Death by a Thousand Cuts

[UncleBob]

http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2010/11/23/death_by_a_thousand_cuts

"Two Nokia phones, $150 each, two HP printers, $300 each, plus shipping, transportation and other miscellaneous expenses add up to a total bill of $4,200. That is all what Operation Hemorrhage cost us… On the other hand this supposedly 'foiled plot', as some of our enemies would like to call [it], will without a doubt cost America and other Western countries billions of dollars in new security measures."

In his October 2004 address to the American people, bin Laden noted that the 9/11 attacks cost al Qaeda only a fraction of the damage inflicted upon the United States. "Al Qaeda spent $500,000 on the event," he said, "while America in the incident and its aftermath lost -- according to the lowest estimates -- more than $500 billion, meaning that every dollar of al Qaeda defeated a million dollars."

But, remember... "The system worked..."

 

[Feeding the Abscess]

Or the plot over the weekend, that was planned and facilitated by the FBI.

New boss, same as the old boss.

 

[Survivalism]

America's like the slow kid you give a dictionary and tell him "gullible" isn't a word. Only instead of "gullible" it was "9/11." So now we're like "ok, we fell for it once. The next time someone gives us a dictionary and tells us 'gullible' isn't a word, we're going to be ready!" And while we're waiting for that to happen they're over there taking our milk money out of our backpack.

 

[Afflicted]

[quote name='Survivalism']America's like the slow kid you give a dictionary and tell him "gullible" isn't a word. Only instead of "gullible" it was "9/11." So now we're like "ok, we fell for it once. The next time someone gives us a dictionary and tells us 'gullible' isn't a word, we're going to be ready!" And while we're waiting for that to happen they're over there taking our milk money out of our backpack.[/QUOTE]


except for the fact that we no longer have milk money to take...

 

[Clak]

I think I said this in another thread. no one really has to attack us again, making threats or pulling cheap attacks like this is all that is needed, there may never be another 9/11 like event, and there doesn't need to be. Why go through all that trouble when some cheap attempt like this makes us run for the hills?

 

[nasum]

So Osama Bin Laden is a fiscal conservative that doesn't believe in Keynseian theory? If his money "defeated" ours, then wouldn't the $500 billion have not contributed to manufacturing for new scanners, more TSA employees, money used for reasearch of new technology and techniques, etc...?

 

[Clak]

I think his angle is that they spend so little and force us to spend so much. Sure that creates some innovation and some jobs, but over time it's just going to amount to a lot of money spent to prevent cheaper attacks.

 

[nasum]

but if spending money is what makes the US economy successful, doesn't that make terrorism a failure?

it's a hilarious rendition of chicken or egg...

 

[Clak]

I think it's that spending for other things would be better than having to spend it on things to thwart terrorists.