🚀 go-pugleaf

Julian Macassey  <julian@tele.com> writes:

> Some kids with intent. Possible?

> http://www.theregister.co.uk/2006/08/17/flying_toilet_terror_labs/

> Looks like more "thought crime" to me like the alleged
> conspiracies to blow up Kennedu airport fuel lines, flood the
> Holland tunnel etc.

"'Thought crime!'  Yeah, that's the ticket!  Nobody actually *did*
anything, so what's the problem?  It's much ado about nothing!"

Isn't intent enough?  The legal establishment thinks so.  That's
why conspiracy to commit a crime is itself a crime.

Julian, you're impossible.  You're in complete denial.  I ought to
start calling you Tendentious Ted.  You refuse to believe that there's
any danger whatsoever to the traveling public from Islamic terrorists,
despite a string of such incidents that goes back to 1970.  

And so rather than considering the matter with anything approaching
an open mind, you start with the premise that any attempts to thwart
such crimes are creeping fascism, a violation of the Rights Of Man(tm),
and go into high dudgeon.  You claim that airport safety is somehow a 
violation of your right to travel, nevermind that all you have to do
in order to be allowed onto an airplane is empty your pockets and take
off your shoes.

(Where does this "Rights Of Man" concept you're so enamored of come
from, anyway?  In what supranational uber-constitution is it enshrined?
I never heard of it until you started nattering about it in connection 
with the WoT.)

I read the Register article you posted the link to.  The gist is that
these guys are incompetent when it comes to the chemistry of explo-
sives.  Okay, what if they are?  What if they'd tried and failed, the
mixture of the TATP precursors resulting in "only" a "violent reaction"
as opposed to a full-on detonation?  

It's entirely possible that some of their fellow passengers would've
been injured, even if the plane didn't fall out of the sky.  It 
could've started a fire when a plane was out over the Atlantic, 
hours from any airfield.  Here's an example of what happens when
there's a fire aboard an airplane, even when there's a place to
make an emergency landing:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_Canada_Flight_797

As a matter of principle, would you want to be on a plane with 
somebody who wanted to bring it down, even if he were incompetent?

At the very least, there could've been damage to the airplane itself,
costing the airline money in the form of downtime even though the 
damage would've been covered by insurance, and causing delays to 
passengers due to the plane's being taken out of service for repairs.
No good would've come of it, however it might've turned out.

And what if they'd never actually put their plan to the test?  Their
intent is significant in itself.  Who's to say that someone with a 
better knowledge of explosives wouldn't have set them straight and
given them a better method before they'd made any attempt to put
their plan into practice?



Geoff

--
"All my father wanted to do was make a toaster you could
 really set the darkness on -- and you perverted his work
 into those horrible machines!" -- Mark Sachs