Be Extra Careful

I’m glad to see that yesterday the US Government decided to simplify our terrorist threat warning system.   I always thought it was kind of silly and I still do.   At least now it’s only 40% as silly as it used to be.   I mean really, what do they expect us to do with the threat information?   I was not really paying attention to that suspicious package until I heard that we were at “High” risk.   If you weren’t paying attention before, you’re not going to pay attention when the threat level was raised.

Now we have a simplified system.   We’re either “Elevated” or “Imminent”.   Since “Elevated” simply means that there is a credible threat of terrorism, we’ll need to always be at that level.   We’ll raise the level to “Imminent” when we have a “credible, specific and impending threat”.   That seems like a good idea.  If we think something specific is going to happen, let’s go ahead and advertise so that they will know to change their plans.   Also, if it specific, we’ll want to alert the whole country, because they will be worried about wherever the “specific” threat was. 

I have a better idea.  Why don’t we tell the country at large that we live under the threat of attacks?   Tell them that they should always be diligent and report suspicious activity.    Tell them that at anytime, anywhere, someone could be planning violence against them.   Let’s keep all of this “warning” stuff where it belongs, with law enforcement.    If there are “credible threats”, or “specific, impending threats”, then law enforcement needs to be dealing with them, not “warning” us to be extra careful.