From the NYT:
Warning that Britain faced a “deadly†and “enduring†threat from terrorism, British authorities announced today that 11 of 23 people held in connection with a suspected plot to blow up trans-Atlantic airliners would be formally charged with offenses including possession of bomb-making equipment and conspiracy to commit murder.
At a news conference, Susan Hemming, a lawyer from the Crown Prosecution Service, said one person was being freed while other 11 suspects would remain in custody under counterterrorism laws permitting 28 days of detention without charge.
The decision to press formal charges against 11 people came after days of growing public skepticism about the extent of the plot, first announced on Aug. 10 when the police warned that the suspected conspirators had planned to commit mass murder on what one officer called an “unimaginable scale.â€Â
Pardon the interruption here—and I admit that I haven’t been following the British press much this last week—but has there really been growing skepticism within the UK?
Can anybody source that implied claim—or is the NYT here talking about “growing public skepticism” here in the US from the likes of the Kos kiddies, or “conservative” stalwart Andrew Sullivan, who the other day broke out his Illuminati decoder ring and uncovered suggestive evidence that this whole “alleged” plot was likely some bit of cynical political theater—a carefully orchestrated piece of cross-cultural and multi-national agitprop that would accomplish, among other nefarious things, its goal of diverting people’s attention from the impressive political power of the people-powered peoples movement (a movememt powered by the people, with the aim of convincing people to become people powered people people, for the good of both the people and the people-powerered people’s people), which managed to unseat a former Democratic VP candidate with a very liberal voting record and replace him with an anti-war puppet candidate who, though rich, white, and intellectually vapid, managed to say the right things when directed to do so by his people-powered overlords?
Because I remain unpersuaded that the Pakistanis and the British Labor Party—along with MI5 and British law enforcement—are so keenly interested in the results of the Democratic Connecticut primary.
But back to the story:
On that day, police rounded up most of the suspects in early-morning raids, saying they had thwarted a plot to use liquid explosives to bomb airliners flying to the United States from London.
Ms Hemming said eight of the 11 suspects charged today had been accused of conspiracy to commit murder and an offense under new counterterrorism laws of “preparing acts of terrorism.â€Â
The three others had been charged under counterterrorism legislation dating to 2000, she said.
At the same news conference, Peter Clarke, the head of London’s antiterrorism police, said the scale of the investigation into the suspected plot was “immense.â€Â
“Inquiries will span the globe. The enormity of the alleged plot will be matched only by our determination to follow every lead and line of inquiry,†he said.
Mr. Clarke said the police had found bomb-making chemicals, including hydrogen peroxide, and electrical components. “We have also found a number of video recordings  these are sometimes referred to as martyrdom videos,†he said. “This has all given us a clearer picture of the alleged plot.â€Â
Well, in fairness to the conspiracy theorists, these “alleged” tapes—along with all the “alleged” bomb-making chemicals and components—could have been planted by a Rovian operative so that it could be conveniently “found” by “alleged” UK law enforcement and counterterrorism “professionals.”
That would explain the delay in bringing charges, after all—as well as account for why the world is not celebrating Ned Lamont’s primary victory quite so much as Jane Hamsher (who, rumor has it is threatening to bring a people-powered peoples’ people-powered boycott™ against the makers of Wheaties should the ungrateful capitalist running dogs continue to refuse her demands to put on their box a picture of Ned Lamont in a gladiator outfit standing menacingly over a vanquished poppy seed bagel).
Just something to consider…
Before Aug. 10, he said, the police had secured “highly significant video and audio recordings,†he said. Since then, police had searched “69 houses, flats and business premises, vehicles and open spaces†and recovered 400 computers, 200 cellphones and 8,000 data storage devices including memory sticks and DVD’s.
“We must be realistic,†Mr. Clarke said, “The threat from terrorism is real, it is here, it is deadly, it is enduring.â€Â
He added, “We cannot afford to be complacent and ignore the reality of what we face.â€Â
The list of suspects to be charged seemed to be predominantly British Muslims of Pakistani descent, but person was identified as Umar Islam, also known as Brian Young, a convert to Islam.
Uh huh.
Just what the Bushies and their British and Pakistani lapdogs want you to think.
As Andy Sullivan’s dementia might say (were it not currently preoccupied with sussing out subliminal pro-torture messages in season two of “Touched by an Angel”), “How terribly ‘convenient’.”
Indeed
Andrew Sullivan
is wrong yet again. But him,
apologize? Never!
Nope, he’ll just go on vacation.
A moonbat friend of mine sent me this over the weekend, with his comment that he agrees with them. He didn’t provide a link, so I’m sending the clipping:
So, to amplify a bit on the NYT, it is Muslim Leaders who are skeptical.
Ron: Brilliant. Who the hell is Ned Lamont? also works.
Brian, googling the headline, i came up with this, it’s from IPS (Inter Press Service)about themselves they say:
whatever the hell that’s supposed to mean. I also noticed the first few google hits were, antiwar.com and common dreams. yay!
Former secret agent Larry C Johnson wrote a couple of days ago (HuffPo) that the fake terrorist plot is actually to distract from the earthshaking Seymour Hersh story. I don’t even remember what Hersh’s latest article was about, but apparently it was sufficiently devastating to Bush that Blair and Musharraf would cook up this hoax to help out the chimperor. Or something.
I wish they would pick one conspiracy theory and stick with it.
Thanks Maggie. I was wondering what the heck IPS was, but didn’t take the time to google it. I assumed it was legit, but far from it. Looks like they’re a background source for the NYT though. Wonderful.
And they say Bush is unilateral when he actually is closely engaged to the international community! Look how he has all these foreign leaders doing his bidding!
Oh, honestly. Stick with one? Rove and his minions are everywhere; conspiring and acting poly-rhythmically in ways that can’t be distilled to just “one conspiracy theory”. Even if they are all just “one conspiracy theory”.
I mean, look at Ron’s non-seq…, er, comment: just another variation on the Rovian theme to confuse the masses. I mean, question the timing!
I can save Sully some work. The only torture in that series was that I was not being touched by an angel. In a personal sort of way, y’know?
TW: Not that it was likely to happen.
Sullivan has a nice echo chamber system in place. Don’t allow comments on your posts, yet you can support your own ideas and even cross lines you’re not willing to by posting your “email of the day”. I love this last one he posted on the 17th before the news release of evidence and charges: http://time.blogs.com/daily_dish/2006/08/email_of_the_da_4.html
Forget how predictable this system he utilizes is, what convinces me now that he is going off the deep end is that he forgot to use it in the first place. He’s been smart enough in the past to espouse his nutty theories and analogies via those emails and subsequently supporting them with a two sentence reply. Often he will distance himself or not fully support such crazy statements with some vague comment of, “this sounds far fetch, BUT under the Rove administration of torture, blah blah blah you just can’t be sure anymore. Anyway, he instead can’t help himself any more and just posts the outrageous stuff under his own name.
Furthermore, what’s this “a reader writes” garbage? Attribute it to the person writing if you want any credibility to these postings.
A reader writes Dario:
Whoa anonymous emailer! There really is no evidence that Andrew Sullivan would have done anything like this. However, that’s quite an interesting theory. I would like to give Andrew the benefit of the doubt here but you do bring up an interesting angel I’ve not considered before Mr. anonymous emailer.
Is that the angel that was supposed to be touching someone while Sully was touching some young lad?
Cripes, Dario. Way to go and slam the door shut on the thread, eh? Nicely done.
I wonder what Time’s standard is on that m’self. You would think that hey wouldn’t want to get caught up in a quasi-sock puppet situation. Perhaps at least a little peek at the alleged e-mails? But, that is a minor point – since I am sure Mr. Sullivan can just have the intern comb through the e-mails and cherry-pick out what he needs anyway.
Intern, Pool-boy, what ever.
An e-mailer writes:
Two postscripts:
1. Look for the “they were just going blonde for Allah” theory.
2. Hypothetically, if someone had a pristine, still-in-the-box Pets.com hand-puppet, would someone getting into the video biz be able to use it?
An e-mailer writes:
Well, I wouldn’t go so fr as to say you can’t make heads or tails of it, but it is an interesting point.
It would seem out of the ordinary to expect that skepticism only occurs here. People aren’t any more or less likely to trust poodles over chimps.
Zing! Actus is back! The. Bitch. Is. Back.
And answering a question not posed, as usual.
He may as well. None of us care what he thinks.
JPod!!!
You mean there are dull angels?
Hey. If I’m going to get chewed out for spelling ‘dialog’ in the non-sissy way, you’re gonna catch flack for this.
I was sure that the fake terrorist plot was cooked up to create a shortage of those great English pomades and mustache waxes, driving up the price, and making zillionaires of all the execs over at Big Gel.
Me neither. See how well it worked?
In other news, Ghiyasuddin Siddiqui said
“Nice little country you’ve got there, shame if anything were to happen to it. Now about that foreign policy of yours. Here’s the changes we’d like…”
TW A likely story
At least we know the British are now serious about fighting Islamic terrorism at home. Would they be re-installing all their prison toilets to face away from Mecca, otherwise?
Yes, I stepped on my skirt on that one. Yet, I’m the guy that drafted Tiki Barbar in my fantasy draft. That guy practically skips to the lockeroom. If that’s not self emasculation then I don’t know what is. I am shamed.
Yeah, wasn’t that interesting how he “aired” his two Michael-Moron conspiracy theories just before going on a vacation.
I suspect the leftards and their “conservative” allies like Sully will just change tack. The new line will be that there might have been a plot but that these were harmless incompetents who never could have succeeded.
I’ve already seen folks pointing to the Buffalo? and Canadian? (trying to recall some of the best jihadis we’ve busted) plotters and saying that not only were those jihadis harmless incompetents but so are the new Brit jihadi kids.
Of course, as some have noted—if before 9/11 Atta and his henchman had been arrested such folks would have similarly scoffed. Boxcutters? Suicide pilots? To bring down the WTC? That would never have worked. Oh, and their rights are being abused. It’s an anti-Muslim crusade, Chimpy’s trying to take over the world, etc.
“past” jihadis, not “best” you idiot Jim.
jdm and phil, I should know by now not to question our dark master’s mysterious ways. There are truly some things that we shouldn’t even wonder aboutâ€â€best to just accept what is.
tw:I have learned my lesson.
Martyrdom, cockblocked
Like a dark ominous storm
The lawyers gather
TW: finally
The UK may finally be pulling their heads out of their asses.
Cythen,
OK – that is definitely the first time I have seen “martyrdom” and “cockblocked” in the same phrase…some sort of congratulations are in order.
Umm, I believe you meant <i>arses<u>
Well, I certainly fucked that up.
You know, I did debate using “arses”, but that might be stereotypical or language profiling. Or something.
TW: mind
Annan must be out his damn mind.
Nah,
It’s just a “when in Rome” type of thing.
TW:I thought about going to Rome once, then I realized the place was full of Italians. (just kidding…I never considered going to Rome.)