(no subject)

[rm]

I assume no one is talking about this racist insanity because no one got shot?

The emerging details of the incident in and around Times Square, provided chiefly by the police, have begun to shape a fuller picture of what became a wild scene at one of New York's busiest tourist attractions: police officers ordering tourists to put their hands up, bomb-sniffing dogs climbing aboard the bus, and five men who appeared to be South Asian winding up handcuffed and lined up in a row on their knees. They were questioned and then released.

...

But the five men, who turned out to be British tourists, left the bus empty-handed. "That's when the decision was made to take them aside and flex-cuff them," Mr. Browne said, referring to plastic handcuffs. "And that's when the decision was made to have the Emergency Service Unit board the bus to determine whether they had left explosive devices behind."

The officers then searched the bus, and dogs sniffed for explosives. Nothing was found, said Mr. Browne. The five men had been separated from the other passengers and questioned, he said. The other passengers were also searched lightly, and their bags were lined up across Broadway for the bomb-sniffing dogs.

...

The detention of the five men has barely rippled the diplomatic waters. Mr. Bloomberg telephoned the British consul general in New York, Sir Philip Thomas, and apologized for the arrests. The two men discussed the common threats faced by the United States and Britain, according to a spokeswoman for Sir Philip.

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/07/27/nyregion/27bus.html

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/07/27/nyregion/27about.html

Comments

[ozfille]

One good thing from that will be that those tourists will go home and advise all their friends never to deal with that company again, but it won't stop some other idiot judging people by the colour of their skin or their accents. It's like whole sections of Western Society have become brain-dead in response to the attacks and anyone who is a South Asian or of Middle Eastern appearance is an immediate suspect in their eyes, a reversion to the most primitive tribalism there is. Timothy McVeigh the homegrown nutter was just as dangerous but then someone like him would probably not be picked up today because he wouldn't fit the "racial" profile of what a terrorist is.