Is a UBL a threat? (new thread)

[BurtWorm]

Original thread:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=364&topic_id=185319&mesg_id=185319


My feeling is there is no way to answer the question except by speculation. However, I think it's reasonable to be skeptical of the bin Laden "threat," given the unreliable filters we get all our BL info sorted through.

Is bin Laden a threat to me personally? As far as I can tell, absolutely not. This would be a most unfortunate position to take however if he actually is a threat. But I can't blame myself for seeing it as I do. I have to blame the lying, deceitful, full of it Bushist administration. Right-wingers (or right-wing Democrats) who are utterly astonished by this reasoning of mine ought to consult "The Boy Who Cried Wolf" if they want to look into my authorities.

[Coexist]

1. UBL is one person - extremist ideology is a threat

in all forms.

[BurtWorm]

2. I can't even trust how much a threat al Qaeda is anymore.

The people in charge of our "Homeland Security" are utter incompetents, as has been shown again and again, yet there's been no attack (as wingers are proud to proclaim) on the US since 9/11. What kind of threat can't get through this pathetic line of defense?

[stillcool]

3. As ye sow...shall ye reap... n/t

[htuttle]

4. I'd have to ask, "A threat compared to what?"

Crossing the busy street in front of my house is a threat (to me). Heart Disease is a threat. 40,000 Americans die of regular old influenza each year -- that is definitely a threat. I smoke, so I consider cancer a threat. I work in a very (statistically) high-risk industry, so my day job can be considered a threat.

But a nut living in the mountains on the other side of the world? Do I think he's a threat to me, living in the Midwest? Not very much. On a scale of 1-10, I'd rate him as a 'threat' somewhere between getting struck by lightning and having a wild rabid dog attack me on the way home from work. Not very high, in any case.

[Village Idiot]

5. He's as big a threat as Emmanuel Goldstein ever was.

[undeterred]

6. I don't think there is an Al Quaeda organization

which is anything like the one we have been told to fear.

Remember Condi saying "we've killed 75% of them" but then she couldn't come up with an answer to "how many are there?" What is 75% of "I don't know"? If they can't tell us whether the number is hundreds or thousands then what the hell do they even know?

[BurtWorm]

7. Didn't Bush also once brag about having killed something like 3,000?

During a state of the Union address a year or two ago? It seems that could have been pretty easily substantiated. I don't think he was talking about Iraqis. :eyes:

[BurtWorm]

10. Sorry, he said 3,000 *suspected* terrorists had been *arrested*

"All told, more than 3,000 suspected terrorists have been arrested in many countries. Many others have met a different fate. Let's put it this way, they are no longer a problem to the United States and our friends and allies."

State of the Union 2003

http://select.nytimes.com/search/restricted/article?res=F20B15F83A5D0C7A8EDDA80894DB404482



What a psychopathic dip shit!

[bigtree]

8. he threatened. we were told that he acted, influenced, whatever

who knows anymore what to believe?



he's shit that could happen

alive, he threatens.

who, what, how?

who knows?

Is that a threat?

Sure, to someone it could be.

[NoPasaran]

9. I think that bin Laden/al Qaeda is still a threat

And they are still a threat because Bush bungled the chance the capture or kill bin Laden and his lieutenante at Tora Bora and since then, nothing, not the invasion of Iraq, not all the domestic spying, not even making airplane passengers take their shoes off has been done to destroy them. Bin Laden and his followers are still a threat because of the abject and total failure of George W Bush and Co to take them seriously.