Remember Anthrax?

The Weekly Standard ^ | 04/29/2002 | David Tell

[Libertarianize the GOP]

fyi

[okie01]

Ping-a-ling.

Tell's treatise is ready for critique.

[michaelt]

Thanks for posting this.

Rosenberg has an obvious bias toward blaming a domestic source.

On the other hand, my bias is toward blaming Iraq. My wish is that sometime in the next few months, the truth about the anthrax comes out - and it points the finger squarely at Iraq, giving us absolutely every reason in the world to go after Saddam, and no one - not even the French - would have any ability to object.

[jennyp]

FBI handwriting experts have somehow determined that the xerox-copied taunts included with last fall's anthrax letters--"We have this anthrax. You die now. Are you afraid?"--were written by a native English-speaker, though they note without venturing an explanation that "he" used only block lettering, with slightly larger block letters at the beginning of every noun. Might it also be that "he" wasn't a native English-speaker at all, but rather someone who grew up speaking a language--like Arabic--whose alphabet has no upper or lower cases? Someone whose experience with Romance-language script was limited to his temporary residence in, say, the one Western country where nouns are always capitalized? That would be Germany, once home to Mohamed Atta and any number of other al Qaeda operatives. It is not clear whether the FBI has considered this clue.

Whoa! Is this true about German punctuation?

[jennyp]

By contrast, the Bureau and its allied "home-grown terror" theorists have clearly given a great deal of thought--too much thought--to the fact that their suspect left no potentially incriminating personal marks on last fall's letters: no fingerprints anywhere on the envelopes or xeroxes, and no saliva on the envelopes' adhesive flaps. To Barbara Hatch Rosenberg, this indicates that the mailer was a spook-like U.S. government insider, someone with "training or experience in covering evidence." Similarly, and for the same reason, the FBI believes Anthrax Man exhibited a notably "organized, rational thought process in furtherance of his criminal behavior." Actually, though, all he exhibited was a bare minimum of human brain function and an animal instinct for self-preservation. Ask yourself: Would you be willing to touch with your bare hands, much less lick with your tongue, an envelope containing two billion spores of the universe's most dangerous bacterium? The question answers itself.

LOL!

[Nogbad]

ping

[Thud]

ping

[Mitchell]

Thanks for the ping, okie01.

There's not really much new in this article, but it does show what the effect of the purported domestic focus is. Those people who realize that the anthrax is almost certainly associated with 9/11 are stuck at the stage of arguing for that (vs. a supposed domestic source). This is basically a diversion.

We should instead be discussing how exactly the anthrax letters fit into the other side's strategy and what the anthrax mailings reveal about who our opponents are and what they are doing.

[Alamo-Girl]

Thanks for the heads up!

[The Great Satan]

"It is protection for Saddam to have biological and chemical weapons, because, in the final analysis, if pressed, if he is surrounded in Baghdad, he will threaten to use them. He's capable of that. This is a sort of Samson complex--if you push me too hard, I'll bring the house down, on myself and on everyone else. Washington realizes that this is a possibility. For obvious reasons, it's not talked about openly. No one in Washington wants to tell the American people that Saddam is still capable of blackmailing us. They're acting as if he is capable of blackmailing them, but they are not going to admit it openly."

Said Aburish -- PBS Frontline

[EternalHope]

An obvious motive was left out of the article. The U.S. government has a strong reason to claim the anthrax came from a domestic source. To do otherwise would immediately put us at war with the foreign nation sponsoring the attack.

Until we are ready for that war, we will maintain the facade of a "domestic" source. Some people believe the number of articles pointing to Iraq as the source will be an "early warning" indicator of when we might attack.

[Alamo-Girl]

Thanks for the heads up!

[Nogbad]

We should instead be discussing
how exactly the anthrax letters fit
into the other side's strategy
and what the anthrax mailings reveal
about who our opponents are
and what they are doing.

I am beginning to think the anthrax issue is small potatoes.

I don't believe Iraq ever destroyed its smallpox samples
as it was asked to do by the WHO.

[Alamo-Girl]

I agree that our major concern needs to be the use of biochem as a WMD by a nation-state!

[keri]

Thanks for the ping.

Wasn't there some horrid rock song called "one extreme to another"? (This isn't quite that bad)

[Betty Jo]

Thanks!I still think it was Binny by way of his medical matrix.

[muawiyah]

The simple fact that the terrorist(s) purchased the postage affixed envelopes directly from the post office demonstrated the attacker(s) to be elderly or foreign born.

Why?

These days most Americans buy envelopes at the grocery store, drugstore, office goods store, etc. (if they "buy" them at all). In addition, Americans buy their stamps at the grocery store!

That way they had exactly the number of envelopes needed, and did not overspend on postage. Notice that among the last acts taken on the part of some of the skyjackers was to remit any excess AlQeada funds back to the group.

These old boys were tight with their money - they come from places where there is no such thing as trash, and a landfill has full time employees working without salaries, making sure nothing "good" goes in!

[aristeides]

Indexing.