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Read This If You Are Low On Mistrust

I have copied the text below directly from the New York Times. Read it and tell me whether the government is dumb, or unethical. (duh):

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Bomb Would Have Been Dud, Scientists Say
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

Published: June 10, 2004

The "dirty bomb'' that the terror suspect Jose Padilla has been accused of planning would have been a dud, not the radiological threat federal authorities described last week, scientists say.

At a June 1 news conference, the Justice Department said Mr. Padilla, who it contends is an associate of Al Qaeda, hoped to attack Americans by detonating "uranium wrapped with explosives'' to spread radioactivity.

But uranium's extremely low radioactivity is harmless compared with high-radiation materials, like cesium and cobalt isotopes used in medicine and industry that experts see as potential dirty bomb fuels.

"I used a 20-pound brick of uranium as a doorstop in my office,'' Peter D. Zimmerman, an American nuclear physicist at King's College in London, said to illustrate the point.

Mr. Zimmerman, who co-wrote an expert analysis of dirty bombs for the United States National Defense University, called the government announcement "extremely disturbing because you cannot make a radiological dispersal device with uranium.'' He added, "There is just no significant radiation hazard.''

Other specialists agreed. "It's the equivalent of blowing up lead,'' said Ivan Oelrich, a physicist with the Federation of American Scientists.

The Justice Department did not respond directly when asked this week whether it had consulted with experts and knew that uranium would not make a dirty bomb.

Instead, a spokesman, Mark Corallo, said Mr. Padilla's statements, in view of his Qaeda links, made clear that he was "willing to cause devastating harm to innocent Americans.''

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Sigh. I thought that when I first read "uranium" in the initial articles, but I figured I was wrong. Nup. Just too trusting...

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I spent most of yesterday (and the day before) crying but this morning I just feel drained... leaking more than crying really. So sad. I keep thinking I see her out of the corner of my eye or hear her calling to me from somewhere.

Ruby lies wrapped in a blanket under a tree, in a sunny secluded spot. She's got her collar and bag of cat treats to take with her. I built a cairn of bricks over the grave to protect her from other animals and in the spring I will scatter catnip and catmint seeds over her to make a garden. Seems strange after so many years that the last things I can do for her are so simplistic and small.

Posted by phreq at June 11, 2004 08:45 AM | TrackBack