as expected, ashcroft/ridge/muellers 'b vscared' message is under a cloud:
"As Ashcroft Warns of Attack, Some Question Threat and Its Timing" http://www.nytimes.com/2004/05/27/politics/27terror.html
"Some intelligence officials said they were uncertain that the link between the fresh intelligence and the likelihood of another attack was as apparent as Mr. Ashcroft made it out to be. Officials at the Department of Homeland Security said just a day before Mr. Ashcroft's announcement that they had no new intelligence pointing to the threat of an attack."

altho i might be wrong about ashcroft: "Other officials said they supported Mr. Ashcroft's warnings. "I think he was right on the mark in terms of what Al Qaeda's intent is," said one counterterrorism official who spoke on condition of anonymity" so there.


thankfully, yesterday we got two terror arrests/convictions which ought to make us all a lot safer

hamza is being extradited from london to nyc. apparently he is a 'fiery cleric' - dog knows we've already got too many of them... "the US attorney general John Ashcroft announced the allegations against the cleric." we all know what falls out of johnnyboys mouth when he opens it... from what i can gather, hamza has already been cleared of the charges which date back years, and theres no new information... it seems the main charge is that someone used a cellphone linked to him. hamza is also guilty by association with naughty shoe-bomber richard reid who was a muslim convert (boy, do we hate them!) and Moussaoui, both are from hamzas mosque. every time you have to take your shoes off at an airport, or get stuck in a queue waiting for others to take off their shoes, spare a quick thought for richie reid - who was apparently sufficiently sophisticated to think itd be a good idea to squeeze a bomb into his shoe, and sufficiently dedicated to the cause that he wanted to blow up a plane, but he wasnt quite smart enough to consider that a brave passenger sitting next to him might not like the idea of matches being lit in the main cabin and was able to overpower him, thus saving everyone from certain death. i dunno about you, but if i was a shoe-bomber and for woteva reason i needed to use an analogue match, id have considered that maybe the guy next to me might get a little uncomfortable about me waving a live match around - so rather than risk fukking up the entire enterprise, id prolly go to the bathroom or somewhere a bit more private so that i could complete the plan... praps the bathroom queue was too long...

speaking of muslim converts, some guy who id never heard of before called jack roche ('terror convert') was being tried for some terrorism in perth - the trial has been top o' the news since it began, including last night with the 'dramtic' news that he had plead guilty. yesterday, day10 of the trial, we get this "The Perth man accused of conspiring with Osama bin Laden's top al-Qaeda lieutenants to blow up the Israeli embassy in Canberra, yesterday suddenly changed his plea to guilty." http://theage.com.au/articles/2004/05/28/1085641711976.html

and "The British migrant stunned the West Australian District Court with his decision to change his plea from not guilty. He now faces a maximum sentence of 25 years in jail." http://www.heraldsun.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5478,9688026%255E661,00.html

i havent been following the story and dont know what to make of it - but apparently this roche character was some low level lackey who was unwittingly trapped into the plot. by the time he realised what was going on, he had already met with obl and hambali (bali bomber) and a bunch of other terrorist kingpins. it seems that once roche worked out what was going on, he wanted to pull out and called ASIO (oz spy agency) twice and tried to tell them, but he couldnt get them interested.

but heres the thing - todays The Age gives the story a low profile on its homepage http://theage.com.au so i went to murderks ostensibly respectable national (http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au) broadsheet and the story curiously doesnt get a mention on the homepage - where they are leading with 2 apparent non-stories. no probs - the roche story must be The Nation section (http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/sectionindex1/0,5745,National%255E%255ETEXT,00.html ) - the story didnt make the top 14 stories here, but it was included below the fold in the 'updates' section (altho the story made the 6pm teeve news last nite) - the editor chose to give the story the title "Terrorist tried to warn ASIO" which is an odd choice when the obvious title would have been 'terrorist pleads guilty' - altho in the 8th para we are helpfully informed that "In a dramatic twist, Roche's trial ended abruptly yesterday after he changed his plea to guilty of one charge of conspiring with international terrorists to blow up the Israeli embassy."

i havent a clue whats going on - but as an interesting juxtaposition, murderks nypost gave the entire front cover to the news that hamza had been arrested (including this awesome pic (http://nypost.com/news/regionalnews/21837.htm ) "The Brits will undoubtedly be glad to be rid of the monstrous imam. He has been fomenting hate for years, calling the invasion against Iraq "a war against Islam"

fish heads fish heads. roly-poly fish heads.

get thee some duct tape.