>>>>>>What if they had succeeded? What would you have posted then?
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>>>>>They didn't succeed and we have no more reason to consider this a legitimate threat than that English lugnut with an explosive in his shoe. The fact is they never got to first base. Just because the government, one with a long track record of lies and obscufation, says it was a legitimate threat doesn't mean it was.
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>>>>I said what if they had, not if they did. Big difference, which you ignored. What is first base? Getting the materials together? Planning? Getting tickets? Boarding the plane? Exploding a bomb? What if the planes hadn't crashed after the explosions? I have a feeling you and some notable others here would be saying the same crap. "But, it didn't happen. There was no real threat, because nobody died! Whine, whine, whine..."
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>>>>>I heard on the radio that airport lines are markedly longer, reportedly 2 hours at O'Hare on average, due to new security checks for liquid carry-ons. Shampoo, mouthwash, nasal spray, all into the collection bags. Good lord. People still ask whether something like 9/11 will happen again. Here's how I look at it. The 9/11 operation reportedly cost Al Qaeda $200,000 in American dollars. How many billions has it cost us to date, not to mention the psychic cost? Of course it will happen again.
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>>>>Money?! What are your wife and children worth to you? I had a direct connection with someone in the WTC in NYC. To be honest, I'm insulted by your attitude. This is the one that pissed me off enough to be harsher above than I would normally have been. Freakin' conspiracy-ridden, liberal "as long as it's someone else" pathetic views.
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>>>I am not following you at all. If you think I meant saving lives is a money issue, you are quite mistaken. All I meant was from the POV of Al Qaeda, it cost them very little and did a heck of a lot of financial damage (among other kids of damage).
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>>I don't get your point. So what should we do? Your point is that AQ made us spend more money and energy then is required?
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>I did not express myself well at all. What I meant was not that there is some price we should pay to stop terrorism and some other price that would be too high. Any attempt to put a dollar value on human life is ludicrous. Whatever we can do to stop it, we should. I was just kind of marvelling at how much effect the 9/11 attacks, and fear of similar attacks to come, have had on us not just financially but in its impact on our daily lives. Five years ago it would have seemed like the stuff of science fiction that we would have to get to the airport more than two hours early, that nail clippers and liquid medications would be confiscated, that we would line up to take our shoes off and put them in plascic containers.

When it comes to a price on a human life, the FAA uses something like $4.2 million.
This apparently is the number they use when they do a "cost/benefits analysis" of possible safety improvements. Things like preventing the ignition of fumes in empty fuel tanks, which had a negative CBA and so has still not been done.