[francisandbeans]

Flamesuit ON!

[Colt .45]

Let me just say this ...

When your time is up, your time is up! There hasn't been anyone in the history of mankind who has beaten death yet. Buying gasmasks at the local Army Navy Supply store won't save your bacon.

#1 - The masks are not fitted to your face.
#2 - The cannisters are (a) out of date, or (b) ineffective against that particular agent.
But it is a good panacea if it makes you feel better.

Be vigilant, be alert, but let's not go berserk over it. This is sounding more and more like the movie '1941' with the late John Belushi in it. What's more ... it would be comical if it weren't sadly true. Too many people are jittery and jumping out of their skins at things that go bump in the night. Live your lives as you normally would. If something looks suspicious, then it might be ... but let the "experts" deal with it.

If you keep crying wolf, then after a while people are not going to believe it. And if you really want to look at the irony of this whole thing it is this ... YEEEEAH ... the publisher of the National Enquirer and other scandal sheets is a real credible source to go after!

[dead]

Man I am so disappointed in you. I was really looking forward to a great "whackjob nutbag" theory, and all I got was this rather reasonable speculation.

I'm heading over to one of those "David Rockefeller Rules the World for the Illuminati" threads. I'm sure they won't let me down.

[Robert357]

I hate to burst your bubble beans, but you need to go up to the 30,000 foot level and get the big picture.

Do you really think postal workers will happily sort mail containing potential anthrax or even fake powder and then deliver it every day for the next 3 months without freaking out?

If we assume that CDC/FBI whoever decides white powder is a potential threat, they will figure out equipment, dogs, what have you to "sniff" every package, envelope, etc. at every postal collection station. If postal employees believe that there is a potential for antrax to be in the mail, they will demand to work in full body contamination suits to pick up the mail and sort it. I would expect nothing less of anyone.

OK, so we can say that if white powder envelopes are a threat, the internet email traffic will soon replace regular mail, which will grind to a halt. Therefore there will not be a need for massive use of antiboitics etc. The mail will not be delivered as you envision.

Sorry, but your theory doesn't pencil out by my way of thinking.

[GLDNGUN]

Pretty logical, except I don't understand why they would not put the Anthrax in every package. I mean, they want to kill as many Americans as they can and frighten the rest of. If they can put Anthrax in some, why not all? That would create even more fear and terror.

[Bubba_Leroy]

If you are right (and I think you are) I actually take it as a good sign. If they had a truck load of anthrax spores then they would have dropped it over a major city with a crop duster. At the very least, they would not bother with fake powder envelopes - they would be mailing anthrax spores to all the media and governmental offices, national and local. The fact that they need to send out fake anthrax indicates to me that they have a very limited supply of the real stuff. At least, that's what I'm hoping.

[FReepaholic]

I have read that Bin Laden is very good at generating a lot of "red herrings" in order to confuse authorities.

Mass mailings of real and fake anthrax sounds like his M.O.

[oc-flyfish]

You know that makes a lot of sense. Frigging terrorists!

[pgkdan]

I don't know if you're right or not, but I really think you're on to something here. This is the most reasonable theory I've heard yet.

[Jack Barbara]

A good way to distribute anthrax to effectively kill people would be to mix it with powdered cocaine. The purchaser intends to breath it in. This method, however, would likely not achieve the levels of hysteria we are seeing.

[Stefan Stackhouse]

A credible hypothesis. However, it might also be possible that they simply don't have a large quantity of Anthrax available. What if they have only gotten their hands on a very small quantity of Anthrax? How would they then put this to the most effective use? How about targeting one major media office, follow up with a bunch of random false alarm mailings, then a target a second media site, then a bunch more random false alarm mailings, etc.? This strategy would assure maximum media attention, and maximum panic effect, using only a very small quantity of anthrax, even if only one or two people actually are killed. Maximum bang for the buck.

[DCPatriot]

The government needs to immediately, discreetly do some MAJOR PROFIING! They need to have these groups in "protective" custody by Executive Order.

If this still results in a major germ attack on our country, they need to drop Nuclear bombs from Damascus to Jakarta before the sun rises the next day.

Welcome to the United States of America in the New Millenium. NOT!

More and more of my liberal acquaintances are approaching me as they've never heard me tell them, "We have to kill them, don't we?"

"Yep", I proudly tell them. "And, tomorrow's not too soon"!

We even have a built-in liberal excuse should we end up being a footnote in World History.

The Western World has felt the real need to go to war against them, to save themselves....for THOUSANDS OF YEARS!

Well, this ain't your mama's military. We should end this bullshit once and for all.

Then, we can all meet at Times Square, this New Year's Eve.

[Don Joe]

It's the same doctrine that says to send large numbers of "decoy" ICBMs with a few real ones mixed in.

However, it's a bit more cunning, in that -- thanks to the time element (not shared by ICBMs) -- it will create a "boy who cried wolf" mindset. When we finally let our guard down (inevitable sooner or later, because that's the way peoples brains are wired), they hit us, and hit us hard.

All the more reason for us to hit them, and hit them hard. Now.

[mercy]

I'm a one note samba I know but it's the only thing I can do at this time and I think this is the most needful thing waiting to be done in our nation.

DEPORT NOW!!!

IT IS OUR LIVES AT STAKE!!!

[browardchad]

FWIW the local Miami radio station reported that the envelope with white powder (which tested negative),received early on by a Hispanic family in Miami was supposedly from a group identifying itself as a Christian religious organization, asking for donations.

The radio reports quite a few stupid non-facts every day, but this one seems ironic enough to be at least interesting.

[FITZ]

All they need to do is put cameras at every mail drop and stamp all mail picked up at each mail drop with some kind of identifier and they can catch both real terrorists and pranksters. Put them all in the same prison.

[RooRoobird14]

Actually, I wouldn't flame you for that theory at all!!

It would be just like those evil worms to set up a "Boy who cried wolf" scenario. I just hope the FBI/CIA/CDC are smart enough to be on top of the schemes of the evil ones.

[discostu]

Some I agree with, some I think you're whacky. This puts you a step above many theorists on FR, I actually think somethings you say make sense. Let me go through it:

The media is a target for a very specific reason. This prevents the government from covering up the details. This is why they went after the sensationalist media and why they went after a major broadcast network. The delivery system is designed not to maximize death, but to make us "anthrax aware"

This is solid. Media is a good target for a subtle attack because media love being part of the story, it's a sickness they have that will cause this story to develop a lot more "legs" than it deserves thus spreading more panic than the threat warrants.

Reportedly, the anthrax was mailed in a white powder. Along with the actual cases, we are finding cases of white powder mailings with no anthrax. Many have speculated that the white powder is done by sick pranksters. I think this is an impossibility. Let me explain...
We learned about the white powder on Monday evening (via Newsweek). Tuesday, we saw several packages and envelopes with white powder show up. It is nearly impossible for a prankster to gather themselves quickly enough to do it.

This I heavily disagree with. What's so "quickly" about it. The hardest part in this is getting the anthrax, if you've scored that already I could prepare this, by myself with no help, in 2 days tops. Between the websites and the mastheads of the media organizations the addresses and worker names are easy to get, other than that it's just envelop stuffing. My wife and I prepped 150 wedding invitations in one night, and she had to write all the addresses (my handwriting is notorious for getting mail sent to "dead letter"). After that it's just a matter of dropping them in a corner box. Anybody that could get the anthrax for this "prank" on friday could have everything else done and in the mail monday morning with no extra tool more exciting than a computer.

There is a plan in action:
Part A:) mail out packages with anthrax contained in a white powder.
Part B:) mail out packages without anthrax, but with the white powder.

There's a lot of possibilities here on how to stage it if you actually want to stage it in phases. I would just put the "real" envelopes in a corner box, and put the "fake" envelopes in an appartment drop slot (you know those ones with 1 outgoing and a bunch of incomings where the resident needs a key, in Tucson you find these actually on the road in front of small apartment complexes). Corner boxes get much faster delivery (1 or 2 days less) than residential boxes especially if you get your stuff in before the 8 AMish pickup, some people actually got our wedding invitations the same day we mailed them. This would allow your deliveries to phase in without the risk of running drops on multiple days. Or you could hold onto the safe envelopes, it's pretty easy to mail a lot of stuff anonymously in this country, just gotta get downtown where the corner boxes are.

What does this do?
CDC has to investigate each of these powder instances. This will strecth thier resources. If enough actual anthrax envelopes are sent out, the US mail will be severly slowed or stop al together. This will have a massive effect on our psyche, our economy and our Law Enforcement community.

The CDC stretching is what most people would think, and they'd be wrong. CDC actually works very oddly, there are doctors all over the country that are actually part of CDC but only do CDC related stuff if something bad happens in their area (that's why they're so fast to respond to stuff), and they work through FEMA and other emergency organization. Minor outbreaks (or threatened outbreaks) all over the country won't stretch their resources at all. As for slowing down the mail, could happen, probably wouldn't affect commercial mail (if the bad guy has infiltrated Amazon.com we're in bigger trouble than we thought), in the end wouldn't do that much to us. 10 years ago before all this internet junk it would have really hurt, since then most mail in this country get's thrown out before entering the house.

What they will do is play the Anthrax Russian Roulette with these packages until the fed decides to start issuing massive amounts of antibiotics to the populace...therfore reducing our supply.

Could be there plan but won't work. The drug industry in this country makes so damn many pills it's obscene. Scattered cases, even giving supplies to 700 people per building won't seriously dent the supplies. Not with the speed they can be made in. It would probably take an hour to replace all the antibiotics handed out to AMI employees earlier in the week.

Now, with antibiotics increasingly rare and the CDC and other departments stretched to thier limit...the terrorists are free to strike a full scale bio-attack and us unable to treat those infected.

This is the real threat, with or without the "hoped for" effects. A major hit would beat us up bad with or without CDC or antibiotics. If you an manage to "dose" a couple million people at once we're in trouble. Of course we'll nuke your ass pretty quick afters, but we'll still hurt bad.

Overall I think this is either the work of loan buttheads (never rule out the possibility of more than one guy getting the same idea, happens in the gaming industry all the time), or a rather small time terrorist org trying to look big time. More than likely I don't see that much of a threat of major biological attack. Bio-agents are a big pain in the butt to store safely and deliver effectively, they go bad and have to be replaced, grow out of control and kill your workers, just annoying. My bigger concern in chemical. Chemical is easy, especially with obl's resources. All you need is an insecticide plant and a couple of vats mixed stronger than usual (which isn't hard, look at the active ingredients percentage on your can of Raid, those things are mixed REALLY weak). Dump this crap in the water supply, or the ever popular crop duster angle and we've got issues, and chemicals are a lot easier to work with than bio-agents. If you're people are patient you don't even need the whole plant, just buy a few cases of Raid, dump the contents and mixout the inert ingredients. A couple of gallons of "pure" bug spray can wreak a lot of havoc.

[Scutter]

I was with you until the last two paragraphs. I think you're right about this being designed to distract and overload our defenses. I don't see the government handing out Cipro until we run out based on this. I think they are distracting us from some other sort of attack -- not Anthrax.

[ivanhoe116]

Doh! Don't give these guys any ideas!

[Madame Dufarge]

I've been thinking along these same lines, francisandbeans, but didn't have enough guts to post a thread about it.

Your theory sure works for me.