Last week, I expressed skepticism over the alert issued regarding a terrorist threat to the New York City subways. Now it’s being reported that the threat was a hoax.
I’m not going to be hard on Mayor Bloomberg, because I respect his decision to err on the side of caution and assume the worst. With that said, if we have too many situations like this, we run the risk of a “boy who cried wolf” scenario, where people no longer heed security warnings. I have to admit that in the four years since 9/11, I’ve pretty much reached that point. Once a terrorist plan is announced publicly, I pretty much assume that it’s not going to materialize. The Sept. 11 attacks happened without public warning, as did the Madrid bombings, the London bombings and every other major terrorist act against a city that I can recall in the past several years.