corrente

To Los Angeles readers: When you bring the breakfast tray to Mom, make sure you fold the paper so this story is on top:

Concerns are growing that Al Qaeda or a related group could detonate a "dirty bomb" that would spew radioactive fallout across an American or European city, according to intelligence analysts, diplomats and independent nuclear experts.
(via the Pulitzer-heavy LA Times)

Well, Cassandra's looking better and better:

Intelligence agencies have reported no reliable, specific threats involving dirty bombs or nuclear weapons...

Well, that tears it. Bush doesn't have the date, the time, and the target, so the intelligence isn't "actionable." We're doomed.

... but senior U.S. and European officials and outside experts said several factors had heightened fears in recent weeks.

The threat of attack is great enough that a senior European intelligence official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said it is
"not a matter of if there is a nuclear-related attack by Al Qaeda, but when it occurs."

Experts inside and outside government said sophisticated extremists have the ability to plan and execute the detonation of a dirty bomb. They had no answer for why a dirty bomb has not been unleashed.

"I'm very surprised that a radiological device hasn't gone off," said Matthew Bunn, a nuclear expert at Harvard's Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs. "There is a bigger puzzle — why no Al Qaeda attacks since Sept. 11 in the U.S.?"

It's quiet.... Too quiet...

The European intelligence official said planning for a large-scale attack has suffered setbacks with the arrests of numerous Al Qaeda operatives. But, he added, "the division is still focused on spectaculars, and they take three or four years to plan and execute."

Nearly 10 million containers of radioactive material — including the detritus from medical facilities — exist in the United States and 49 other countries, according to a 2003 survey by the congressional General Accounting Office.

The agency said that each year, hundreds of containers are lost or stolen in the U.S. and other countries, particularly in the former Soviet Union. The report warned that the radioactive material posed a "national security threat" and urged that controls be strengthened worldwide.

Tell me again why Bush is so good on keeping us safe? Oh, wait, I forgot! Cities vote Blue! They're not "us"! (And they probably deserve to be cleansed from the Fire on High anyhow.) Fuck 'em. And if you don't think His thinking is exactly that cynical and callous, recall that the Republicans treated first responder money as campaign spoils, and passed the money out to their base.

See "Bush's Reckless Indifference to the Nightmare Scenario" (back) for the ugly, ugly details.