Oslo - The English Connection

[Atheist-Lite]

Can we clarify this? His father lives here? There's maybe a couple of cells following his twisted idealogy here?

[MrJonno]

Can we clarify this? His father lives here? There's maybe a couple of cells following his twisted idealogy here?

There are plenty of people with that ideology just not that many so far with the means to actually implement it and hopefully it will stay that way

[Atheist-Lite]

Can we clarify this? His father lives here? There's maybe a couple of cells following his twisted idealogy here?

There are plenty of people with that ideology just not that many so far with the means to actually implement it and hopefully it will stay that way

I worry about these bio-hackers in the US. A lot of unemployed biologists with all these cuts in R&D. Some must think about population the way crumple sometimes does, being biologists, and have the centrifuges and stuff, the expertise & means to act.

[Seth]

According to NBC news, his father lives in England, and has not spoken to his son since he was 16, and has disowned him and said he wishes his son had committed suicide.

[Atheist-Lite]

According to NBC news, his father lives in England, and has not spoken to his son since he was 16, and has disowned him and said he wishes his son had committed suicide.

That must be where he got his callous side from then?

[Seth]

Can we clarify this? His father lives here? There's maybe a couple of cells following his twisted idealogy here?

There are plenty of people with that ideology just not that many so far with the means to actually implement it and hopefully it will stay that way

I worry about these bio-hackers in the US. A lot of unemployed biologists with all these cuts in R&D. Some must think about population the way crumple sometimes does, being biologists, and have the centrifuges and stuff, the expertise & means to act.

You are right to worry. A year or so ago I attended a conference about terrorism and WMD's hosted by Northern Command (formerly NORAD) at which a round dozen military, government and civilian experts on terrorism gave presentations about the various threat vectors out there and how well prepared the US is to handle each.

The short answer is: "We're not prepared."

The biggest threat, according to the experts, is bioterrorism. In part because although somewhat complex and dangerous to produce, very small amounts of biological weapons like weaponized anthrax can have a disproportionately large effect, and such weapons can be transported and concealed very, very easily in small, innocuous containers and distributed by simply opening the container next to an air intake in a large skyscraper. Weaponized anthrax is milled into particles so small that when the container is opened, it looks like smoke escaping from the bottle, and the slightest air movement will disperse it widely.

One of the experts, who lectures on this threat frequently, had a plastic test-tube about an inch in diameter and five inches long filled approximately 1/3 full of a white powder. This, he said, was a sample of a weaponized bacillus in the same family as anthrax, but which is harmless to humans. He said that the amount in the tube was sufficient to completely contaminate the entire hotel (7 stories) and, were it anthrax, infect more than 90 percent of the people inside within about 20 minutes.

To illustrate how unprepared we are against such threats, he told us that some years earlier he visited the White House to brief President Bush. He was carrying a briefcase, and in it was that very test-tube. He said that he went through multiple searches for weapons, and Secret Service agents carefully searched and x-rayed his briefcase. One agent even picked up the test tube and looked at it, did not question it, and put it back in the briefcase. The test-tube with the bacillus ended up in the physical presence of the President. When the expert mentioned the test-tube and showed it to the people at the briefing during his presentation, there was an audible gasp and flurry from the security personnel in the room.

That's why such a big deal was made about the party crashers at Obama's inaugural party, you know, the man and woman who managed to slip past security and be within feet of the President? All the woman had to do to potentially kill everyone in the room would be to stuff a test-tube full of weaponized anthrax up her snatch, gain access, go to the ladies room, remove the tube, conceal it in her hand and open it somewhere near the President. The material, which is so finely divided that it's invisible as soon as it leaves the tube, would contaminate everyone in the room within less than a minute, and would contaminate the entire White House inside a half-hour, and nobody would know it happened till people started dying.

Bioterror is a very real threat, and our intelligence agents spend a LOT of time searching things like Craig's list for listings of equipment, like centrifuges and pharmaceutical milling equipment, that can be used to produce weaponized biologicals.