Saturday, November 27, 2010

FBI thwarts terrorist bombing attempt at Portland holiday tree lighting, authorities say | OregonLive.com

FBI thwarts terrorist bombing attempt at Portland holiday tree lighting, authorities say | OregonLive.com:

"The FBI thwarted an attempted terrorist bombing in Portland's Pioneer Courthouse Square before the city's annual tree-lighting Friday night, according to the U.S. Attorney's Office in Oregon.

A Corvallis man, thinking he was going to ignite a bomb, drove a van to the corner of the square at Southwest Yamhill Street and Sixth Avenue and attempted to detonate it.

However, the supposed explosive was a dummy that FBI operatives supplied to him, according to an affidavit in support of a criminal complaint signed Friday night by U.S. Magistrate Judge John V. Acosta."

Can't get closer to home than this. A reminder that we live in a time where no one anywhere is "safe." Nice to see the FBI doing its job! I assume they were. However, to turn cynical, maybe they posed as radicals and talked the vulnerable kid into doing it, so they'd look good catching him. Hard to trust anything at surface value any more. Sad.

Perhaps the greatest challenge of our times is to remain a free and open society despite the times. Fear is a great motive for repression.

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