Crying wolf to cover their butts.
What cities?
Ashcroft needs to chill.
/john
Ashcroft and Ridge have a huge responsibility on their shoulders. We shouldn't be surprised if some mistakes are made.
Who would want to be in their position to make that judgment call whether to issue urgent alerts or not? If we were in on some of the intelligence reports they get, probably all of us would have the whole nation under urgent alert everyday.
In fact, IMO, GW's entire Homeland Security program is a farce. For example, since 9-11, how many pilots are armed? How many additional border guards have been placed? ow else has our border security been enhanced? Of course Afghanistan and Iraq have been briliant campaigns (until the time that the idiot PC police took over), but when are we going to do something about OUR BORDER SECURITY? Without this, everything else GW does is nothing but perfume on a pig.
Damed if they do, damed if they don't. IIRC wasn't it the 9/11 Commission complaining about the FBI not notifying the proper officials of a threat? I wouldn't want to be in their shoes in this POLITICAL SEASON. As if "The New York Times" should be complaining about anyone making a mistake or getting information wrong.
I am afraid, if I was in the FBI, that I would be tempted to contact TERRORISTS and point them in the direction of the UN and THE NEW YORK TIMES.
Your gov't cannot protect you, nor do they have a legal duty to do so (you can't sue them if they fail to protect you). Anyway, if they wanted to do so, the first thing they would do is to seal off the borders to prevent illegals from coming here. Securing one large outer perimeter is much easier than attempting to secure tens of thousands of smaller, interior ones.
Since they have failed to do so (and apparently have no desire to do so) people are ultimately responsible for their own safety. As such, I avoid large crowds (which is easy since I don't like people anyway). In the event of a chemical attack, I plan to get outside and simply head upwind. In the event of something more "personal", my Mossberg and my SIG are up to the task of dealing with it.
Not smart
Well I'll tell you what, Mr. anonymous city official, why don't you go it alone then without the help of the feds.
Geez, should the FBI have ignored info that an attack was imminent within 24 hours while they took the time to check the sources? When time is that limited, they HAVE to take it seriously before they investigate the legitimacy of the claim.