Letters to the Editor
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Terrorist Protocol
Wouldn't it be just slightly ironic if the next terrorist plot involved a husband and wife team in which the husband acts erratically and runs towards the cockpit, the air marshals take notice and immediately begin their protective countermeasure procedures, and the wife, in an act of desparation, screams loudly that her husband is bipolar and is acting the way he is because he hasn't taken his medication?
The air marshals, after hearing the pleas of mercy from the exasperated wife, along with all 98 passengers onboard, are torn to shreds by the 6.5 lbs. of Semtex the husband detonates in his suitcase bomb, the extra time bought by his wife enough to allow him to press the button.
Given the sequence of events, these air marshals were justified in their actions. Why didn't the wife make sure her husband was indeed medicated if she knew he was bipolar? Given the possibility that someone in his condition could act the way he did, isn't the responsibility on her to make sure he is in a mentally stable state of mind before flying on an airplane in today's political climate?
She should be ashamed for allowing the burden of a life and death split-second decision to fall on the shoulders of the air marshals charged to protect the safety of all onboard. She failed, and, unfortunately, paid dearly for her oversight.
My wife is diabetic and I have never let her go anywhere without the proper medication at our disposal.
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boxcutters, etc
I am a firm believer in protecting our civil liberties-- nevertheless I fail to see how being allowed to bring any and all sharp objects aboard a common carrier like an airplane is a civil liberty; a nail clipper is one thing, a boxcutter or a metal screwdriver quite another.
You say, "if the September 11th terrorists had been unable to bring boxcutters aboard, they would have fashioned weapons from something else."
Ok, like what?
Would Mohammed Atta have gotten into the cockpit with a necktie and a spork?
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Tray-tables
Tray-tables can be snapped into strong, sharp pieces.
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Why do the evacuating passengers have their hands on their heads?
...because they were ordered to do so at gunpoint. As with most things complex, the picture becomes less clear with mounting information.
Some on board claim that Alzipar never said anything about a bomb. But - An unholstered sidearm, with desperate hollering, and cold-blooded killing, tend to affect witnesses' memories. The Air Marshal gets the benefit of the doubt. We don't want Air Marshals to hesitate. But maybe they need better training.
The plane was en route from Colombia and probably had a lot of brown people on board. After the perceived (if not stated) bomb threat and Alzipar's tragic death, the Air Marshal probably thought about Jose Padilla and realized he couldn't trust anyone on that plane.
Then he buried his warm pistol in the faces of scared passengers, ordering them off the plane, hands on their heads. Those are the accounts that will be surfacing very soon.
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For those blaming the wife
The article notes that 'He and his wife had arrived earlier in the day on a flight from Quito, Ecuador, after a working holiday as church missionaries'. Now I don't know how long of a period they were there, but it is quite likely that he might have ran out of his prescription while there.
Additionally, it's quite possible that he might have become homesick after spending a long time there, and in combination with being off the meds (which leads him to hopping around in a plane) + accent (which can make I want to go home, sound like I have a bomb), you can see where this is going.
Frankly, I don't blame the Air Marshalls for what they did. They have a set protocol, and if they had acted slower and some other passenger had gotten hurt, they would have gotten a lot of flak, fired, sued etc. However, I really wish they would invest all the time and effort into screening checked luggage, instead of sniping about scissors and box cutters.
Who honestly thinks that any terrorist or madman who jumps up in a plane with a sharp object is not going to get bumrushed by 50 passengers?
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The real enemy to fear is this fradulent war on terror
The sad thing is that none if this is necessary. Rigoberto Alpizar's death was unnecessary. Trigger happy air marshals are unnecessary. All the loss of privacy and freedoms since 9/11 are totally unnecessary.
The "War on Terror" is perhaps the biggest fraud ever sold to a gullible and fearful population in world history. Americans need to wake up out of their stupor of fear and understand the truth about this so-called "War on Terror": It was a massive fraud sold to the American people by a group of neo-cons bent on turning America fascist and taking over the middle eastern oil fields, while profiting massively at every level and at every step of the way.
While not politically correct to discuss the truth about 9/11 - the fact that it was the Bush Administration along with the collaboration of certain entities in New York City that made 9/11 possible and successful, rather than sharp objects or a cave-dwelling rich islamic fanatic on a dialisis machine in Afghanistan - it is nevertheless crucial that we come to terms with it if we hope to ever get ourselves out of this unfolding nightmare of an America turned fascist and an empire out of control.
The blue print for the War on Terror and the ensuing invasions of middle eastern oil-producing countries was spelled out in the Neo-Con's document, "Rebuilding America's Defenses", published a year before 9/11 before they even took office. This was their primary document put out by their organization they formed in 1997 called, "Project for a New American Century". In this document, they essentially stated that Americans would not go along with this agenda unless there was a, "catastrophic and catalyzing event — like a new Pearl Harbor" (page 51).
If you can't get your mind around the possibility that our own goverment would pull off something like 9/11, consider all the ways they benifited by 9/11, and everything else they got away with:
1) Blatent lies and deceit over the pretext for the Iraq war, and the running of the war.
2) The systematic use of kidnapping, torture, and forced confessions by the CIA and US military.
3) Shredding of the Bill of Rights and Due Process with the Patriot Act and the conduct of the War on Terror
4) Massive profiteering and corruption in the Iraq War, with Chaney's Haliburton and other well connected contracting companies operating in Iraq and the bloated Military Budget that increased 50% since 9/11
5) Massive documented election fraud, in 2000 and especially in 2004 with the use of electronic voting machines that manipulated milions of votes in Bush's favor.
6)Character assasination and harassment of anyone who leaves the Bush Administraion because of disagreements with their policies, like Jo Wilson, Paul Oneil, etc.
If these policies are not the hallmark of fascism, that what are they?
Cave-dwelling fanatics with sharp objects were not responsible for the stand down of the North American Air Defense on the morning of 9/11, nor for the controlled demolition of 6 World Trade Center Buildings, including 4 that weren't even hit by planes. Before 9/11, the Air Force typically intercepted about 100 aircraft every year and typically within 10 to 15 minutes of an aircraft going off course or losing communication. It is well documented that standard proceedures were suspended on that morning of 9/11 by Donald Rumsfeld and that not a single one of the 4 hijacked planes were intercepted, even though the Air Force had anywhere from 20 minutes to to an hour and a half to intercept the various planes.
Educate yourselves. Read David Griffin's book, "The New Pearl Harbor", and Michael Rupert's, "Crossing the Rubicon". Until Americans are ready to face some painful truths, we will continue to slide into the gathering inferno of fascism, global war, and environmental meltdown. We all have a choice to make at this critical point in world history. What is your choice going to be? Are you going to be a Good German and not stray beyond what is politically correct to talk about, or are you going to begin taking steps to save our country and the world from these depraved fascist fanatics?