New York ‘lone wolf’ was one hour away from finishing his bomb
She also praised the New York Police Department, saying, “I think they handled it well.”
Officials with the NYPD, which conducted the undercover investigation using a confidential informant and a bugged apartment, said the department had to move quickly because Pimentel was about to test a pipe bomb made out of match heads, nails and other ingredients bought at neighborhood hardware and discount stores.
Two law enforcement officials said Monday that the NYPD’s Intelligence Division had sought to get the FBI involved at least twice as the investigation unfolded. Both times, the FBI concluded that Pimentel lacked the mental capacity to act on his own, they said.
The FBI thought Pimentel “didn’t have the predisposition or the ability to do anything on his own,” one of the officials said.
The officials were not authorized to speak about the case and spoke on condition of anonymity. The FBI’s New York office and the U.S. attorney’s office in Manhattan both declined to comment on Monday.
Pimentel’s lawyer, Joseph Zablocki, said his client was never a true threat.
“If the goal here is to be stopping terror … I’m not sure that this is where we should be spending our resources,” he said.
Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly defended the handling of the case Monday, saying the NYPD kept federal authorities in the loop “all along” before circumstances forced investigators to take swift measures using state charges.
“No question in my mind that we had to take this case down,” Kelly said. “There was an imminent threat.”
Added Kelly: “This is a classic case of what we’ve been talking about �� the lone wolf, an individual, self-radicalized. This is the needle in the haystack problem we face as a country and as a city.”
Authorities described Pimentel as an unemployed U.S. citizen and “al-Qaida sympathizer” who was born in the Dominican Republic. He had lived most of his life in Manhattan, aside from about five years in the upstate city of Schenectady, where authorities say he had an arrested for credit card fraud.
His mother said he was raised Roman Catholic. But he converted to Islam in 2004 and went by the name Muhammad Yusuf, authorities said.
Using a tip from police in Albany, the NYPD had been watching Pimentel using a confidential informant for the past year. Investigators learned that he was energized and motivated to carry out his plan by the Sept. 30 killing of al-Qaida’s U.S.-born cleric Anwar al-Awlaki, police said.
Pimentel was under constant surveillance as he shopped for the pipe bombmaterials. He also was overheard talking about attacking police patrol cars and postal facilities, killing soldiers returning home from abroad andbombing a police station in Bayonne, N.J., authorizes said.
One Helluva CEO
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http://www.clarionledger.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070321/BIZ/703210344/1005
This guy is gold to me. Too bad he is retiring.
From the article:
Northwest Airlines, which filed for Chapter 11 protection on the same day as Delta, filed its reorganization plan with the court on Feb. 15, leaving out its proposal for executive compensation after bankruptcy. The company has said it will file that at a later date.
Wow, fear of terrorism really killed airlines, didn’t it?
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I, for one, was against the government bail out of the airline industry, always have been. I don’t think the government should bail out any business for any reason, ever. You either sink or swim on your own in the marketplace.
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I agree in principle, but my understanding (i.e. correct me if i am wrong) is that this was such an extreme situation, caused largely by extreme circumstances (9/11) and that the impact of simultaneous bankruptcy of our airline industry would be crippling to an already damaged economy in the fallout of 9/11.
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I agree in principle, but my understanding (i.e. correct me if i am wrong) is that this was such an extreme situation, caused largely by extreme circumstances (9/11) and that the impact of simultaneous bankruptcy of our airline industry would be crippling to an already damaged economy in the fallout of 9/11.
Um yeah, the airlines all fail, leaving us with circa-1940s transportation options, leading to the total collapse of our economy. Yep, that would be bad. HELLO, 9/11 WAS AN ACT OF WAR! FOR WHAT DOES THE GOVERNMENT EXIST EXCEPT TO PROTECT US FROM OUR ENEMIES??? Geez, even a conservative like myself can understand that. The regular rules of laizzez-faire capitalism DO NOT APPLY in times of war. Witness rationing during WWII, price controls, etc.
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I, for one, was against the government bail out of the airline industry, always have been. I don’t think the government should bail out any business for any reason, ever. You either sink or swim on your own in the marketplace.
Attempting to regulate the price of silver: Bad idea.
Attempting to support transportation: Good idea.
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On another note:
Let us say that farmers were in trouble. For whatever reason. So less food was being produced. So food prices skyrocketed. So poor people couldn’t eat. So there were food riots.
If I were a poltician, I would just nip that problem in the bud by sending farmers a big fat wad o’ cash.
At a billion dollars, it would still be cheaper than having to pay two billion dollars for added policing, building repair, and so forth . . .
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If you really want laissez faire, the government should stop regulating monopolies.
Think that’s a good idea?
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Actually, certain airlines fail, they go into bankruptcy. New companies spring up like pheonixes from the embers of the dieing airline companies, revitalizing the industry and bringing in new ideas, new concepts.
That’s a good thing.
Regulation is a bad thing. I don’t care if you are regulating the price of rice in China, it’s a BAD thing. Government is evil. Individuals are good.
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Actually, certain airlines fail, they go into bankruptcy. New companies spring up like pheonixes from the embers of the dieing airline companies, revitalizing the industry and bringing in new ideas, new concepts.
That’s a good thing.
Regulation is a bad thing. I don’t care if you are regulating the price of rice in China, it’s a BAD thing. Government is evil. Individuals are good.
Inexperience = waste = cost paid by the consumer.
Large company fails = mass unemployment = detriment to society.
Even if the proportion of those that would be re-hired will be subject to probable decreased benefits and renegotiation of salaries.
Societies are fundamentally based on interactions between multiple individuals. Inevitably, particular groups become stronger than other groups, and those strong groups will naturally feed upon the weaker groups, as a cheap source of energy and resources. Proper regulation prevents abuse. Governments exist for the good of the people, and are, in fact, good for the people so long as, of course, those governments act in the interests of the people.
Of course, governments being natural products of groups of people, it is natural that groups of individuals will exploit the government for their own benefit, thus profiting at the expense of other individuals.
Yet, I argue that such profiteering is a natural and inevitable consequence of current groups under current social systems, and further, that although weaker groups of individuals will pay, that system is still preferable to an anarchy - because in anarchy, there is no regulation that limits what the stronger groups can take.
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Large company artifically supported results in worse service, enslaved population, stagnation of innovation and entrapeneurialship and results in the rich getting richer and the poor getting poorer.
Large company doing a good job, staying afloat on their own merits, good for everyone.
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Large company artifically supported results in worse service, enslaved population, stagnation of innovation and entrapeneurialship and results in the rich getting richer and the poor getting poorer.
Large company doing a good job, staying afloat on their own merits, good for everyone.
Lol.
You slay me!
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As do you. Ya know, this is a capitalist country, NPB, if you want to live in communism where the government owns everything, may I recommend such wonderful paradises as China, North Korea and Cuba?
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As do you. Ya know, this is a capitalist country, NPB, if you want to live in communism where the government owns everything, may I recommend such wonderful paradises as China, North Korea and Cuba?
Since I have never said or implied that I wish to live in a communist nation, I must regard that as an ad hominem attack. Make accusations in jest if you must, but I will not stand for misrepresentation!
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I think that it is you that wish the downfall of representative democracy in the United States.
One need do no more than read your posts to obtain evidence to this conclusion.
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Thread is shifting to political in nature…
Back on topic or it will be locked in this topic area.