Cheney and the 400,000 tons

Dick Cheney is whining that John Kerry isn't mentioning the "400,000 tons of weapons and explosives that our troops have captured."



As Jesse Taylor notes:

It took about 3/4 of a pound to commit the Lockerbie attack. The total explosive power of what was stolen is enough to commit 4000 Oklahoma City-size bombings. The death toll would be measured in the tens of thousands, possibly the hundred of thousands - more in a crowded city like, say, New York.



But it doesn't matter, because it's only .00095% of the total. Let's look at Russia's nuclear arsenal - a nuclear attack inside a crowded city would likely also result in tens-hundreds of thousands dead. Suppose that a terrorist got one weapon. Just one. Russia has around 10,000 nuclear weapons. A single weapon would be merely .0001 of their entire arsenal - nearly ten times less, percentagewise.



And therefore, friends, absolutely nothing to worry about. Hell, we might as well just give al-Qaeda a nuke, and stop fucking worrying about it altogether.

Using Cheney's logic, we should just file September 11, 2001 away under "shit happens." After all, how many planes land perfectly safely every day? Hell, how many planes landed safely on September 11, 2001? Let's look at those instead!



This Administration never ceases to astound me with their ability to spout utter horseshit.