Karachi native Shahzad returned to Pakistan for a trip and “during that trip he traveled to Peshawar” (Wall Street Journal) It is believed he still has family in Karachi.
Apparently he acquired a girlfriend after his wife left.
Neighbors said they spoke limited English.
http://www.nydailynews.com/ny_local/2010/05/03/2010-05-03_times_square_car_bomb_square_evidence_points_to_overseas_terrorist_involvement_w.html?page=1#ixzz0mz8t0Oah
“As Shahzad was tracked, investigators have also started looking at a Connecticut-based Web site purporting to represent a faction of the Taliban in Pakistan, sources said. The site went up last week, and within 24 hours of the failed bombing was laying claim to an attack on American soil, law enforcement sources said.”
Claims of responsibility are probably only made to mislead, probably to make an organization look smaller and less centrally directed and well financed or sponsored than it is.
May 4, 2010, 2:06 pmAnonsters says:
Update on the Miranda-angle: Mirandized after questioning under the public safety exception.
They’re also reporting that they intend to charge him with attempting to use a “weapon of mass destruction.”
Am I wrong in thinking that that’s a little ridiculous?
May 4, 2010, 2:08 pmQET says:
I am assuming that the “they” are the Feds, not the State of NY, so perhaps that crime carries a longer sentence or something than other possible Fed crimes they could charge him with?
May 4, 2010, 2:16 pmgeokstr says:
It may again be just that I am not a 3L, and so could be totally misinformed, but last I heard, John McCain lost in 2008, and is therefore not in charge of administering our entire judicial system, like Holder and his boss are. Shouldn’t Holder, politician or not, be held to a little higher standard when discussing the application of that antiquated concept, justice, that he is responsible for enforcing, especially when it is the “presumption of innocence” that is pretty much the foundation of it all?
May 4, 2010, 2:16 pmKen Arromdee says:
What are you talking about? The idea isn’t to give him an unfair trial using a confession that he made despite not being Mirandaized. The idea is to accept the fact that it’s harder to try him, because getting information about his accomplices is more important than convicting him. He himself would benefit from not being Mirandaized and therefore being harder to convict.
May 4, 2010, 2:17 pmBleh says:
I suppose you’re entitled to dislike the “niceties of law,” until it’s your door they’re breaking down.
May 4, 2010, 2:20 pmSteve says:
Am I wrong in thinking that that’s a little ridiculous?
Yeah, “weapon of mass destruction” has a statutory definition that pretty much includes a garden-variety bomb. The charge is standard. It’s not to be understood in the same sense as Saddam’s non-existent WMDs.
May 4, 2010, 2:20 pmAnderson says:
They’re also reporting that they intend to charge him with attempting to use a “weapon of mass destruction.”
What’s the next weapon to earn this honor? A semiautomatic pistol?
May 4, 2010, 2:21 pmAnonsters says:
Right, it was from a Holder presser. But I just meant the “weapon of mass destruction” part. I thought we reserved that label for things like NBC.
May 4, 2010, 2:21 pmAnonsters says:
Um, ok.
As someone pointed out above, the judiciary is a separate branch of government. Holder and his boss do not run the courts.
So I guess I would modify my question and ask whether we ought not get rid of that statutory definition, because it seems a little ridiculous. Or call it something else.
May 4, 2010, 2:24 pmneurodoc says:
The Attorney General is, in effect, the chief prosecutor and when he offers those concerned about the decision to try in a federal district court rather than by a military tribunal assurances that the accused will be convicted and given the death penalty, that is no different from “a typical prosecutor hyping up his case”? Maybe when combined with other facts, like KSM’s willingness to plead guilty at a much earlier time, this supports those who ask why a “show” trial.
You are correct that the judiciary is an independent branch of the government, though it has not always acted as one in national security cases, e.g., the Rosenbergs. But what is your point, that because the judiciary exists as an independent branch of the government a trial of KSM cannot be seen as a “show” trial?
You are. see Title 18 USC, Section 921
May 4, 2010, 2:27 pmSuperSkeptic says:
Ok, given all those things: He’s still an American citizen, so my point holds true. (See also OrenWithanE’s recent points about being born in America.) That we should be more careful about who will dole out citizenship to is another critical point (it also militates against a general amnesty).
May 4, 2010, 2:27 pmAnonsters says:
See the final paragraph of my second post, directly above yours.
Also, 18 U.S.C. § 921 doesn’t appear to define “weapon of mass destruction.” The term “destructive device” is the closest thing I saw.
[Edit: But I see that 18 U.S.C. § 2332a(c)(2)(A) includes "destructive device" in its definition of WMD. Silliness.]
May 4, 2010, 2:29 pmSuperSkeptic says:
Why limit that observation to national security cases, those being only the most conspicuous?
May 4, 2010, 2:31 pmQET says:
Well, I thought we reserved RICO for the Mafia. I understand your point and perceive criminal charge inflation in many places. I thought I read somewhere lately that WMD is being defined downward to reach weapons/devices that seem quite far away from nukes and Scuds. [edit--I should have read the rest of the thread before posting]
May 4, 2010, 2:40 pmUrso says:
I’m not sure how this guy’s citizenship, or lack thereof, is relevant to the question of general amnesty. Are you saying if we hadn’t made him a citizen, he wouldn’t have committed this crime?
And if this car bomb had gone off correctly, we’re looking at potentially dozens dead. To me that would qualify as a “weapon of mass destruction.”
May 4, 2010, 2:41 pmflavor says:
I’m not sure what the point of such a gratuitous reference was. Perhaps only to suggest that your own perceived erroneous legal decision- in a single instance- invalidates the independence of the judiciary, 50 years later?
And by the way, I do not accept the premise of your example. The Rosenbergs were clearly guilty, and deserved what they got for their crimes.
An independent judiciary, that provides a man a fair trial, excludes the possibility of a “show trial” by definition.
May 4, 2010, 2:45 pmneurodoc says:
Yes, all “silliness,” overblown, hysteria, etc. in your view, as you have made clear in the course of this and previous threads, including OK‘s one of two days ago:
zuch: No need to get our knickers twisted into a knot about this … in fact, that’s what the perp wants you to do, so “Just say ‘no!’”.
Anonsters:Amen. I think the best thing you can do in the face of terrorists or terrorist-wannabes is just to say, “Hey, fuck off.”
Anonsters: For what? For us to piss our pants and cower under the tables with the conserva-police-statists?
Anonsters: Meanwhile, 100 actual people were killed in the Congo by the Lord’s Resistance Army two weeks months ago:
[Orin Kerr says: I just want to thank the commenters here for proving that when a news story first breaks and no one knows what really happened, most observers will naturally construe the story to nicely fit their preconceptions. May 2, 2010, 2:29 pm ]
May 4, 2010, 2:58 pmJoe Kowalski says:
Were McVeigh or Nichols ever tried on WMD charges? I know McVeigh was primarily convicted on Murder of Federal Agents and took the juice for those particulars, but I don’t recall if WMD charges were in the mix or not.
May 4, 2010, 2:59 pmjccamp says:
“weapon of mass destruction” is defined by USC as “any weapon or device that is intended, or has the capability, to cause death or serious bodily injury to a significant number of people through the release, dissemination, or impact of—
(A) toxic or poisonous chemicals or their precursors;
(B) a disease organism; or
(C) radiation or radioactivity.” (50 USC 40:2302)
I’m assuming the charges are going to be related to 18 USC’s definition of “destruction device’ as previously noted by several people, and the “WMD” reference is a mistake.
But then, who knows these days? Maybe they’re going to try the stretch to (A).
May 4, 2010, 3:00 pmwhit says:
just for record…
it’s VIN
or VI number
it is NOT “VIN number” or “VIN #”
i realize this is petty, but file under “dept. of redundancy dept.”
May 4, 2010, 3:01 pmRandy says:
geosktr: “The disgusting speculation from Bloomberg, the fake Republican, about this being a disgruntled health care takeover opponent is a great example about how badly the left wants to provoke the tea partiers to do something — anything — that they can use to tar them with, given that even lying US congressmen didn’t work out well.’
Well, it’s no more ‘disgusting speculation’ than when people here at the VK assumed, right from that the start, that an incompetently planned bombing is the work of some one who wanted to pin the blame on the Tea Partiers in an effort to discredit them. They are great examples of how badly the right wants to blame anyone on the left for things they never did.
May 4, 2010, 3:01 pmneurodoc says:
What exactly do you believe that Ethel Rosenberg was guilty of? I think you are uninformed, because there is little disagreement among serious historians that she was not guilty of what she was convicted of and executed for. And there was gross misconduct on the part of both the prosecutor and the trial judge, most especially the latter.
That sounds like circular logic to me, but you’re welcome to it.
May 4, 2010, 3:05 pmA. Zarkov says:
That sounds right, but evidently the police can trace a “burn phone,” and trace it quickly, see here. I wondered how the police could do that so quickly. If someone pays cash for the “burn phone,” how do the police link to the person who makes a call. My speculations:
1. He renewed the minutes on the cell phone with a credit or debit card or in some way which reveals his identify.
2. He called other numbers, which form a path to the clandestine caller.
3. Shahzad called Pakistan with the “burn phone” and the NSA recorded the conversation and the numbers he called.
4. All cell phone calls (perhaps all calls) made in the U.S. are recorded. Yes I know that’s not supposed to be legal, but NSA or some other entity does it anyway. I remember reading that in Europe (where they trust govenment), the content (the conversation) from all cell phone calls are recorded.
How would one make a truly anonymous call? Use a burn phone. Make only one call and then dispose of the phone by grinding it up into small particles less than 10 microns. Do not reveal anything in the conversation that discloses your identity. Use a voice distortion device. It’s possible NSA has a vast library of voice prints for most everyone.
May 4, 2010, 3:09 pmAnonsters says:
Yes, I do think it’s silliness to define “weapon of mass destruction” so as to include any explosive device.
As for the rest, it’s completely irrelevant and has nothing to do with me thinking we shouldn’t be defining terms of certain gravity to include less grave instances. Kind of like we shouldn’t just start calling every act of mass violence “genocide.”
But it is mildly flattering that I appear to have totally unhinged you. Go me.
May 4, 2010, 3:19 pmneurodoc says:
TITLE 18 > PART I > CHAPTER 44 > § 921
Prev | Next § 921. Definitions
“any explosive, incendiary, or poison gas—bomb, grenade, rocket having a propellant charge of more than four ounces [113 grams], missile having an explosive or incendiary charge of more than one-quarter ounce [7 grams], mine, or device similar to any of the devices described in the preceding clauses….”
TITLE 18 > PART I > CHAPTER 113B
CHAPTER 113B—TERRORISM
•§ 2332a. Use of weapons of mass destruction
the term “weapon of mass destruction” means—
(A) any destructive device as defined in section 921 of this title
***Is your concern that this is all “silliness,” that an insuffient number of people were at risk from that car bomb that failed to go off as intended, that federal prosecutors don’t know what they are doing, or what?
May 4, 2010, 3:27 pmSuperSkeptic says:
It sure is relevant if we want American citizens to enjoy the full protections of our Constitution and regular criminal justice system. I am not suggesting that if he wasn’t given citizenship, he would not have committed the crime. But in dealing with “terrorist” acts (anything from a snuke to a tiny pipe bomb – see surrounding discussion), citizenship is a very important factor, perhaps the most important factor, in determining how the subsequent judicial process functions. This implicates amnesty and general immigration issues tangentially.
May 4, 2010, 3:30 pmAnonsters says:
neurodoc, quick!
Someone on another thread just said for people to STFU.
Hop into action!
May 4, 2010, 3:31 pmSuperSkeptic says:
haha! Good point, but, “VIN #” is what people actually say. (Descriptivism! Descriptivism!)
Since we’re off topic: Did anyone else lose the italics, blockquote, emphasis, etc. capabilities in the comments? And I’m still waiting for numbered comments to appear… What’s going on? Is it just me?
May 4, 2010, 3:35 pmUrso says:
Forgive my ignorance, but why not simply use a pay phone? (Assuming you can find one)
May 4, 2010, 3:40 pmJoe Kowalski says:
To answer my own question: Per their Wikipedia articles, both Nichols and McVeigh were charged and convicted with Conspiracy to use a Weapon of Mass Destruction, McVeigh was convicted with “Use of a Weapon of Mass Destruction” in addition to the conspiracy charge.
May 4, 2010, 3:47 pmneurodoc says:
If it makes you feel better, I acknowledge that you are not the only one of your kind.
May 4, 2010, 3:54 pmSuperSkeptic says:
Inefficient. Also requires one to enter fixed public places. Those are two of the biggest reasons I can think of off the top of my head, but there’s thousands more…
May 4, 2010, 3:59 pmneurodoc says:
I don’t know where you gleaned all that, but thanks, that’s a lot.
May 4, 2010, 4:01 pmneurodoc says:
Right, try to find a pay phone? How many of us are within a 15 minute walk of one, if we even know where there are any around them? The disappearance of pay phones is a remarkable, but mostly silent, reflection of the adoption of a new technology. Did pay phones and typewriters, both of which still exist to be sure, go away in about the same amount of time?
May 4, 2010, 4:05 pmBill Twist says:
I suspect that what happened is that the seller of the car noted the phone number of the buyer (or the FBI pulled it from phone records), and then they checked out every single other number that had been called from that particular cellphone, and then interviewed people. Alternatively, if he did something stupid like use a credit card to pay for the phone, that just makes their job easier.
Had the phone only been used for the purpose of buying the car, and had the phone been paid for in cash at some bodega with limited video surveillance a couple months or so in advance, then they might not have been able to find out who it was (as long as he didn’t use the phone in his own home).
May 4, 2010, 4:09 pmA. Zarkov says:
I think you answered your own question. Finding pay phones is difficult. Then how does he get a return call? Stand by a pay phone all day? Now days most cell phones come equipped with E911, which locates the phone, so you don’t want to make the call or receive one anywhere near where you live.
May 4, 2010, 4:30 pmSun Tzu's Nephew says:
They are convinced that they are innocent, that they deserve whatever they were stealing to be put into jail, that the people they attacked deserved it for whatever reason….the same reason that people are converted to islam and radicalized in jail now.
May 4, 2010, 4:31 pmSun Tzu's Nephew says:
Well, since one of the warning flags for terrorists happens to be buying tickets for cash, at the last minute, and he bought the ticket and passed through screening AFTER he was identified, I’d say you’re right.
May 4, 2010, 4:35 pmgeokstr says:
Once they’d strip- and cavity-searched all the 6 year-old blonde kids and 80 year old nuns in wheelchairs, they must have felt pretty certain that there were no other risky characters on that flight.
May 4, 2010, 4:45 pmA. Zarkov says:
“This guy couldn’t even properly file a VIN off an engine block.”
Do you think that’s easy? Suppose the VIN is somewhere inaccessible? What do you do pull the whole engine? Not only that other parts of the car have VIN. The police found a VIN or some serial number on a drive shaft or axel in WTC truck bomb and traced the truck. Let’s remember that truck blew up and they still found a number.
As a practical matter you can’t get rid of the VIN without taking the whole truck apart into little pieces. Then it’s hard to file off a number. In many, if not most cases, you can still recover a filed off number because invisible traces are left behind.
May 4, 2010, 4:57 pmflavor says:
I’m going to reply to this, but right now I’ve got more pressing concerns- I need to go to the ATM machine, but can’t recall my PIN number. I’m looking for my driver’s license to drive there, but can’t find them.
May 4, 2010, 5:10 pmflavor says:
agreed 100%, even with all the VINs removed the car can be traced through its parts. Removing a VIN will only buy you time- but in this case, the guy almost had all the time he needed. What if his flight had been just a few hours after he dropped off the truck at Times Square?
As an aside, do you still get all those virgins in heaven if you bomb civilians, or do you have to blow yourself up to get them? I do get so confused on the rules of mass murder.
May 4, 2010, 5:19 pmneurodoc says:
Do you really “think it’s silliness to define ‘weapon of mass destruction’ so as to include any explosive device,” or did you mean to say “so as to include all explosive devices”? Would it be less “silly” in your view if the explosive device was meant to disperse toxic biologic, chemical, or nuclear materials? Would you limit the term to those devices that killed/maimed a certain minimum number of people, or had the potential to injure that number of people, and if so, what would be your threshold number? Do you see those anthrax attacks that killed/sickened “only” a few individuals as employing “weapons of mass destruction”? Is it your concern that the penalties that go with use of “weapons of mass destruction” as that term is used in 18USC are too severe for Shahzad?
And the rest of it, whether you deem it relevant or not here, are those posts of yours that I quoted above (2:58PM) a fair reflection of your thinking or not? Did I misapprehend them as discounting, if not dismissing, the significance of this terrorist attack? If I did, I’d be interested to know more about your perspective on this particular terrorist attempt to kill innocent passersby in Times Square?
May 4, 2010, 5:23 pmTexEd says:
No one seems to have mentioned the coincidence that Amadinijadh (sp?) was probably still in NYC at blast time and probably could have given the muslim evil-doer a ride out to JFK.
May 4, 2010, 5:24 pmThe point that strikes me, however, is the fact that this was such an amateurish attempt. I believe that almost any college engineering student or former military explosives guy could have done a far better construction or placement job. Simply imagine TWO cars going through the tunnel, the driver of the second car stopping, setting the fuse and fuse and hopping in the first.
Wouldn’t some of the true evil-doer countries have smuggled into NYC via diplomatic cover some supplies of powerful explosives? This just doesn’t seem to be anywhere near powerful a hit as could have been dealt with not a lot more effort.
neurodoc says:
I don’t have a theological answer to your question, but I do know that you must die and your death must be somehow connected to what is seen as the Islamic cause, if you are to be counted as a martyr. Yayha Ayyash, “the Engineer,” who before the Israelis assassinated him in what some style an “extrajudicial killing” was responsible for bombs that killed dozens of Israeli innocents, is celebrated by the Palestinians as a “martyr” though he didn’t blow himself up along with his victims. I doubt that virgins were waiting for him on the other side, I can’t say.
May 4, 2010, 5:44 pmneurodoc says:
In response to Anonsters and others who think the rest of us are overreacting to this latest terrorist attempt and through our overreaction handing the terrorists some undeserved victory, I offer this from today’s Washington Post (“From Belfast to Baghdad to Braodway: The complexity of thwarting ‘simpler’ attacks”):
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/05/03/AR2010050303385.html
May 4, 2010, 5:57 pmHarryEagar says:
‘No warrantless wiretapping. No land that law forgot in Cuba. No foreign wars. No waterboarding. Just shoe leather and good detective work.’
And his unwillingness, atypical of the breed, to die for the cause. Taking comfort in the amateurishness of his effort misses the point: If he had been willing to go out himself, that bomb could have been made to work easily.
No amount of police work would have stopped him, either. Nor would alert handbag vendors.
May 4, 2010, 6:02 pmJoe Kowalski says:
Such individuals would be more likely to have the knowledge necessary to get off to a much better start in the process. The problem with building an effective bomb though is that it takes more than just the knowledge and expertise to do so.
You also need explosive materials that are:
1) Stable enough to be safely handled and put into a container and moved;
2) Explosive enough to actually wreak some serious damage without requiring complicated and unreliable detonation sequences;
and
3) Can be accessed or purchased without drawing the attention of law enforcement.
If you try to engineer & mix your own homemade materials, you will likely need some kind of testing facility out in the sticks, which increases design time and the odds of exposure to law enforcement. Not to mention this is a good way to end up in multiple pieces without hurting anyone you want to hurt (as Bill Ayers’ friends found out in the 70′s).
Getting a big boom out of over the counter materials is much harder than I think most realize, and I don’t think it should be surprising that the recent bombing attempts look incompetent and crude.
May 4, 2010, 6:11 pmSammy Finkelman says:
You’d most easily make an anonymous call by standing in the street or in a school and asking to borrow somebody else’s phone to make a call.
There is some interesting news
Behind the News with Bill RitterTuesday, May 4, 2010
Faisal Shahzed’s failed escape
It was one of Maxwell Smart’s best lines: “Missed it by THAT much.”
Federal agents and New York City police detectives were THAT close to having that happen to them last night, as Faisal Shahzed, suspected of leaving a potential SUV bomb in Times Square, was on a plane which was on the taxi-way, ready to take off for Dubai. He must have been breathing hard, but with a sense of relief and victory, having eluded authorities and federally hired bounty hunters.
What must he have been thinking as the plane suddenly turned around and headed back? What did the pilot say? That we have mechanical problems? That there’s a suspected terrorist on board? (I doubt that.) And how did Mr. Shahzed react, outwardly and inwardly? Oh to have seen his face when the feds boarded the plane and arrested him.
More: Behind the News
It’s a happy ending, and there are plenty of boy-howdy’s going around. But the truth is they came very close to losing Shahzed. And once he had made it to Dubai, they would have had no shot at ever getting him.
Turns out the feds hired a third party to keep tabs of Shahzed in New York after they identified him as the suspect.
That’s right. They outsourced the tailing of this guy. We’re trying to figure out why they do this.
We’re also taking a closer look at who Shahzed is, and why no one raised a red flag about his possible jihadist behavior. The naturalized American, who hailed from Pakistan, got two degrees from the University of Bridgeport, including an MBA. And he was a junior financial analyst with an investment company in Stamford.
He owned a home that reportedly went into foreclosure last summer. And he moved his wife and two kids back to Pakistan, then returned five months later.
No one, not in school or at his work, ever heard him talk politics or about jihad? Hard to imagine.
We’ll have complete coverage of the terror plot tonight at 11 – the 11th terror plot against New York City since the Sept. 11 terror attacks. Lots of 11′s in there
May 4, 2010, 6:17 pmAnonsters says:
Yes, you did. Am I surprised? No.
No, because I think we should keep the “WMD” label for NBC. And I suspect that anyone could’ve divined what I meant if they weren’t purposefully looking for ambiguities in order to try to attack me.
I’m not sure what you’re really asking here, so if I missed the point of the question, re-ask and I’ll re-answer. I think it’s despicable. I place an extremely high value on human life. But I also think that we (Americans) overreacted after 9/11 and have become far too scared, and I say this as someone who like most Americans was profoundly hurt by 9/11. I still can’t watch footage or read stuff about the day without crying. I think it’s good that we realize the legitimate threats and dangers of the world, of course, and we shouldn’t just write them off. But I think fear is corrosive, and the more we give in to it, the less free and the less at peace we’ll ever be.
May 4, 2010, 7:07 pmBrian G. says:
It appears to be good police work, but soon enough we’ll find out all of the civil rights violations it took to catch the guy. Not to mention the mandatory claims of torture.
May 4, 2010, 7:21 pmDavid Schwartz says:
The correct use of the acronym “VIN” has only to do with what that word *means* and nothing whatsoever to do with what it stands for except as that illuminates its meaning.
Acronyms are words, and there is no reason they have to follow the same grammatical rules as the individual words they stand for any more than any other word must be replaceable by its definition to be used correctly. There are tons of counterexamples, such as “scuba gear”, and “atm machine”. (Can you imagine anyone saying “My computer runs the MSDOS”?)
May 4, 2010, 7:51 pmRPT says:
Why does the right/conservatives hate our law enforcement agencies and officers? Wow.
May 4, 2010, 8:18 pmPintler says:
What I like is that the usage I hear is always ‘VIN number’ but never ‘SSN number’.
May 4, 2010, 9:56 pmrpt says:
Anyone heard that the cell phone call to UAE reservations was intercepted by army surveillance planes over Manhattan?
May 4, 2010, 10:51 pmleo marvin says:
“We’re gonna win the game. I guarantee it.”
- Joe Namath, architect of Kangaroo Super Bowl III.
May 4, 2010, 11:05 pmBartman says:
1) Stable enough to be safely handled and put into a container and moved;
2) Explosive enough to actually wreak some serious damage without requiring complicated and unreliable detonation sequences;
and
3) Can be accessed or purchased without drawing the attention of law enforcement.
ANFO fits the bill. Indeed, it’s so stable that you can’t set it off with simple blasting cord or even n open flame, but you need explosive-grade blasting caps. (Learnt all this while studying hard rock mining in grad school). From what I’ve heard, model rocket enthusiasts have (or, at least, had) no trouble getting those, but there certainly not readily available at the local WalMart or gas station, like the other parts of ANFO.
May 4, 2010, 11:22 pmBartman says:
And once he had made it to Dubai, they would have had no shot at ever getting him.
Not true. The ruler of Dubai, who owns half of Kentucky, would be only too happy to curry a bit of favor with the US by turning him over to the US. He would have been tapped on the shoulder by a handful of guys in mirrored shades while waiting in Dubai airport (where the immigration like is an hour long at the best of times), and likely subjected to a little bit of rather uncivilized questioning, which would absolutely not have been “unconstitutional”, since no agent of the US government was involved. And had he made it back to Pakistan, there’s certainly no reason to believe he wouldn’t be turned over, if the right people got to him.
May 4, 2010, 11:28 pmJoe Kowalski says:
The blasting caps and fuel oil may be available, but from what I understand is that since Oklahoma City, Ammonium Nitrate fertilizer is difficult to obtain in quantities sufficient to make a decent bomb without drawing the scrutiny of law enforcement and having them stop by to make sure your garden is growing well.
May 4, 2010, 11:43 pmneurodoc says:
Since we aren’t going to settle this between us, why don’t we invite others to say whether they understood something very different from what I did when you wrote:
zuch: No need to get our knickers twisted into a knot about this … in fact, that’s what the perp wants you to do, so “Just say ‘no!’”.
Anonsters:Amen. I think the best thing you can do in the face of terrorists or terrorist-wannabes is just to say, “Hey, fuck off.”
Anonsters: For what? For us to piss our pants and cower under the tables with the conserva-police-statists?
Anonsters: Meanwhile, 100 actual people were killed in the Congo by the Lord’s Resistance Army two weeks months ago.
No, it wouldn’t be less “silly” in your view if the explosive device was meant to disperse toxic biologic, chemical, or nuclear materials; it would still be just as “silly” in your view?! And (or?) it’s “silly” because you think 18USC, the FBI, and others (e.g., Congress, the authors of 18USC) shouldn’t use “WMD” to characterize anything that doesn’t involve NBC? If an enemy could land a “daisy cutter” bomb on one of our cities, would you make an exception and allow that as a WMD thought there was no NBC component? (BTW, did you ever say what your threshold number is for counting a weapon as one of mass destruction, and whether you viewed the anthrax attacks as ones employing a weapon of mass destruction, perhaps because highly toxic biologic materials were involved, though relatively few people were killed?)
You think we “overreacted” to 9/11, when four commercial airliners were hijacked and crashed into the WTC’s two towers, the Pentagon, and a field in PA though the intended target was the White House, with the result being approximately 3,000 dead and many grievously injured, huge economic damage, radical changes of various sorts affecting our domestic and foreign affairs, the start of a war (do you think we “overreacted” when we went into Afghanistan?), etc. I don’t think many share your view, but you are entitled to it. The subject at hand, though, was this latest terrorist attack, albeit a failed one, in NYC, and I asked you to explain your views of this one if you did not think it was being overblown, that we were overreacting, that it did not deserve greater attention than “100 actual people…killed in the Congo by the Lord’s Resistance Army two months ago, that “conserva-police-statists” were somehow blameworthy in this, etc. I don’t see how I misapprehended you as “discounting…the significance of this terrorists” attack and encouraging others to do so too.
May 5, 2010, 2:54 amneurodoc says:
Leo, you got it exactly. The trial of KSM in a federal district court in NYC would be very much like the most watched game in the US, with the same entertainment value. And Eric Holder can be seen as something like Broadway Joe, both of them being leaders of their teams, though Holder’s team is the overwhelming favorite, while Joe’s team may have had its fans but was very much the underdog. Trash talk is trash talk whether it comes out of the mouth of a pro football quaterback or the US AG.
Now, I’m exaggerating for effect, but you certainly aren’t rebutting the “show trial” argument.
May 5, 2010, 3:07 amDavid Schwartz says:
You can build detonators for ANFO yourself using a homemade intermediary explosive. Directions are easily found on the Internet. However, building such detonators that are both stable (very unlikely to blow up when you don’t want them to) and reliable (very likely to blow up when you do want them to) is not simple at all. As we’ve seen, nothing is simple enough for the current crop of terrorists.
May 5, 2010, 6:59 amleo marvin says:
neuro,
If I understand the kangaroo court argument, it’s that Obama and Holder planned to subvert the criminal justice system by fixing KSM’s trial, and then they bragged about it publicly? What, they thought nobody would notice? Like so many conspiracy theories, this one requires us to imagine brilliantly evil conspirators who are implausibly also dumb as a bag of rocks. Why would anyone construct this scheme and then announce it to the world? If that’s the argument, I don’t think it needs much rebutting. The common sense understanding of “guarantee” is indeed very much like Namath’s guarantee, i.e., a confident prediction of victory. No more, no less. But maybe there’s more to the argument than I’m aware of. If so, please enlighten me.
May 5, 2010, 6:02 pmMichael B says:
geosktr: “The disgusting speculation from Bloomberg, the fake Republican, about this being a disgruntled health care takeover opponent is a great example about how badly the left wants to provoke the tea partiers to do something — anything — that they can use to tar them with, given that even lying US congressmen didn’t work out well.’
Excepting,, for one, there was an openly and well promoted launch of an effort from the left to discredit the Tea Partiers.
There has been no such avowal, openly or otherwise, from the center-right or right to discredit the left.
Excepting, for two, when Katie Couric and Mayor Michael Bloomberg – representative of the DL/LEM *** and the establishmentarians in government – were virtually hoping it could be attributed to at least someone, anyone, on the center-right or right, there were no corresponding figures among the DL/LEM or establishmentarian government types on the right who were hoping it could be attributed to someone of the left.
Excepting, for three, in addition to Couric and Bloomberg, there was an entire array of others among the DL/LEM and establishmentarian types in govt., including the administration, who were inline with the sentiments expressed by Couric and Bloomberg.
A couple other, similar supportive points come to mind, but it’s not as if any coherence is being sought by such as yourself, excepting for purposes of indulging a contemptuous and dismissive equivocation.
*** DL/LEM dominant left/liberal establishment media
May 5, 2010, 7:15 pmmarkm says:
It depends on what their real goal is. Perhaps it’s to transfer the burden of supporting their village idiots to us.
But I’m insulting village idiots. In my home town, the guy who best qualified for that title had a hobby – making small fireworks, from black powder he made himself. They worked, and he never hurt himself.
May 5, 2010, 10:17 pm