Boston Tried a Police State and it Failed

Boston was turned into a police state for a day. It was an experiment. It failed miserably.

Yesterday a major US city – perhaps as many as 1 million people – was put under martial law. Business and universities were closed. Public transit and Amtrak were padlocked. Paramilitary cops from multiple states rolled down Boston’s residential neighborhoods in humvees with manned machine gun turrets on top. In full battle gear, these guys – they looked like soldiers – called people out of their homes. They then searched the homes. Boston became a ghost town and a police state for a day. And Bostonians cheered them for it. Some even called for a parade to honor the men who treated them like prisoners in their own homes.

This grand show of force, which even the FBI admits is unprecedented, was carried out for the purpose of catching a suspected terrorist – a 19-year-old honor student – who stands accused of deploying pressure cooker bombs at the Boston Marathon. These bombs reportedly killed 3 people and injured 170.

Think about that. Boston was turned into a giant prison for a day to catch a teenager with pressure cooker bombs.

What does this mean?

1. Terrorism “Works”

For a maximum investment of perhaps $1 or $2 thousand dollars, ideologically-motivated individuals can cost the economy perhaps as much as $1 billion dollars in economic output. Nobody yet knows how much it costs to shut down down Boston for a day but $1 billion is about how much the city produces on a daily basis. The return on investment for an enterprising terrorist could be as much as 500,000%.

The brothers Tsarnaev succeeded in gaining a lot of attention for themselves. Chechnya will benefit from this attention. People will want to travel there. People will want to understand what has been going on in Chechnya. We all want to understand why people do these kinds of things and people now want to understand these brothers.

In short, the boys in blue created a tantalizing incentive for others to copy the Tsarnaevs. The Tsarnaevs’ terrorism “worked” but only because the Boston government helped them make it work. This is not a conspiracy theory. By overreacting, the governments at work here magnified the Tsarnaevs’ effectiveness. The Tsarnaevs didn’t shut down Boston. They didn’t put paramilitary troops on the streets of a major US city. The governments at work here did that.

2. The Demand for Tyranny is too Damned High

Boston lockdown People will put up with a lot – really a lot – in the name of safety.

  • Turn the city into a war zone with soldiers and humvees? Sure.
  • Lock down my proud city as if it were a prison? No problem.
  • House to house searches without legal basis? It’s ok.
  • Snipers aiming at me and my family while I wait on the sidewalk for my house to be searched? Yep, it’s legit.
  • Cheer the guys doing all this, let them high-five my kid, suggest throwing a parade for them? Yep, it all happened.

It was like the TSA came out to your house for the day – and you were thrilled about it.

The ability of the US population to cheerfully accept tyranny is nothing short of amazing. If this doesn’t rouse people from their slumber, then anything that will rouse them is going to be too late.

3. The US is Shockingly Weak

It was just a 19-year-old kid with pressure cookers and guns. He didn’t even have fully automatic weapons. Yet everyone was so scared that they willingly cowered in their homes and complied with every request made of them.

Imagine if this kid actually knew what he was doing. Imagine if there were a dozen of these guys in multiple parts of the city or multiple parts of the country operating simultaneously. They could have brought the whole country to a standstill.

I thought America was a great country – a powerful country. I thought it was the best country in the world. That’s what they tell me at least. Is this the country that defeated Hitler in World War 2? Is this the country that put a man on the moon? If these events are meaningful to you, then you need to question what the hell happened. You can defeat Hitler and Tojo, you can hang Saddam and assassinate bin Laden, but you cower in fear of a 19-year-old kid?

Yesterday’s show of force actually made everyone more vulnerable by showing just how weak, frightened and cowardly people in the US are. Not only are the government cops a threat to freedom but they actually make you less safe!

The Proper Reaction

Boston lockdown The proper reaction to a criminal (and let’s remember that the surviving Tsarnaev brother hasn’t been convicted yet) is to boldly (but tactically) proceed forward against him until he is neutralized.

Human life is precious. All life is precious, in fact. It demands protection. But there is something more important to me than my life – my self-respect. My self-respect demands that I not allow another person to control me through fear. It demands that I have courage. It demands that I resist evil.

We all feel fear. When there is a gun to your head, you have no choice but to comply. But we must not allow the fear to control us. We must not allow the gun, or the pressure cooker in this case, to become internalized and control us even when it is physically absent. Otherwise, any old boogieman can – and will – come along and enslave us.

If you allow an angsty teenager with a pressure cooker to frighten you into abandoning your daily routine and cowering in your home as if it were a prison, then you desperately need to re-evaluate your posture towards life. Reclaim your self-respect, Boston.

Bostonians could have sent a powerful message of courage to the world yesterday by continuing with their lives as usual. Now that would have served as a great deterrent to future terrorism. And the suspect would have been caught more quickly.

Should People have Cooperated?

Boston lockdown When a dozen paramilitary cops with fully automatic battle rifles backed by a guy on a humvee turret and snipers come to my house, the words ‘voluntary’ and ‘cooperation’ have no place. I would be a fool to resist. They have guns to my head and the heads of anyone with me. It’s now too late to resist. I don’t blame anyone for cooperating. I blame them for cheering their oppressors.

Would an AR-15 have Helped?

Would having an AR-15 battle rifle and a high-capacity magazine have helped anyone (other than the paramilitary forces) survive the Boston lockdown (as one politician suggested)? No. It would be suicide for you and yours to fire on the paramilitary forces (not to mention not being constructive) and in the tight spaces of an urban area, I would rather have a handgun to defend myself from a home intruder.

The Police State for a Day Experiment Failed

It’s absolutely fascinating to me that only when they lifted the lockdown did they find the surviving Tsarnaev brother. That’s when the owner of the boat Tsarnaev was hiding in came out of his house and noticed something amiss.

Boston was turned into a police state for a day. It was an experiment. It failed miserably. The governments in operation there rallied all of the military might at their disposal with a near-complete suspension of liberty and they failed to find the man they were looking for – until they lifted their siege.

The bottom line is that the man on the street, the civilian, the regular joe, is a more effective agent for public safety than any hopped-up government employee with body armor, night vision, full-auto rifles and flash-bangs. Just like with Flight 93, the shoe bomber and the underwear bomber, it was the regular folks who played the key role in neutralizing a suspected terrorist – not the cops or the TSA. That should be a sobering fact for any law enforcement cheerleader.

What do we do now?

The Boston Lockdown confirmed what many of us already suspected. The climate for personal liberty in North America is going to get a lot worse before it gets any better.

  • Those who favor arms will surely get more arms and better training. And they should.
  • The lawyers will sue. And they should. It keeps them busy.
  • Those who like protesting and running for office will do more of it. And they’re annoying so they should definitely stick to that.
  • Those who are getting themselves put in jail for liberty should stop. Governments have an unlimited ability to incarcerate. And taxpayers have little sympathy for people who “break the law.”
  • If you really want to do something useful, I think the best way forward is to practice what we preach. Become more resilient. Build more prosperity, for yourself and others. Build those personal bonds that constitute the emergent order of a free, decentralized society.
  • And become stronger, both physically and spiritually. Because the road ahead is a long one. While there are no easy solutions, I foresee a lot of fun working them out.

Bonus: Here’s how the troops handled an individual video-recording them from his own home.

Bonus #2: Here’s what a house search under martial law in Boston looks like.

Bonus #3: As requested by the critics, here is how I would have handled a terrorist manhunt.

By George Donnelly


354 replies on “Boston Tried a Police State and it Failed”

Excellent point about the suspect being discovered by an observant local just released from lockdown.

A huge part of this seemed to be network newspeople playing the role of federal/PD public affairs personnel while they promoted the script that read:

Stop asking questions. Wait for further instructions.

If the voluntary lockdown hadn’t been in place, the second suspect would not have been forced to remain in the area in hiding. If the community of Watertown had been business as usual, the second suspect could have more easily passed through the streets and out of the area without detection.

Didn’t look very voluntary to me BlueLineCop. Looked like an exercise in illegal warrentless door to door searches to me.

Exigent circumstances were first coined and used in criminal law in the 80’s, WAY after the 4th Amendment was ratified.

“Even in exigent circumstances, while a warrantless seizure may be permitted, a subsequent warrant to search may still be necessary.”

Officers did not SEE any bomber go INTO any house. There was NO IMMEDIATE danger to that house, yet they pulled EVERYONE out with their hands up as if THEY were being arrested. It may hold up in court but declaring an entire area as an ‘Exigent circumstance’ is a mighty slippery slope to be going down…..

” I don’t blame anyone for cooperating. I blame them for cheering their oppressors.”
While it’s true they were completely out gunned, it was sickening to watch. And cheering them afterwards even more so.

That’s reasonable but the cheering, the free pizza, the flag-waving, the calls for parades to honor the cops, it was all a little over the top and can’t be explained just by the lifting of stress alone.

I can explain it. Imagine your completely safe city is suddenly attacked: you realize that you can die at any moment (though so unlikely, the subconscious still knows that it could happen). Then, equally suddenly, someone comes and ‘saves’ you. The government steps in, finds the guy who’s scaring you, and arrests him. You are safe again, and it is natural to party when in such a state of mind.

And all that you say is scary in and of itself. Because the one saving you could also be the one hurting you.

I didn’t see people relaxing at home, calmly assisting the authorities. I saw people pulled out of their home at gunpoint and their civil liberties violated. the suspect wasn’t even found during the searches OR in any of the houses they illegally searched. The owner of the boat noticed blood and notified the authorities. I’m ok w/ them searching my outside property, since I wouldn’t be totally sure he wouldn’t be out there, but no one comes into my house w/ out a warrant, marshal law or no.

I honestly just think it might be American nature, in general. Same thing happens after big profile trials, when Osama and Hussein were killed, etc.

Were you there? People weren’t stressed and scared. We were having family meals, hanging out and enjoying a free day off.

Germany and South Korea have many more vacation days than the U.S. — and still have higher productivity. So I’m not worried about the “$1 billion” in lost GDP. Folks will show up on Monday and catch up on work. In fact, if you do a cross-state analysis, you see that the states with the most work days lost due to snow have much higher per capita GDP. In other words, these kinds of obstacles and setbacks seem to just keep people refreshed and motivated.

Nobody was cowering. We were staying in our houses to make it easier for the cops to find the guy and bring him to justice. And it worked. The Humvees in Watertown forced him to hide in a boat instead of fleeing. And we caught him!

Also, despite what is being reported outside of Boston, there was no “police state”. The “lockdown” was strictly voluntary. As I said, people chose to stay home to help law enforcement catch a terrorist. The only evidence you provide to a “police state” is a link to one guy’s Facebook page — a page that includes words and no pics.

I’m beiginning to think there is something in the water out there. No one was angy and that seriously irritates me. The fact that no one spoke out set our civilization back thousands of years. We may as well be bowing down to the Pharaohs.

I find it really odd as well. And I know a few people from Boston who generally staunchly defend civil liberties as the most important thing an American can retain. I think it’s just that they can’t handle the questions or criticism, and so they’re defensive even if they disagree with how this was handled.

Nothing voluntary about armed men in riot gear shouting at you to exit your house and searching your house against your will. That was a suspension of liberty and a test to see what the American citizens will allow. I know it was a horrible tragedy, but this was a teenager with a pressure cooker filled with nails and ball bearings. Not a full terror assault from an organized attack.

Sad days are ahead.


Exigent circumstances. There are exceptions to the fourth amendment. Just as there are exceptions to the first and second.

Those of us who live in Boston are stating a simple fact: Most of us were at home and relaxing that day, watching the news. Very few people had their homes searched (I believe a few dozen). And even then, those were only in Watertown where police had probable cause to believe the suspect was in hiding in a home, garage, or yard. And you know what? They were right. Their search radius was off by one block.

only a few dozen? no. it was a 20 block radius and the guy was in the yard of a house that was searched.

btw, there are NO exceptions to the first, second or fourth amendments. that is the lie they are wanting you to believe. the ppl of watertown set back our civilization thousands of years by not fighting for their rights. the suspect was not in a house and therefore their searches were unfounded.

Dude was hiding in the boat all long before the lockdown, as evidence shows when he first occupied it, lol.

Eh, I do. I’d be the only person SHOT dead in Boston for NOT raising their ‘criminal’ hands over the heads to a regime… sorry.

Are you serious? Those measures were put into place to protect the city from someone KNOWN to be armed, dangerous, and willing to kill. Don’t try to belittle it by stating he’s only a “19-year-old honor student.” He and his brother killed four people and injured over a hundred others, and the police forces were only trying to stop them and keep Boston safe, all the while risking their own lives – including the police officer that they DID gun down. I don’t know how you dare incriminate and criticise them for doing so.

Are you kidding me? Boston was neutered of its rights and people cheered. The Constitution was shredded for a day and people cheered. Bundy killed more then these 2 and you didn’t see this type of response. If you don’t understand what happened in Boston, keep reading the above until you do.

Just who’s rights are you looking to protect here then? If all you’re attempting to do is appease your own discomfort at the fact that your own country is immensely powerful when dealing with domestic affairs then you sir are an idiot.

Of course your law enforcement made a big deal over this:
1. Nobody knew who Boston was dealing with. A kid, a group of terrorists, nobody actually knew.
2. The media blew this story up and Americans were scared. Airport security makes passengers feel good, and having a large police presence actively investigate a crime makes the public feel safer.
3. This large military response is a beautiful deterrent towards any other losers who attempt to commit a similar crime. The actions in Boston demonstrate that your government refuses to put up with such terrible crimes.

If you hate the government response to this so much then I dare you to live in Libya, Syria or Iraq for the rest of your miserable life. Oh, you don’t want to live in any of those places because thousands of people there die from bombs each year? If only they had strong central governments who nailed the S.O.B.s who set those bombs off….

There’s such things as lesser evils as I’m sure you’re unaware but I highly suggest you read into them. Only children think the world is black and white so let me explain to you that the American Constitution has never been and will never be completely absolute and uniformly enforced throughout the land. Although this is the general idea, you actually *would* be living in a police state if this were true.

I wonder if there are any countries that are a middle ground between these two places liberty-wise?

Expect Israel does employ a hard crack down with strong centralized Government responses to these kind of things it hasn’t for a moment stopped Terrorist from bombing them. This country has had no problems capturing Bomb suspects without the need to shut down entire cities, going door to door. Something this made one different… The real question what will the response be the next time a terrorist sets off a bomb here. Its going happen again its just a matter of when and where…

wrong dude those bros have backpacks after the bomb. and thats his elbow. look at the person in the foreground, not a backpack and elbow. some nerd yelling aint make it true

Dipshit, the constitution is what our country was founded on. How can this ridiculously jacked up security possibly be what makes our country great, when it directly contradicts everything this country was founded on and continues to stand for, motherfucking FREEDOM. If you don’t know what the constitution says, you should probably read it. And then say ‘FUCK YOU’ to anybody who tries to violate it. Here, just for convenience sake, and because you’re a misinformed dumbass who thinks they know it all, I’ll post the fourth amendment word for word. Just for you. “Amendment IV

Actually dipshit, there are numerous examples in the history on United States where Martial law occurred, including in its inception. But, you continue holding onto your insane thoughts that its better a terrorist be allowed to escape and continue to kill. BTW, spouting off parts of the Bill of rights and amendments does not make you appear smart when you leave the more inconvenient parts out that contradict your views.

Except Martial Law was never declared in Boston. A “Stay-In-Place” order was issued, an order whose legality is murky and will be legally challenged. Since Martial Law was not in effect and no state of emergency had been declared by the POTUS, then the actions of the police were illegal.

actually, there are only 2, not numerous. The Civil War and over Hawaii in response to the attack on Pearl Harbor. Unless your definition of ‘numerous’ is different then mine, then I’d say, technically, there are only a couple of examples.

Iraq used to have a strong central government who made sure bombing didn’t happen, his name was Saddam and he was a crazed dictator. Same With Moammar same with Assad, and what else do they all have in common, the US government is paying the same Terrorist (Al Qaeda) it is supposed to be fighting to assassinate those leaders. Fascism is so lovely please sing its praises again I do so love the song. Please don’t say America was afraid, you were afraid, not me, I’m not so scared I wont go outside. After all what is life without freedom and exercise of said freedom but enslavement. I will never understand how anyone can openly embrace their own enslavement, but America seems to be doing it.

Gaddafi was neither mad, nor a dictator, he handed power to the people of Libya in 1977. His philosophy, via the Green Book, download it free, was that people can govern themselves, so he did it. When the NATO clique attacked Libya, they were attacking everyone, not just Gadaffi, the country was united except for child slavers and drug dealers, who were the only part of the ‘rebellion’ that was Libyan…Gadaffi had at least 80% support, something western ‘leaders’ can only dream of. Assad is also supported by his people, in both cases lies and staged events are blamed on them to justify intervention under R2P… In Syria, it is estimated that only 10% of fighters are Syrian and they are doing it for the wages. They all get paid by the US/UK etc donations. Some of the fighters thought they were in Israel fighting the Israeli army…it’s an invasion, not a civil war…

Libya, Syria, and Iraq are all being militarized by America, so we are living in those places, according to the actions that occurred on Friday. It must be stated that I, as am American citizen, refuse to give my power over to anyone. I have the right to live and protect myself on this planet…as do those in the countries you named.

Also, you resort to saying if we don’t agree with our nation’s constitution being smashed, then leave. I think you have it backwards…you have been brainwashed to believe only military can protect. YOU can protect you. And, all this paramilitary insanity did nothing – the one kid was found by a homeowner.

And lastly, the Constitution has ALWAYS been defended by people throughout the land and will continue to be so. It is true there are those that push the limits to see how far they can seize control…then there are those who push back and make it good again.

What side are you on? And if you have words to write, please write them in your name, not anonymously. Stand up and be counted.

“Nobody knew who Boston was dealing with. A kid, a group of terrorists,
nobody actually knew.”…wrong…The FBI knew. They knew it when the
paraded grainy pictures of the “suspects” and asked for the “public’s
help” in “identifying” them, (photo’s which, btw, were posted as clear, decidedly un-grainy pictures on several websites).
The FBI knew WELL before . As a matter of fact they knew the suspects
intimately after having a three year plus relationship with them as well
as a working relationship with authorities in Russia which was ALSO
were directly involved with the “unknown” suspects. The FBI was forced
to come clean on these facts only because an upset mother couldn’t be
intimidated into keeping her mouth shut. The fact that this “feigned
ignorance” enabled them to launch a massive complacency programming test
on Boston has apparently been lost on you?

That is funny, because the people of Libya, Syria and Iraq live perpetually in a state such as Boston experienced last week.

uhhhh, we’re the ones who set the vast majority of those bombs off in their countries. Ever seen ‘collateral murder’? Terrorists by definition try to strike fear into the hearts of as many as possible and disrupt our free and peaceful way of life for as long as possible. That is exactly what happened. The best thing to do to a bully is to stand up to him, if the terrorist is the bully, then the citizens should have gone on with their lives as normally as possible, trusting the law enforcement of our country to apprehend the suspect in the most timely and least intrusive way possible. I might recommend 2-3 officers in body armor, with small sidearms, unmarked or regular squad cars, and civilian clothes going door to door asking people respectfully to have all occupants quickly show their faces and perhaps escort one of these friendly looking and sounding officers or national guardsmen around their property. If they really felt a search was necessary, then respectfully request in the same way if they could escort them on a quick walkthrough of the house. Though in my opinion entering resident’s homes would be going too far.

Actually, the police response did make Bostonians safer, only because it encouraged many of us to stay off the roads, which are far more dangerous than terrorism. It also postponed many elective surgeries — another cause of preventable death.

I don’t think anyone in this thread was actually in MA on Friday. To reiterate: NOBODY WAS SCARED. In fact, we were less scared. The easiest way to know that my daughter isn’t out getting killed by a drunk driver is to have her at home next to me.

Most of us stayed in our homes voluntarily to help the cops catch the bad guy. There was no “lockdown”. You can’t rewrite the truth according to your script.

I was in MA. I was in Boston, actually. I live there. I have for 11 years. I wasn’t scared. In fact, I went out for coffee and lunch in the middle of the day . Plenty of people out and about, albeit close to home.

So true! I just have a question to this George Donnelly, who calls himself a writer. What if this “only 19-year-old honor student” have killed one of his children instead of the 3 others victims from his terrorism in the Boston marathon? Or, what if this “only 19-year-old honor student” had decided to hide in his house, and kill all of his family instead of the brave police officer who was killed? What if that was the story? I’m so sure that he would have had a complete different thought… Mr. George Donnelly, you are just a writer. You don’t know or understand anything about security measures, but the law enforcement do! I’m not from USA, but I’ve been a US resident many years for one main reason, the security that this country offers. I wish in my country I could have ever seen what I saw yesterday, law enforcement working hard just for the security of all… Those men and women put their own lives on the line for people like you and your family. Don’t you be so UNGRATEFUL!

I would rather die than give up my self-respect and turn into a wimpering wuss who cowers in his home over a freaking teenager with a pressure cooker. I have my dignity and I plan to keep it. Of what purpose is a life spent cowering in fear of shadows?

Having a common system of security does not equate to “a life spent cowering in fear of shadows.” Your hyperbolic rhetoric is efficient at stirring people up, but ultimately is not based on reality. That “freaking teenager with a pressure cooker” went on a killing spree straight out of Grant Theft Auto until Boston police locked the situation down. One day of quarantine to track down a mass murderer on the loose will not encourage terrorists. A continued killing spree with dozens dead across a swath of Boston would have. No search for a dangerous terrorist armed to the teeth and ready to kill will ever be pretty, but an iPhone video is evidence out of context. Reconsider the big picture and whether leaving your macho pride intact is worth innocent deaths (as you state clearly that you believe it to be). As you retorted so arrogantly at Nicholas, “You don’t get it. Perhaps someday you will.” I hope that someday, you realize your immature, unhelpful role in stroking Americans’ outsized egos and reconsider your boastful and foolish stance.

I don’t think you understand the purpose of terrorism. It is not to kill a few people. It is to incite mass terror. It is to make people very, very afraid on a large scale.

If we allow ourselves to become afraid, then the terrorists are winning. This is a fact and has nothing to do with ego.

If we amplify the fear created by a small event like the Boston Marathon Bombing with the media and an unprecedented police action, then we’re playing into their hands.

Also, the terrorists realize that the mighty US military empire is sustained by US economic power. So every time they rob the country of economic output, they are winning. I want to see the US military empire gone as well but you have to realize that if it all comes crashing down due to terrorism, then the entire US society will be thrown into chaos and a lot of people will die needlessly.

If the terrorists kill 5 people, and are caught quickly, the public will be angry and sad, but no longer frightened. If the police don’t act aggressively enough to catch them quickly, and the terrorists kill another 5…or 10…or however many people, the people would be afraid. Not because terrorists, in a general sense, are out there – the people already expect that, and aren’t afraid, but rather are angry – but because they would not have faith in the ability of their nation’s protection system to protect them. THIS would be mass terror. In that definition lies my rejection of your claim.

If we allow the fear created by a small event like Boston to amplify – because we don’t contain it and KEEP IT A SMALL EVENT – then we’re playing into the hands of terror. Terrorists don’t just stop killing because their initially planned attack is completed – as we observed with police shootings, a car chase where grenades were thrown out the window of an SUV at police, and further exchanges of gunfire on Friday night. Do you think more of that would not get more media coverage? Further ongoing terror, chronicled in painstaking detail for the public to see and wonder if they might be next, until the police finally track the culprits? Faith in our protective system is the opposite of terror – except for conspiracy theorists asking the public to second-guess its safety at every turn.

Furthermore, an attack on a marathon is not intended to stop economic output. An attack on the business district or transportation infrastructure, or prolonged threats punctuated by small random attacks would be. You misidentify terrorism when you improperly group it into a singular thought process. There is no one purpose, other than “terror,” which each individual defines differently. By promoting this reductionalist interpretation, you are irresponsibly simplifying the situation to feed your sensationalist fear-mongering.

This response isn’t for your benefit, George, it is for the readers whom you are deluding. Don’t bother replying again unless you only want the last word, because I won’t give you the pleasure of baiting me into a debate. I don’t expect to change your (public) viewpoint because I get it – this blog is your shtick it gives you your unique identity to be another blog among the masses spouting off extremist viewpoints in an attention grab. But my hope is that at least a few readers will see past your sensationalism and remain rational.

My political philosophy comes from a place of optimism and trust, not fear. I trust and am optimistic that a society based on freedom not only can work but is the only workable option for dealing with my fellow men and women. That’s the opposite of fear.

you put individual liberties way above all else, forgetting that our individual rights can and often do infringe upon others’ if unchecked. You see any kind of communal help and support as a police state. You think we should all just pull ourselves up by our bootstraps, forgetting the millions of people who have nowhere near the amount of advantages you started with. If we were living in a libertarian utopia, we would be ravaged by preventable diseases because God forbid the government tell us what to do by insisting we vaccinate ourselves and our families. We would have a higher illiteracy rate because–and please try to retain this–not everyone has the means and education to home school their children. We would have vigilante justice. Common good protects many of the individual liberties you cherish, this country only triumphed when the states stopped squabbling and worked together, yet you believe any kind of communal cooperation is tyranny. I honestly cannot fathom your worldview.

Like I mentioned before Eve, there is no such thing as the common good. There are only a lot of autonomous individuals, none having more rights than any other. Even if you firmly believe that a common good exists, how can you possibly know it? There are 7 billion of us. Even if you can read minds, I doubt that you can read 7 billion minds at once.

“You see any kind of communal help and support as a police state”

That’s a lie.

I stopping there because that was simply ridiculous. You’re making assumptions about me that have no basis in reality.

“I honestly cannot fathom your worldview.” Clearly, because you seem to have very little comprehension of it.

It is built out of irrational paranoia… paranoia fomented by sites on the Internet and by people who think they know more than they actually do.

I would like to remind the author that both the shoe and underwear bombers failed due to gross incompetence on their part, and everyone onboard United 93 died horribly. Not exactly shining examples of how the no-state approach to collective security will make us all safer.

It wasn’t kept a small event. The FBI had already identified the 2 suspects before the lockdown was put in place.

“Whimpering wuss”? “Cowering”? “Freaking teenager”? “pressure cooker”? “fear of shadows”?

Seriously? Name calling? Your validation is crumbling with me. This is probably the last time I’m leaving a comment here because you just don’t seem to “get it”. And no amount of talking sense is going to help you come out of your straight-jacket.

How about these words:
“Smart person who understands the point of mortality (when you die, you’re dead forever, no reset, no coming back)”, “Protecting their self from harm”, “psychotic confirmed-killer”, “proven lethal bomb”, “an actual life-threatening current situation”?

What else would YOU do, Mr. Donnelly? Go on your own and hunt for the bomber yourself? Stop the bomber without guns, without body-armor, without care of your own life and hug him until he stops killing?

Would you have everyone simply just let the bomber go free and continue his parade of murder? Would that stop him? Would that scare future terrorists away?

“I would rather die than give up my self-respect” -Would you? WOULD YOU? Alright, I’m sure I can find a “freaking teenager” with a simple “pressure cooker” to come to your place so you can show your level of “self-respect” then. And of course replace “freaking teenager” and “pressure cooker” accordingly.

“Would you have everyone simply just let the bomber go free and continue his parade of murder?”

You’re being ridiculous. People suspected of committing crimes are apprehended daily without shutting down a major American metropolis.

What happened in Boston wasn’t a crime. It was an act of treason, yes, and multiple acts of murder, yes; but it was primarily a military incursion against the citizens of Boston, however limited in scope and duration. That it was perpetrated by two young men who were raised here and who were (both?) citizens only effects whether or not the perpetrators get a trial, not how they are apprehended.

If it had been a dozen shooters, operating in two man teams, each with a distinct AO in separate parts of the city, would you advocate the same stance of heroic indifference and no-state collective security?

Citizens wouldn’t have to go “without guns” if there wasn’t gun control. Gun control is another problem that goes against the Constitution. If the citizens were allowed to freely arm themselves, they would be able to protect themselves. Because the government has limited the basic ability to protect themselves, the citizens live in fear and are therefore happy to be put under martial law and have even more liberties taken away, ie unnecessary search and seizure. So the government is winning one step at a time. Remove one liberty, and force the people to allow removal of another. Make people believe that the only way they will be safe is with government intervention, because we have disarmed them so they cannot protect themselves. Brainwashing. Take away the people’s belief that they can think for themselves. Government must ORDER people to stay inside to be safe. They cannot DECIDE ON THEIR OWN if they feel safer inside or would rather risk going to work. Its slowly picking away at the Constitution and the foundation of our great country is crumbling. We are gradually working our way back to the way things were before the Revolutionary War, under complete control of a government that disallows liberty and freedom of its citizens.

are you a parent, and if so, are you as cavalier about putting self-respect above your children’s safety? This is one of the biggest flaws in libertarianism: you forget that people care about more than just their own lives.

Yes, I am. But I am not being cavalier. This is an issue I have spent many years considering. What I definitely would not put above my son’s safety are the arbitrary orders of government bureaucrats. Staying inside is not smart because (1) if there is a greater risk, like a dirty bomb, then we’re sitting ducks and (2) If I need assistance, it’s harder to get it because we’re isolated.

And in the long run, the lockdown gave the terrorists exactly what they want – an interruption of business-as-usual in the US. So it’s making my son less safe because it will incentivize more terrorist attacks.

Also, that people care about more than themselves is not a fact that is absent in libertarian political theory!

I find it difficult to believe that you know better than the FBI, Boston PD, National Guard, etc. If what you say is true, there would be a chorus of criticism from the international community, from countries that deal with this all the time. There were resources set up so people could get help if they needed it. Your points defending your stance are dead wrong. You’re trying to justify something I find morally reprehensible: putting your political beliefs above your family’s safety. You don’t make for a good spokesman for your cause.

Your kids are your personal concern/dilemma not mine nor the rest of society’s. While I adore kids, I am sick to death of parents slamming this in everyone’s face. I don’t value your likely dip-shit kids above any other human life!

“only 19-year-old honor student”
I would have preferred “weekend terrorist and part-time bomber” ( GIGGLE ). Lock down the city! Have the peasants take cover immediately – we are sending in the Tanks! :-)

well if the terrorist decided to hide in his house I suppose that being forced to stay in his house would have been useless. You guys don’t understand that freedom has a price. Everybody assumes that only soldiers pay that price, but in reality we as a nation have to be willing to pay the price if we truly cherish the freedoms this country offers. Unfortunately every time some idiot does something like this we are too willing to hide and coward when we should be standing up for the one thing we should all cherish. As scary as it is to come out and live your life after such attacks we must do so if we truly believe in preserving freedom. I guess the problem lies in the fact that too many people no longer understand what it means when they say freedom has a price.

“As scary as it is to come out and live your life after such attacks we must do so” … and then be blown to steaming, powdery bits because we didn’t think bombs were going to kill us at the exact time we were told a bomber was loose in the area… yeah, real smart there bucko. Go ahead and prove Darwin right. Those with the best instincts live longer.

Actually, there was a pipe bomb found on Friday morning at Charlesgate and Commonwealth Ave in Boston, that the police found – they shut down the area to keep the area clear and had to do a controlled detonation. I was listening to the police scanner all day that day, and I live in the area and work in Lexington, Ma, just outside the perimeter of towns that were asked to stay in their homes…which was voluntary, by the way, Not a single person was arrested for stepping outside. Also, my cousin is a member of the SWAT team, and he went in, risking his own safety for trying to make sure the rest of us were safe. And I really can’t believe how you can just nonchalantly refer to the bombers as a “Teenager with a Pressure cooker”…that was not just a “pressure cooker” it was a BOMB that killed 3 Innocent civilians, including a child for fucksake, and Maimed over 180 other people. These two “teenagers” had a bunch more bombs too, as they were tossing them out the window of an SUV like beads at a Mardi Gras parade!

The cops took this threat very seriously, because if they hadn’t many more would have been killed, I promise you that…oh and “only three” people died…it would have been a LOT more had the first responders and other civilians acting as quickly as they did to provide tourniquets and get all those people to the hospitals.

Ok, so one pipe bomb required the closing of a major US city? The lockdown was not voluntary. There were checkpoints. Streets were blocked. People were forced out of their homes. The evidence is right on this page if you care to see it.

The only place one finds the words “only three” on this page are in YOUR comment. Be careful not to put words in my mouth – it’s intellectually dishonest and not very polite.

“Reality” is something you yourself don’t seem to have a grasp on, Mr. Donnelly. You come across as a disgusting little human being with an attitude problem and a need to wave around his dick so people can see how enormous it must be since GODFORBID people stay inside when their city has been victim of a terrorist attack.

I have big dogs and lots of guns, and am quite secure in my home…a right I have as an American (a right that has slowly been chipped away in MA, at least when it comes to the firearms). Plenty of Americans are more than knowledgable, capable, and willing to provide their own security measures. If the kid showed up here with his crock pot, it may well have been my last day on earth, but it would have been his, too.

I declare today National “Polish An Officer’s Boots Day”. Everyone put on your worst outfit, go out and buy some shoe polish, and go find some Police on lunch and ask you can spit-shine their shoes while chanting USA after paying for their lunch.

I think you missed the part where the people of Boston had their rights taken away with those bullshit searches. I would have been pissed, that’s my motherfucking house. And I feel like the only reason your comment didn’t get more downvotes is because you have to create an account to vote something down, and you don’t have to to upvote/comment. And people are lazy. But seriously, don’t be a little vagina when it comes to your rights. Those pigs kicked innocent people out of their homes at random to find one dude… I don’t know how you don’t dare incriminate and criticize them for doing so.

They are being criticized for the WAY they went about it. There are federal and state laws which they violated, not counting the 4th Amendment to the US Constitution! Does that not matter? They were the ones SWORN TO PROTECT THE CONSTITUTION, yet they crapped all over it, stumbling toward an elusive suspect! Shame on “someone”. :(

Excuse me Nicholas, but we have a system in place that says, “Innocent until proven guilty.” I have seen absolutely NOTHING proving their guilt. Nothing. And until they stand their day in court with a jury of 12 people, they are innocent.

About 10 times as many people are killed every weekend in Chicago as were killed by this kid – do you think Chicago should always be under martial law?

Not only was this illegal, but it was completely irrational and pointless too.

They didn’t lock down LA to hunt Dorner, and he was far more armed, dangerous, and willing to kill with more bodies in his wake. Your argument is invalid.

Were you actually in Boston? I’ve spoken to numerous people out there who were approached by authorities to have their homes searched. They were not forced to comply. The officers came to the door, asked residents if they wanted to have their homes searched, and if they said no, they moved on to the next home.

This article is way overstated.

Oh yeah, it must be a big misunderstanding. The photo of the snipers on the rooftops. The gentleman in his bathrobe coming down the steps of his house with Assault Weapons pointing in his direction. He must have just been so excited to cooperate with the Teddy-Bear’s knocking on his door asking if he wanted a search ( GIGGLE )

Sharp, of course it’s way overstated. The only way libertarians can get any traction is by sowing fear and distrust. The vast majority of libertarian thought was created by scared little children who couldn’t possibly understand how Nazism came to be and they’re simply overreacting and cowering at any show of state force. They’re fundamentally unamerican.

That’s not true at all. I’m a libertarian, and I’m sure there were examples of improper search with the sheer number of authorities involved. But it wasn’t the standard and there is a bit of overreaction surrounding this article.

Really. I live in Boston. At 10AM, I went for a walk and got some coffee. Saw about 20 police cars. Not one stopped me. At 2PM, I went to the gym that was open. At 6PM, I had some neighbors over for dinner and news. Shortly before that, I walked to an open liquor store to get some wine.

Wine, coffee, fine food, exercise, and unobstructed exchange of ideas with friends and neighbors. The archetype of martial law.

a spokeswoman for the ACLU pointed out that there was no order to stay inside, only an advisory. People obeyed it because they cared more about the safety of their loved ones and community than about adhering to a selfish and extremist political ideology. What cowards you all are…

It had nothing to do with 9,000 paramilitary troops armed with machine guns, ordering people out of their homes with their hands up, telling videographers to stop filming, pointing weapons at people looking out of the windows of their own homes. Right.

Libertarianism is about equality, peace and honesty. Those may be extreme ideas to you, but they’re run-of-the-mill for me.

once you admitted that if your family was in that situation you’d sacrifice their well-being in a blind adherence to your political beliefs, and refused to back down even when I proved that your arguments that people would be safer obstructing a police investigation in a city possibly armed with more bombs was woefully flawed, I realized I was speaking to a blind ideologue. There’s nothing peaceful about the libertarians I see the GOP manipulating to scream about dismantling government and arming everyone regardless of whether or not it’s safe for them to carry and fire a gun. There’s nothing supporting equality in kicking indigent and sick people into the street and telling them to fend for themselves as you assume they have the same resources and advantages as you. You are a selfish zealot and I will not be responding to any more of your fallacious arguments.

“You’re making assumptions about me that have no basis in reality.”

You’re making assumptions about the people of Boston that have no basis in reality. Yes, you can keep showing the ONE video you keep showing, but there’s a darn sight more people in Boston than that, Mr. Donnelly.

Oh yes. It is majorly overstated, mostly be people sensationalizing a video or some photos rather than actually listening to people who lived through the “lock down”.

Here is what life looked like for 95% of Boston residents that day:

1. Stay at home voluntarily

2. Walked down the street in the morning to an open coffee shop.

3. Went out for lunch in the neighborhood of your house.

4. Watched the news.

5. Kept an eye out for suspicious behavior.

There were three 5-10 block areas that were under evacuation or car/pedestrian traffic stop: Inman Square, Boylston Street bombing site, and the 10 block radius in Watertown where the suspect was last seen. All in all, perhaps 500-100 people – not ZOMG MILLIONS!

People weren’t under martial law. We were supporting and participating in a police action to find the f*cker who bombed our city!

You are quite simply incorrect about the number of people affected. The evidence is in the article. I even saw mainstream media estimating that 2 to 5 million people stayed home from work that day.

I am far from incorrect. I wasn’t referring to people who were staying home from work, either because the absence of public transportation or because of choice.

I’m referring to the people who were either evacuated from their homes or ordered to remain in their homes for their own safety. That number, as I pointed out, was very, very small and only occurred in two additional neighborhoods on Friday (not including the already existing evacuation of the residents and shops on that segment of Boylston Street).

Many people stayed at home. That is very different than being forced to stay in your home. Only two neighborhoods in Boston were in that level of lockdown, as I had pointed out. The remaining neighborhoods were not in lock down. People could go outside. Shops were open. Aside from the odd police car here and there, it felt like a quiet, summer, Saturday morning.

Here is a list of neighborhoods where people were not forced to remain in their homes:

North End
Downtown Crossing
Financial District
Beacon Hill
Back Bay
South End
South Boston
East Boston
Central Square
Harvard Square
Kendall Square
Union Square
Porter Square
Davis Square
Ball Square/Powderhouse Square
West Roxbury
Jamaica Plain
Sullivan Square

Don’t believe me, though. It’s not like I wasn’t there or anything.

Would mowing the lawn during Boston’s Lockdown result in terminal punishment?
I can’t help but believe this was a “Generated Crisis”. Was the Boston Bombing was a secret plan to eliminate objection to the Gun Vote the following day?

Chuck, George doesn’t have any idea what happened in Boston. Of course you could go outside and mow your lawn.

You have been able to put my thoughts into words and share it to America. You are very intelligent, people like you will help change this country back to where it needs to be. I feel like a prisoner here and I’m not even in Boston! Thank you for this GREAT read.

Ironically you call the United States weak because it was a “19 year old kid” who was able to cause such havoc and then you continue saying if the kid knew what he was doing that the situation would have been worse. But your entire article is about how law enforcement here went too far. Make up your damn mind then. Did law enforcement go too far in Boston, or “is America weak” and did law enforcement not go far enough. You sir, are an incompetent idiot.

This article is complete trash and seems to be written by a child himself. First apparently America is the best country in the world and America single handedly defeated Hitler in World War II. Am I reading a “news” article here or am I reading an over glorification of America that the author felt inclined to write after watching the intro of The Newsroom?

1. Terrorism “Works”
The city was going to lose money regardless after this event. Did American tourism decline after 9/11? Yes. Is it going to decline going to Boston after this bombing? Yes. The author is angry about money loss because the city closed however there would have been immense money losses anyway because this event occurred in the first place and people don’t want to go to Boston because of that fact.

2. There’s two reasons security was heightened as much as it was. First, nobody originally knew what Boston was dealing with and in that right the security was justified, because the attack could have been perpetrated by individuals whom were seeking to do a lot more additional damage proceeding the initial bombing. Second, the security was put in place because your absolutely ridiculous media industry blew up the story to be as large as the States itself and the security was implemented throughout the city to make the people feel safer (think airport security, it doesn’t catch every threat but it makes fliers feel safer).

3. The US being “shockingly weak” is absolute and utter crap. Put two high profile criminals in a massively populated area and you have yourself a needle in a haystack almost impossible to hunt down. Again this section of the article seems to emphasize that the kid was just 19 but at the time nobody knew that and nobody knew what Boston was dealing with. If this had been a full scale terrorist attack you would likely be advocating that not enough was done.

4. Your “The Proper Reaction” is essentially a feel good cluster of text and doesn’t actually discuss at length what strategy should have been taken to catch the criminals in question because it’s easy for you to criticize how the situation was handled but since you lack a magic wand you don’t have the faintest of clues as to how the situation should have been handled in order to produce results as efficiently as results were produced.

Your article was complete nonsense, written poorly and doesn’t actually make any realistic or even just slightly conceivable points whatsoever. Boston was definitely not a city state for a day, instead your own government took actions to make sure your own people felt safe, and your own government demonstrated that if this had been a bigger threat, that they were ready and that they would have done everything in their power to resolve it swiftly.

It is precisely the phenomenon of law enforcement overstepping its bounds that enables 1 kid, or a dozen across a nation, to be so powerful as to bring the country to its knees. In other words, what the kid did, while obvously abhorrent, is not powerful enough on its own to cost the people of the Boston area $1 billion dollars of economic output. It was the government response that multipled enormously the brothers’ impact to such levels as shutting down a major US city. Does that make it any clearer for you?

It didn’t cost the Boston are of $1 billion dollars of economy output. God, do you believe everything you misread?

Wh has to be stressed, again, is that the economic effectwas most likely not on either of these is guys’ minds. Pointing it the economici, or possible economic impact, is pointless and has no validity as pertaining to any Actions actions that the Boston police department had taken in capturing these individuals. It makes no sense

They were attempting to prevent more bombs going off. They were attempting to prevent the deaths of more people.

And they did, didn’t they? $1 billion? Nothing, compared to keeping people alive. Unless you want to put a value on a human beings life? You want to do that? How much are the people of Boston worth to you? Sickening.

“””No. It would be suicide for you and yours to fire on the paramilitary
home intruder.”””

The AR platform makes a fine, fine home defense platform. You kick in my door you’ll be met with…Well, with whatever is handy at the movement, but frankly rifles just work better.

In general your post is more-or-less spot on though. The actions of the Feds and the BPD virtually guarantee that this will happen again.

Get training–first aid and firearm training. Keep a tourniquet, an Israeli Battle Dressing and a handgun on you when you’re in public, and know how to use them. Especially (with the medical stuff) on yourself.

I like ARs. I have owned one in the past and enjoyed it immensely. It just seems like Watertown is a densely-populated area and a lone home intruder on the run from police is probably not coming in the front door. You may face a situation where there is precious little space between you and the attacker. You may not be able to get a rife up and in firing position in time.

Obviously a bunch of idiots who were not there and if they were when the gunfire started? You would all still be cleaning stains from your underwear..

Your point is well taken, Donnelly. I made the same observation myself about the lift of the lockdown leading to the quick capture of the suspect. However, I guess my reaction is simply a little more muted than yours. I guess I would have felt better if the theme of the lock down failing was more evident than it seems to be…given the general reaction of the citizens of Boston. The reflexive cheering of Bostonians with little concern for the fact that the siege is not what found the suspect is somewhat disappointing.

For all you people who do not like it here in America, then move. Our boarders are open for you to move, please go.

It’s so easy for people to comment who don’t actually live in the area affected… speculating how they would feel, what they would do…. Do you think perhaps this government, that you don’t trust, knows a bit more than they were letting on (and still do)? We are proud of our city and proud of the way our residents AND officials responded.

The point being that you would have wanted to walk happily out into the street where a gunman holding explosives could have been hiding out?

Yes, politely requested over a loudspeaker from a humvee where there was a man with a machine in a turret and a dozen paramilitary buddies similarly armed barking orders, um *requests*, to them. Sure thing.

I have friends who live down the street from the suspect’s house. They gathered in the street and had their pictures taken while the FBI worked in the background. You are grossly misrepresenting facts to prop up your political agenda.

People, if you are here then you should be good candidates to read this book and understand what led to the police state that is yet to come as well as the transformation from a constitutional republic to the mob rule democracy. Please check out this site and think about buying the book. We are like minded people and the more prepared the better!

You can also learn more at their fb group page (

So much nonsense. What can man do against such reckless lack of fact-checking?

This is the most factually inaccurate and nonsensical, deluded piece of writing I’ve read in months. Keep in mind I’ve visited Conservapedia on accident within that time frame, so that’s really saying something.

Wow. I actually made it through the article and all the comments. I have received an education.

That Boston suffered economically is outweighed for me by the statement sent by law enforcement that terrorism is not tolerated. Life is more than metrics, spreadsheets, cost-benefit analyses, and economic evaluations. Just as the assassination of a public figure has more of a public effect than the death of an unknown citizen, so a terrorist event like what happened at the Boston Marathon has a disproportionate psychological effect. Thus a disproportionate response matches the offense. This is a rare–but real–example of using a hammer to crush an ant.

Bostonians dislike it when terrorist outsiders kill their citizens. They disliked it on March 5, 1770, and they disliked it this past week. I think Boston responded in a very Bostonian way. And since they were the ones in danger–not you–perhaps a more nuanced article is in order.

While I certainly respect–and would fight for–your right to write this thought-provoking post, I also disagree with your extreme conclusions. If you had nuanced your argument differently, I might have been more receptive to it. As it stands, it seems like your article cheers your flag-wavers but gains few converts.

Zero tolerance policies are blank checks for government tyranny. I don’t wave flags. I don’t seek converts. I just call it like it is. The governments at work here magnified the fear around the bombing.

The Whiskey rebellion. the slave revolts, and the civil war among others would be historical incidents where the US government dealt decisively with armed attacks.

Going door to door in a small neighborhood looking for a mad bomber known to be on the loose and in the area is quite reasonable. Using massive numbers of police to do it quickly is reasonable. The two interviews and the images i have seen are that the police knocked on the door and asked if they could search. Saying Yes is the home owners right.

The question that should be asked is why was the boat not searched. Is it possible that the owner of the property told them no?

Shutting down the rest of the city was overkill. As for it being a ‘police state”.. Not even close.

Wow, you’re really some kind of idiot aren’t you? Boston wasn’t turned into a police state. People could walk outside if they wanted, they could drive if they wanted. Police weren’t stopping them and demanding papers and impeding free travel. It was a *request*, and, people being sensible and not scared little libertarians, exercised their right to follow a reasonable request. I love your little value judgments, like claiming Bostonians were “cowering” in their own homes. Leave your own projections out of it. I don’t know anyone who was “cowering” in their home. From your statement though, I can guess what you’d be doing in the same situation, and it isn’t pretty. I do know plenty of people who voluntarily decided to cooperate and allow the police to do their jobs. You think you need to tell *us* to regain our self-respect? You need to look in a mirror, grow up, and realize that your adolescent libertarian tough-guy is fundamentally incompatible with the principles upon which this country was founded.

Again, there are approximately two areas on complete lockdown going in and out. Inman Square and a neighborhood in Watertown. The actual lock down itself impacted perhaps 2% of Suffolk County.

Our point is simple: You’re taking a small amount of evidence that you are misrepresenting and blowing it up to a grand statement of “Entire city under martial law” when that was simply not the case. At all.


No one said anything or did anything when they dropped their bombs at the finish line, so how effective was the regular joe at preventing this event from even happening.

No one was able to prevent this so if you’re comparing the government vs the regular joe, it’s a draw. I don’t claim that regular folks are perfect, I just claim that they are the critical factor in preventing terrorism and locking them up in their homes is not helping. I suspect counter-insurgency experts will have something interesting to say on this topic.

Aside from, you know, when a suspect is on the loose who was shown to be in possession of explosives, thought to have a bomb strapped to his chest, was armed, and was willing to take hostages….

That is justifiable cause to ask the small number of people in the neighborhood he was tracked to to remain in their homes. It is also grounds to search homes and yards for said armed suspect. Exigent circumstances.

enough of the bashing of the average parent/homeowner in Boston/Watertown. While I don’t think acceptance of the lock down was a good thing, people were thinking about their families. Going forward we need to voice our displeasure with the police/paramilitary overblown response.

I could’ve sworn I heard that a woman, from inside get home, saw something and with her neighbor’s boat, thereafter alerting the authorities of what she had noticed which brought the Making manhunt to that house, and the rest was covered by breaking news reports. That’s what I remember hearing.

My God! What a media coverage of “The Manhunt”! All those media tracks “conveniently” and “strategically” parked around “the war-zone scene”! Let’s pay attention to the word used: “War”! “The Manhunt”, it seems the title of a movie! How strange Spielberg is not there too! Most probably because the real director of this MACABRE and sadly REAL movie is Obama himself! It seems he wants to make sure that all American people and the whole world are well illustrated about this unprecedented display of military power and about how these “brave” TEN THOUSANDS POLICEMEN are at “killing” JUST TWO YOUNG STUDENTS WHO THE HUNTERS SAY ARE “MERELY SUSPECTS”. Do they call this MANHUNT “doing Justice”? It rather looks like “murder”. And in fact, more than media coverage “all this staging” looks rather like “a cover up”. And the saddest thing about all this is that these two students seem to have been used as scapegoats. And all this because “in this movie” the American Government is called “to play the role of “Superman””, the invincible superhero who arrives at “the crime scene” to “serve Justice”. Bottom line, who and what is really behind the Boston Bombs that all this “cover up” seems to be so eagerly trying to hide! May be perhaps the Obama Administration itself to justify his need to turn the US into a TOTALITARIAN AND POLICE STATE? Pls read and share this valuable information on this subject:

I agree with origanalist these idiots are cheering cause they are steeple they won’t be cheering when they heard them into the Fema camps

Hey, remember in the DC area when we went about our daily business while terrorists were on the loose? That worked out well!

Your daisy-dew-drop view of terrorism is cute.
“Oh, the terrorists will be frightened of us and leave us alone if we show them that they can readily-expect us to ‘not do anything’ about their active bombing of our city and that we’ll all be in the same place at the same time every day no matter what they do because making ourselves predictable is making things much more difficult and scary for the terrorists”
Yeah, that’ll scare them right out of their pants and have them running home to suck their thumbs. They’ll never think twice about hating American’s again.


I say remove the emotionally-stirring word “powerful” and fix your misused word “courage” for “stupidity” and we have a correct statement.

And beyond that, much of your claims are purely subjective/emotional.

“19-year-old honor student”, “angsty teenager”, “pressure cooker”
You even beg the emotional question: How can you let a simple youngster “frighten you into abandoning your daily routine and cowering in your home as if it were a prison”
Here’s the real deal: I DIDN’T let a teenager scare me into my home. I heard “bomb”, after that, who-the-heck cares who is carrying it? Grizzled terrorist or third-grade girl in a pink tutu. I let common sense and survival instincts tell me that “Bombs kill. Stay away from them.”
If I see a kitten with dynamite strapped to it’s back, I’m not about to pick it up and snuggle with it. I’m about to run and shout “BOMB!” and purposely forget to mention “on a kitten!” because that’s not what’s important to focus on. Yet that’s what you are doing in half of this article. I picture the scene where everyone else is running away to get some distance and your standing right next to the bomber laughing “Hey guys. Pfft, It’s only a teenager, why are you all running?” *boom*

And then you stated to the effect that “My self-respect is more important than my life.”
You know what? There were a lot of self-respecting Jews that still wound up in concentration camps. Many of them wrote books on the matter (if they were the lucky few to survive.) Do you think any of them were not “self-respecting” for “living another day”? You are saying that THEIR priorities are skewed and not your own? I pull out an extreme case here because that’s what you have been trying to do in your article here. You are trying to extort human emotions here through fear yourself to get people to agree with you.

It’s just outright stupidity to say “I rather die than have my self-respect tarnished.” You haven’t really been put in to any life-or-death situations, have you? Your lily-soft hands have never been cuffed and told to work in the mud and grime or die, have they? Your instincts at that moment might actually kick-in and say “You know… I could have them spill my blood in the dirt and have me writhing in pain in the muck right now… OR, I could do this dirty chore for a day, month, or year and find my way out of this and back into better life later.”

There is “self-respect” and “self-preservation”. And a lot of us “seemingly dumber” people will choose “self-preservation now, self-respect later” rather than “death now, to prove a self-righteous point to deaf ears.”

You further wrote: “My self-respect demands that I not allow another person [in reference to the armed police] to control me through fear. It demands that I have courage. It demands that I resist evil.”

Are you saying that the police force that we elect/allow to protect us on a daily basis now brings you FEAR? Are you now implying that THEY are the “EVIL” ones in this case???

Whose side are you on? Why are you fearing the like-minded American citizens whose JOB it is to protect American lives? Have you been to any of their debriefings? They don’t stand around in a candle-lit cave plotting “How can we further entrap the American’s in our clutches of control!” No, they are a bunch of average Joe’s who woke up that morning, came to work and were filled-in that “We have a situation here that needs attention. We have a lot of frightened people and a person on the loose leaving home-made bombs in trusted public areas. At the moment, this person is showing no signs that he is finished taking innocent lives. A lot is at stake. If we stand idly by and allow another bomb to go off then the American people will put much of the blame on our lack of mobilization. Let’s hit him hard and fast to stop this senseless killing here.”

You need to get your priorities straight and learn to differentiate your conspiracy-fantasies with utter-reality. Now, I don’t like or agree with Obama and the current Congress… but I won’t go so far as to say they are staging practice attacks on ourselves.

Last (and probably least of my arguments)

“I blame them [Bostonians] for cheering their oppressors [the police force]”

Another clue of your strange hatred towards our own trusted law-enforcement over some “unknown” and life-threatening bomber. “Oppressors”? Really? Another emotionally-charged phrase thrown in to influence others to your side? I cheered because these FINE men did their expected JOB and averted further senseless loss of innocent lives (yes, I used the same words again, because it’s a perfect description. Get over it English majors.)
Could they have done a better job? Almost always. Given these circumstances though? Probably not. It was a mess, but they dealt with it anyway. And that they ACTUALLY CAUGHT THEIR INTENDED SUSPECT? That is amazing even for me who is cheering for them. I was expecting the culprit to escape and an avalanche of negative PR against the police forces. (Headlines like “All those police, and nothing to show”, “American law bungles again!” “No surprise here! The police lose the suspect.”)

It’s really a Catch 22 everyday for these guys. Damned if they do, damned if they don’t. Lighten up and tell them they did a good job given their crazy circumstances. Congratulate them for actually catching one.

Mr. Donnelly, if I wasn’t giving you the benefit of the doubt here, I’d ask what your ulterior motives for this article is. It seems like you have a strong support in favor for anarchist terrorists’-side here, and you are trying to influence American’s from trusting their own government by calling the police force “evil” and “oppressors”.
Luckily, I’m chalking it up to the fact that you might just be a conspiracy hobbyist. Which is okay: “Freedom of speech” is one of the many things this “oppressive” government gives you. Along with the right to vote and the right to bear arms (although Obama IS trying to stifle that right now… You should write conspiracies around that. Unless, that is, you also enjoy disarming the Americans so that your terrorist friends will have an easier time against us in our own borders… See? I can write crazy conspiracies too.)

Sooo, you’re not going to clarify it then?
And then on top of that you’re just going to ignore the rest of what I said then too, are ya?
Well, THAT’S convenient for you, isn’t it?
Thanks for not shedding any new light and just casting a longer shadow at the door.
Thanks for taking the same time that I did in critiquing your article.
Thanks for so-readily standing by your own statements that I so easily poked holes into.
I’m disappointed you shied away from my particular argument. I wanted to hear more about how I was wrong and you were right.
And then I wanted to strip the pretty adjectives and anecdotes that you hide behind to get down to the core of your belief to show you that you stand on a pinhead of philosophical depth while the rest of us “cowering, whimpering wusses” stand on solid ground of common sense and thousands of years of survival instinct.
I wanted to study your utter aversion to law enforcement and your baseless trust that “good things will happen” if we do the ideological “right thing”. And show you that while things work in theory they don’t work in practice. In this article you have already proven that you can’t possibly ever think like a terrorist (take it as a compliment) and if you even try to think like one you’ll only surely be making a grave generalization that misses the fact that not all terrorists think alike. You could say all terrorists have a specific motive in mind, but then you find out that many men do in fact just enjoy watching the world burn. You might say they all aim to cripple our economy, but then find out they only aim to kill as many as they can before they get caught and that your assertion that economy was a target just makes them squeeze their eyes tightly as they try not to tear up in their uproarious laughter against you. You can try and try again to understand the terrorist mind only to find out there is never going to be any inkling of a reliable pattern. It is completely sporadic and based on the different stirring experiences and delusions of each particular so-called terrorist.
Even the word “terrorist” is misleading. It infers that “terror” *is* their prime objective. When in most cases it is simply a sadistically satisfying byproduct to their heinous actions.
I think you should not fancy yourself a philosophical writer, because you are neither philosophical nor a great writer. That is not to infer that I am one, but I would pride myself as a critic of such things, and your article was (though emotionally-stirring) ineffective in displaying convincing evidence to share your point of view.

> Is this the country that defeated Hitler in World War 2?

Wait, who believes that US defeated Hitler in WWII? Last I checked, Stalingrad was in Russia. US defeated Hitler in WWII just as much as Russians defeated Japan by invading Manchuria in the last minute.

It wasn’t the Soviet Red Air Force strategic bombers that were beating the shit out of German war industry around the clock for two years. And I seem to recall an awful lot of American grain, steel, trucks, and even small arms ammo making it’s way to the USSR during the worst days of WWII as well…

Silly Americans.. they crib about self-respect when dozens out there are willingly sacrificing their own lives for these Americans’ safety. They crib about having to stay one day at home, when numerous others are trying to convey a message to trouble makers that they wouldn’t get too far. You really ought to live in some place like Iran, Iraq, Pakistan where they don’t even get to voice their opinions against the Military. Huh, for what you suggested, should have been the right way of dealing with this, why didn’t you yourself act according to your proper reaction?
Why didn’t you have the courage to go out against the police orders? Were you afraid that they would hold a gun agianst you? Well so would the bomber have done. Why didn’t you give up your life to a military person than to a terrorist? Would have been more worthwhile. Easier sitting back at home and typing down a shitty, stupid essay in the comfort of your safety.

Hey, moron, your fav dictatorships started somewhere… is your rabbit brain too minuscule to consider where? Dictatorships evolve from SOMETHING. They don’t just purely exist… They are made… Some of you simple-minded military/authority-addicted dweebs need to open the brain stem up to new knowledge that has evolved over the last 1k years in terms of sociopolitical information rather than being stooge bitches for government spoon feeders.

The video of paramilitary troops going door to door in an American city, rifles up and aimed at residents being forcefully driven out of their home at the point of a gun, hands on head, searched like prisoners; that was the most chilling thing I have ever seen in America in all my years.

My God, they were so efficient at it, as though they drilled for this everyday? I suppose we’re to feel proud that our government has domestic paramilitary forces so well trained and equipped as to execute a forceful population control, search and capture operation like that over such a large geographical area of dense population with such precision?

Right at the moment though, I am just stunned on a lot of levels…those visuals are simply shocking to me. Even if for a good purpose this week, the existence of a federally controlled paramilitary power that can be deployed on a domestic population like that….well…history shows these things can have very undesirable consequences.

K. ‘Cept I’ve studied the rudiments of dictatorship for 20 years. Your microscopic brain has no idea how your ‘real dictatorships’ initiate. Sadly.

I guess those years teaching ESL to students from Equador, Venezuela, Turkey, and Saudi Arabia render me clueless. If you can’t argue without resorting to name-calling–and lame name-calling at that–you don’t have an argument.

question to all you liberty-loving he-men: how should the authorities have gone about catching these two? You obviously have all the answers. How should it have gone down? Give me specific tactics, please, not just a diatribe about how your gun makes you a superhero.

Here’s a better idea, hero. YOU tell us. Since we all don’t fucking GET what it means to have a nazi boot on our fat ‘Merican necks, according to you.

So, Mr. Condon, you ‘condone’ house to house paramilitary searches of AMERICAN homes. AMERICAN FAMILIES being led from their home with hands above heads over a single shit fuck terrorist? I’m pretty sure the Nazis did this in their search for the hated Jew but they NEVER made a GERMAN citizen submit to the state like these sick fucks are making AMERICANS submit. Your knowledge of history is a woefully inadequate.

Christ, the Nazis and Stalin’s Russia are a PRIMARY example of massive elite empires that strangle the citizenry. Negating this over Just-world leanings indicates a total disconnect from reality which I’m sure you are expressly adept at.

you fool, here the police didn’t know who the actual ‘terrorist’ was. They were assuming anybody could be behind this and hence, those strict measures. Its easier to spot a Jew among a bunch of Germans. Idiot!

“They were assuming anybody could be behind this…”

Sooo, let us just make the entire United States a pitiful terrorist camp shall we? EVERY fuckin’ American is capable of killin’ people. Right? So, what’s to stop the concentration camps, fuckwaffle? What’s to stop the gubment paranoia, fuckwaffle? What’s to stop TURNING OFF the brain and branding ANYONE slightly different a terrorist, nutsucker?

Bring in the American citizen that that is trained to treat his/her citizen companions as ‘anybody that could be behind horror’ and ya got some serious fucking problems in the BEST society on earth- American society. People like you stupid bitches KILL IT! and you are too retarded to even knowit.

Honestly, I feel you don’t value your self-respect more than your life. Just staging to pull over people on your blog. If that would have been true, wouldn’t you have been a part of some Military police force? rather than being a dramatic libertarian?

I’ve shut down everyone I’ve wanted to, so I’m out. One last thing: sitting in safety and calling people who lived in the midst of the first terrorist attack on American soil since 9-11 cowards does not make you smarter or superior. It makes you a hypocritical, judgmental coward. Enjoy your mangled 1984 references.

You shut down no one you sick pig. Your mind doesn’t work. It’s been created and, sadly, the system you’ve aligned with WILL make you see the outside as animals….

Not impressed with George’s opinion. Sorry. That coordinated police response is the reason why those two animals where hunted and cornered. George does seem to enjoy his blogging role as Monday morning quarterback tough.

So, your wife was led out of her house with hands on her head, yelled at, and then searched by some arrogant fuck down the street?

Sure, the police could instead politly ask if there was a terrorist in the house and if they got a “No” they would just leave. Because naturally anybody that would be harboring a fugitive would just be honest and give them up when asked. Maybe they would just lay down and not attempt a violent escape if the police were really nice to them.

Americans all lie, right? Bring in the bullets and drones… ‘cuz naturally we cain’t bahlieve no goddamn ‘Merican boyz’n girlz….

You always have to assume the worse. There are plenty of dead people who, “bahlieved them good’ole ‘Merican boyz’n girlz kood do’s nah wrongz”

I find it insulting they are calling him just an honor student with a
pressure cooker. What a load of B.S. to down play how dangerous that man
is. This man actually got away twice after committing heinous crimes.
Let’s just pretend he’s an angst driven teen and not to be taken
seriously. From what they knew this man could blow up an entire house,
so yes they went into any suspected house very tactically. I’d like to
see everyone drive AWAY from their children to just go to work like
normal with someone 2 blocks away packing bombs and a lust for blood. To
make the assumption that most of those people didn’t volunteer to stay
home is also BS.

It’s a “to each his own situation”. You’re either going to think it was necessary for the protection of the city. Or that is was a belligerent attack on the constitution. All I see from articles like this and the comments I read are that people just want to be right and don’t care about anything else. In all honesty, I’ve been hearing the “before it’s too late” phrase since the mid-nineties (I’m sure people have said it before, I’m just not that old), and have yet to see anything to the contrary.

American society killed by the best intentions. Period. The despicable killers and maimers of precious innocents WIN!!!!! DON’T you people SEE IT! You lose your freedoms by giving your security to the military-minded (Home-invading SWAT/FBI/Police which is a DICTATORIAL cognition. New answers and methods are required to retain the PRECIOUS thing called OPEN SOCIETY and the military is NOT the answer.

The second suspect was located after the voluntary lockdown was lifted because the voluntary lockdown reduced his freedom of movement due to the wise-thinking community of Watertown heeding the warnings and making any movement in the public incredibly noticeable.

” wise-thinking community of Watertown”

How ’bout the military shits not let people get killed in the first place?

That is an unrealistic expectation. Bad things happen and police unfortunately are forced to be a reactionary force more often than we would like.

Yeah. I know. Tom Ridge sez no gubment work kin save us from bein’ blowed up…. Oddly, the cities are still paying ultra millions to protect tho, right? I’m thinking that militarization is the flaw. Militarization is weak, It’s ego-based. It’s about muscle, And, ANYONE bright who knows a muscle-head knows he/she is ultimately weak in spite of their brilliant stature. I know one. He can physically beat the ass of anyone on this thread. Like a REAL special forces fuck. ‘Cept this IS NOT the way you protect intelligent and open society. It’s about DETAIL. DETAIL. NOT ego-centric 1950’s based biceps.

Don’t fucking educate me on unrealistic expectations and the military rape on Boston that followed. Only difference is… BOSTON thought it was being raped for a good cause.

So, you know someone that is really strong but isn’t very smart…and that means all careers that have a macho stereotype are ignorant of detail and intelligence?

I sincerely doubt you know “a REAL special force fuck” since American SOF don’t recruit idiots. They tend to go for athletic nerds, actually. You find more operators in church groups and on honor rolls than you do frat houses or football teams. They take the mindset and then build the body around it.

In short, I think you’re a lying piece of shit.

That obviously would have been a better result, and that does happen more often than you know.

That obviously would have been a better outcome. And that does happen in more situations than you know.

“3. The US is Shockingly Weak

Way to actually show proof of such a bold statement in those enthralling few paragraphs.

Never thought of the whole ordeal this way but what happened in Boston did violate some Constitutional rights. Let’s hope this doesn’t happen again.
At least it worked though…

You have validity to what you say there, because I found myself saying the same thing. This is a 19-yr old running scared. The whole thing exposed our six in terms people may not understand. Because we as a society never had exposure to this type of martial law, we stood there and took it. I don’t subscribe to the words you say, the US is shockingly weak. There were many I’m sure who, if confronted by more than just a young punk with a cooker, there would be more vigilante style chaos. Restoration of order as fast as possible by true professionals is what was needed here.

Disaster preparedness takes order over anarchy. It did not show panic or chaos, but order, discipline, and faith. Really, it was about the respect for those who were lost.

The real issue I had was where they took this nineteen year old life stealing bum. There is no way he should be offered any medical treatment in a comfortable bed next to someone he tried to kill. That’s where we went wrong here. Not in a billion dollar moment of stop everything and catch this loser.

Thank you for presenting the facts. I am a targeted individual and have no rights for over 3 years. They are now getting around to the rest of us. Peaceful protests work.

It is looking highly likely that at least one of these ‘bombs’ was actually faked altogether, flash powder, fake injuries, the whole thing a movie. Now if true, this MUST come out, as then these brothers didn’t kill a soul… but disregarding that for a moment we have a few disconcerting precedents set here, as far as I have got..
1. Naked arrest (why did no-one give alternate clothes, even a jacket for some decency?)
2. Assumption of guilt. (even today the BBC were saying these two were ‘suspected’)
3. Ability to arrest and kill in custody based on 2.
4. Search without warrant
5. Acceptance of heavy military/police highly armed presence.
6. Lockdown/curfew orders. (which allows any shenanigans to be unobserved)
7. Potential for high security/id production at large events, which precludes…
8. Issuing ID cards as mandatory….
9. Russian connection…

Any more folks ?
If all these agenda are fulfilled, they can kill any one of us at any time, get everyone to look the other way, and establish house to house search for all criminal activities, for safety’s sake… The house to house allows for evidence planting and arrest of anyone, anytime.

To my eyes, the Navy Seal/Craft operators were the core bomb drill team, and so also progress chasers, co-ordinating the scene and making sure the fake bombs were in place and then step back. The elder brother or both could have likely been employed to be the fake bomber for the drill, same as 7/7 was done. That would explain why the younger holds back, as his brother is ‘at work’… So then the bombs go off…if the brothers knew they were real, then surely you would leave town next day at least… If they were employed, then even if they knew they had become real, then they could have been sent home with something like “Good job, thanks, seems someone found out and planted real bombs, don’t worry we will catch them..” The team could have armed the elder brother ‘to make it more real’ and left him with the gun, hoping will resist at the right time. Then they go for the pickup, the brother realises he is sold out and tries to escape knowing no-one will believe him… We have to know the Truth…is it real or pretend ?

It seems to me like this demonstration of a police state was a test to see how much control this government has over its citizens. I don’t think that our freedom should be withheld from us even if it seems necessary for our own safety. I think people should have been able to make their own decision as to wether or not they would go about their normal activities. If someone didn’t feel safe they can stay home. Don’t use soldiers with guns and humvees to intimidate an imprison people within their homes and make that choice for them.

Wow! You are one serious idiot. An ideologue if ever there was one. I wish you had been standing out there on Th. night instead of the MIT cop who was killed. Hey, George, move to your libertarian island and rid yourself of the “tyranny’ of the best nation on Earth”

How would you feel if you posted this the morning the request was made for people to stay indoors, the police lifted their request, and someone went outside with their little kid and the kid got killed?

Your comments about the economics of shutting the city down remind me of comments people made after my city, NYC, was shut down in anticipation of Hurricane Sandy. I don’t understand the point of counting loss of business during the day if everybody buys the same shit the following day? Is it really so horrible for people to stay home one day? Not drive their cars for one day? Not shop for one day? How about all the money *saved* by everyone that didn’t give it to a business that day?

I think it’s also pretty insensitive of you to focus on the weapon being pressure cookers and it being done by two young men. If it was a 40 year old who killed four people and mamed a hundred others with a sophisticated laser gun, would that have weakened your argument? Would that have made the police’s action more justifiable to you?

People got hurt, nobody knew what the hell was going on, so police asked people to stay out of the way. If this starts happening on a daily basis, we can talk, but it was a fluke and I don’t see this becoming an ongoing issue where are freedom is forever impaired. People stayed home and watched the news. It’s *OK* that they stayed home.

The whole point was the fact that it was a citizen who found the guy shows we can defend ourselves better than the police that 19 year old could have easily shot up the guy that found him with a fully automatic rifle.

pressure cookers are not a big deal? Tell that the the people who died or had their legs blown off you piece of shit.

THE USA beat Hitler? Far from it. It was the Soviets. Thanks for taking credit though.

At the end of the day the police where trying to protect you. You think its hilarious the terrorist was only 19 but he killed 4 people including a police officer. You are a fool for underestimating him.

The FBI knew. They knew it when the
intimately after having a three year plus relationship with them as well
as a working relationship with authorities in Russia who were ALSO
directly involved with the “unknown” suspects. Gathered information was shared by them with the FBI. The FBI was forced to come clean on these facts only because an upset mother couldn’t be intimidated into keeping her mouth shut. The fact that this “feigned
ignorance” enabled them to launch a massive complacency programming test
on Boston, has apparently been lost on most authority loving boot licks.?

I thought it is only here in Africa that people tend to have short memory… exists over there too. I also thought rights is for the living….as in when you survive death

Are you so sure it failed? What I saw was the successful systematic lockdown of a major metropolis which completed it’s “just minutes” after that a civilian quickly finds a guy hiding in a boat which is clearly visible from both the road and the air covered by a tarp. Seems they got everyone EXCEPT the suspect.

You call this a failure. I call this a successful dry-run and a precedent you’re sure to see more of.

You are a dumb little boy who sits behind a keyboard spouting off crap. You would not have the testicular fortitude to ever put on a uniform and risk all for others and that makes you feel like a little man. This is how a little puke like you gets back at the world by convincing other morons that you have a purpose beyond spewing this crap. In the police state morons like you claim exist were true, your putrid blog would already be down and you would already be in a dark room, yet you continue to be able to write up whatever filth your little demented mind wants to post.

Still rather keep my freedoms over “safety”. Kinda looks like Northern Ireland in the late ’70s. The reading of the article makes it sound like it too! Anyone who is naive to believe that our freedoms are safe in the western hemisphere should have a chat with Gerry Conlon or Paul Hill.

“For a maximum investment of perhaps $1 or $2 thousand dollars…” no… for a few thousand dollars PLUS their life.. anyone who does can kiss their asses gooodbye

The most disgusting display of police overstepping the law I have ever seen in my life! Where the heck was probable cause, where were court orders to search? This situation DID NOT warrant a house to house search on a scale this large. Over zealousness to say the least and I hope that Bostonian s will stand up to the abuse in court!!!

Sooo many things wrong with this article, but the key take away is you’d rather bring a handgun to a grenande/bomb fight. Got it.

No doubt there was overreach that deserves denouncing. I certainly don’t think the leaders of Massachusetts have a particularly high regard for liberty or the Constitution.

But I sure wouldn’t rely on a piece like this for analysis of it, which is so intertwined with the “TYRANNY!” drama-queen crap libertarians always pull whenever the subject of terrorism arises, regardless of the facts of any particular story. Hint: if you’re actually trying to persuade anyone, don’t set up a childish, insulting either-or like “if you disagree with me, you must not have self-respect.” If, on the other hand, stoking your ego is all you’re really going for (entirely possible, given the current state of the libertarian movement), then carry on.

1.) No, seriously, what is the point of emphasizing the “honor student” part?

2.) A “maximum investment of perhaps $1 or $2 thousand dollars.” “Just a 19-year-old kid with pressure cookers and guns. He didn’t even have fully automatic weapons.” And yet, that was enough to shed a lot of blood. If these brothers used the rest of the explosives police found, it could have been a lot worse. Hell, it would have been worse had they rigged the bombs higher off the ground. If the point of these tidbits was to downplay the danger in some way, mission not accomplished.

3.) He was believed to have been wearing explosives. Think that might have a teensy bit to do with the urgency of finding him sooner rather than later?

4.) The requests to stay at home and off the roads were just that – requests. Not orders with legal penalties for noncompliance, which one would expect of a “police state.”

5.) The suggestion that it failed because he wasn’t discovered until after it lifted is just stupid. Think that, juuuuuuuust maybe, he was hiding in some boat in the first place because his travel options were limited?

Now you’re pretending your own words don’t imply their obvious meaning? There really isn’t any end to the ways libertarians’ strange relationship with truth will manifest itself.

I wish you and the voices in your head the best of luck.

Ok, so the solution for a social problem is changing your (as in your individual) life, habits, thoughts? I’m sorry, I agree with your post all the way there when you propose this idiot solution. You are able to question everything in the situation except this psychology-bound methodological individualism that has taken us here – and will take us nowhere else, specially not where you want to go.

Sorry, but your being a hypocrite, you say stand and resist the enforced police state and yet you would back down from an Officer with a weapon. So your willing to make a stand as long as your not in danger. Should the government try to make me do something illegal or immoral with a gun or with legislation I will refuse to do so. As you say my self respect would demand this. Your unwillingness to stand up for that right is a concern. Giving up your wallet on the street to a thug with a gun is understandable. This is the greatest country in the world. We are not perfect and have many failings but the people can make change as has been obvious over the years

Way to fan the flames of irrational anti-government paranoia… the government is made up of people like you and me, not this “nebulous group of nefarious anti-American tyranical despots” who, according to many ‘libertarians’, are extensions of the current administration. Any body that think this incident was to “test the police state” is a moron.

Actually, you did say it… or am I misreading your subsection title “The Police State for a Day Experiment Failed” and the subsequent declarations like “Boston was turned into a police state for a day. It was an experiment. It failed miserably.”

This wasn’t a quote. It was a concept attribution. You specifically say the “The Police State for a Day Experiment Failed”… the concept behind this is that you believe someone coordinated this reaction to the Boston Attacks as a way to “test the police state”. Hence, the quotations. You are intellectually dishonest, and now you are back-pedaling. REAL MEN, left, right or center, are accurate, honest and objective.

Who’s being dishonest now..? Real men are honest, accurate and objective. Your ramblings about this being a police state experiment are misguided at best, downright dishonest, delusional and inflammatory at worst.

“…you can hang Saddam and assassinate bin Laden, but you cower in fear of a 19-year-old kid?”

in a similar way, don’t you think bin laden’s terrorism “worked” but only because the US government helped them make it work? it seems to me that in the US, terrorism is not marked by solely the criminal actions of another, rather it’s the US’ response to the criminal and his/her/their actions that give birth to terrorism. it actually reminds me of how a ‘trauma’ is defined in the field of psychology. it’s not the event itself that constitutes a ‘trauma,’ rather it’s how the event is experienced (and re-experienced) in the present day through intrusive symptoms. (dissociative/avoidance/distancing symptoms as well) maybe this is a bit of a stretch :D, but perhaps the US govt’s ability to moderate information about and responses to an “act of terrorism” creates enough distance to dissociate US citizens from what “actually happened.” (just the facts about the event itself)

Watching this all unfold on the news from Iowa gave me goose bumps. All the responders and military working as one to protect the community………that is why America is so great! They captured a killer and kept the community safe. I would like to think that if this happened in my community , I would be thankful that my family and myself were being protected. God bless all the first responders and prayers for the victims and their families. And shame upon the writer of this story. Let’s hope you never need the men in blue to back your ass!

It sure does give me goose bumps. What if the suspect was holding a family hostage? Damn right I would want these guys raiding my home. Usually the people who get so upset over this stuff are those who are trying to hide something. I have nothing to hide so if they want to search my home to keep me safe then they may do so at ANY time!

The last thing you do in a hostage situation, only after all other options have been exhausted and maybe not even then, is raid it. The reason is obvious: the hostage-takers are likely to either outright kill the hostages or use them as shields (thus getting them killed by the cops). You’ve been watching too many action movies Ali!

Seriously dude, your self-respect is more important than your life. I wish this kid entered your house and shot you in the head because you’d rather have your self-respect than your life protected. But then, your family would be up in arms because the police did not do enough to control the situation.

This is an ignorant, politically biased article. As a Watertown resident, it was shocking to not only have the Boston Marathon bomber in the area, but to have a teen age kid armed who shot an unsuspecting cop. Having that guy in the neighborhood, the last thing I was going to do was to leave my family at home so I could go work. While I was outside of the perimeter, I would have been happy to welcome those guys in. If you’re not doing anything wrong, you’ve got nothing to hide. Could it be seen as an invasion of personal liberties? Yes. Was it one I’d gladly give to keep my family safe? Absolutely.

Huh, hadn’t seen that. I can definitely see the disturbing side of this. None of my friends had an issue, then again, everyone was cooperative that I spoke to. That said (and I realize this is on the far end of the spectrum), it could have been that the guy or his family was held at gunpoint by the guy. I’m still comfortable with the act if anything “other activity” found was inadmissible in a court of law because it didn’t follow proper search procedure. I.e. the guy could be cutting cocaine but if he didn’t invite the cops in, they have no right to arrest him for the activity if there was no probable cause.

What i see in these comments so far is a common thread: On one side there are the people who agree with this article and the observation that this was a good excuse to declare martial law for a day and only make this country looked more terrified in the case of one lone 19 year old terrorist. The fact that i saw innocent people being led from their homes with arms raised wasn’t a good sign either. On the flip side are those apparently thrilled to see that police were out in force to protect them from this one horrible person,in full military gear with armored transports and machine guns no less, they were willing to cower in their homes and do whatever they were told even if that meant being treated like the very criminal the police were trying to catch. Clearly you can see the difference in these comments between those that love this country and are willing to sacrifice for it, including sacrificing their own lives for freedom and those that are willing to go along with whatever the government declares is legal, even if it means sacrificing what freedoms they have left.

Some of you people are fucking retarded. This wasn’t government oppression, it was ensuring the idiot with bombs and other weapons who launched a terrorist attack didn’t get away to do it again. The reason the people celebrated was because they captured the guy, they were not being “oppressed”. What would you want? Them to just be like, “well, he’s out there, just keep an eye out for bombs” Maybe you guys would have grabbed your guns and went hunting. Because a bunch of untrained people, even maybe a few well trained people out hunting with guns would have made the situation a lot better. I think you guys want to see the end of our society so you could run around like Rick Grimes killing zombies. I think maybe the author thinks he knows exactly how things should go down, and maybe he thinks any form of law enforcement is tyranny. I think the author has no idea what he’s talking about, seeing as he called FBI agents who were looking for a terrorist tyranny. But hey, that would be simple for you guys huh? If everyone who is in law enforcement and government are a bunch of controlling tyrants it would make your precious sick little dream come true. Pretty well stated in his last sentence. “While there are no easy solutions, I foresee a lot of fun working them out.” That kind of thinking is not very far from how a terrorist thinks.

This is easily the worst piece I’ve read on the incident. I am all for individual rights, but without the immediate and decisive actions taken by the agencies involved, this little pr*ck could’ve easily slipped away, and struck a future target. Peoples rights were not trounced. Most of the actions taken were for the residents of these communities. The LEOs there were most local or regional agencies- neighbors protecting neighbors while on a manhunt. This story is totally off-base.

To the AUTHOR: you are missing many facts, like the fact that then two brothers shot and killed an MIT police officer at around 1030pm Thursday night as he was responding to a call about a robbery at the 7-11 they chose to hold up for money to escape the city since they realized their faces were all over the news as unidentified possible suspects for the bombing. They then stole a Mercedes and took the police on a chase through Cambridge into Watertown. None of the events on Thursday night into Friday morning occurred in the city of boston. They also shot a transit police officer but he survived. To say that boston was in a police state is an overstatement. The city of Watertown sure was but the surrounding areas were in a state of emergency and high-alert. Boston the city itself was still open for the most part and most people who don’t rely on public transit went to work anyway. If you are going to write an article about recent events you should really do some more research on it or actually witnessed them first hand like me and many of my friends did. Boston does not fear anything you prick, we just wanted to catch the assholes threatening our loved ones safety. No ones freedoms were being violated by cooperating with their friends in blue. Boston has a small town feel to it and it is a large tightknit community that looks out for each other.

On a side note: US DID NOT defeat Hitler in World War 2. Russia (USSR) did it – with great help from US and other allies.

Idiot cops lock down a whole city and can’t find the guy.

If I were in the lockdown, I’d just set up half a dozen cameras in my home and just sit on my couch and force them to carry me out of my house. Then I’d sue them for warrantless searches.

The govt. over reacted? Move out of America bro, then you can write all you want about how you disapprove of this nation.

Yes, I echo the point about it having been the real CITIZEN who found the fellow being pursued. I noticed this right away. In them olden dayze, they would deputise the citizenry and allow the friends and neighbours to participate in the wo/manhunt. Security begins at home, not waiting for a horde of armoured men and their vehicles to spend the better part of a day declaring an exclusion zone then finding their quarry, not within the zone but, just outside of it. Were the lockdown less restrictive, the fellow might have been detected and located some time earlier. So far, we know that the FBI had (one of) them under surveillance, the one left alive ran a police barricade, and someone in a window across the street from the scene of the first gunfight was unable to act, and on and on. The only thing I haven’t heard is any vilification of the boat-owner for being a tobacco user!

I am wondering if someone said on tape, “I do not consent to this warrantless search” whether they would have a better chance at monetary damages in court. Also, what happened to those smart enough not to open their doors?

Thanks for the article George! A few thoughts…

This is a good article because it asks the right question: what does this mean? This is a bad article because of nearly all of its answers. 1)Terrorism Works. OK, sure. We know this, because despite all the “Boston Strong” and “Never Forget” ribbons and banners flying proudly under the stars and stripes, we still don’t feel secure enough to leave the middle east, or leave our shoes on in an airport. This point is nothing new. The financial analysis is interesting, yet borders on presumptuous. I’ll accept the $1Billion estimation and we can throw that on top of the $516Billion allocated for FY14. Our defense spending is already out of control, but at least this $1Billion can be justified by its results.

On to another point: 2) Chechnya will benefit from the attention. Do we care about this? Is it wrong to be curious about other parts of the world, or even visit those places to attempt understanding a wildly different perspective? Or is it just un-american (/sarcasm)? Is the author implying the Chechnya is the enemy? Because I thought it was two nut jobs with some backpack bombs. It doesn’t make sense that a war riddled, impoverished, Russian occupied state would attack us while a country armed with nukes (DPRK) and blatant public hatred for our country would not. Let’s let Chechnya have some of the limelight, because it’s as much their fault this happened as it is Massachusetts for letting them live in those respective areas. Really, the fact that they lived there is the only thing that they have in common with the area.


This is a difficult point to argue with, because it delves into speculation (as will many of the following points). If the city hadn’t been shut down, might there have been more attacks? We won’t know. Will there be more attacks in the future? Almost definitely, but whether this is because we appeared weak last week, or because there are plenty of people in the world that already genuinely hate us, want to kill us, and are currently in the process of planning our demise, we also won’t know. If the goal wasn’t to kill/scare people, but to cost us time and money by shutting out cities down for a day, there are more effective ways to do it. I would argue that what happened in Boston was not the goal of the terrorist.

4) “My self respect is worth more than my life.” This is debatable, but I won’t debate it. Let’s say it is preferable to risk your life than to stay in your home for a day to get out of the way of government personnel hunting down a dangerous fugitive. What, then, do we gain by asserting this? Or more to this point, what did Boston lose by complying with what effectively amounted to Martial law? I would argue not much. Having many Bostonian friends, and understanding their character, I know they would have much rather gone about their usual lives as if nothing was happening, and then, on the off chance they encountered the suspect, put him down themselves. They are not cowards, but they are not stubbornly brave (read: stupid) either. Instead, the did their part in helping by staying out of the way. What can a regular Joe Citizen do against a terrorist armed with rifles and bombs. Shoot him? Sure, but we really want the guy alive. I don’t trust Mr. Joe Citizen to deliver this in general (granted, I don’t really trust the government in this regard either). Vigilantly ignore him? That seems to be this author’s prefered method, and perhaps I agree with him. But I don’t fault Boston for complying with what amounts to a an imposed day off. And I don’t fault them for appreciating those who were putting themselves directly in harms way. Martial Law or not, those police and soldiers are humans too, and they were at risk. There is nothing wrong with applauding them for their service, regardless of what the intention of their orders were.

5) “The suspect would have been caught more quickly”. Again, speculation. However, I also thought this after hearing the report of the Bostonian who finally found this guy simply by walking into his back yard, which he was unable to do throughout the day. But to this point, the author is trying to generalize why what happened in Boston as a bad idea. We can’t extrapolate this to every scenario after a terrorist attack, because it’s possible in a different scenario the public would impede efforts to capture a suspect. I would also point out that the city wasn’t shut down the day after the attack. It was only shut down after some maniacs stole a car and drove around the city with bombs and long guns. It seems acceptable to me in this instance to ask people stay away from the crazy people with bombs and guns, and let the professionals deal with them.

6) Boston Cheered for their oppressors. Yes, they did, because they “got the bad guy” not because they felt oppressed. To that end, we cheer for our elected officials after a victory (except I dont…poor libertarian me :[ ).

7) I like his examples of regular citizens as agent of public safety. This is an undisputable fact: you are responsible for your own safety. You protect yourself best on a daily basis; not the military, and not the cops. When you apply this in a grand scale, it makes sense that there would be many examples of regular citizens stopping a terrorist plots, if for nothing else because of sheer numbers. There are way more of us not wearing a uniform than those that are, yet all of us value our lives. I agree with the author in this respect, but I don’t think anyone in Boston could, or should, have engaged with an armed terrorist This is where to boys in blue come in, and I’m happy to have them on my side in situations like this.
To me, the most disturbing part in all of this is how rabid normal people became once a face was released in connection with the bombings. How quickly many were in asking for their tortures and deaths. Even before we had suspects, many assumed this to be the work of islamic extremists. We still don’t know that this is true, but we’re so willing to believe it because the boys are muslims. And what happened to innocent until proven guilty? And why were we displaying so much patriotism after we detained (ACTUALLY detained, not like the request people stay home illustrated in this article) a fellow American citizen? There may be a mountain of evidence against this kid, but we’re getting way ahead of ourselves. Our ability to trust the police to protect us against armed maniacs pales in comparison to ability to trust “facts” as they are fed to us by government and media sources. A fair trial is supposed to protect us from all of this insanity and misinformation. In my mind, both Tsarnaev are innocent until indisputable evidence of their guilt is presented to me, or more importantly a judge and jury of his peers. We must continue to treat him humanely, treat his friends and family with respect, and caution ourselves and others against angry feelings towards the demographics that he falls into, whether it’s mulsims, chechens, russians, or hell, UMASS Dartmouth students.

You’re a fking idiot…maybe you would think differently if your son (martin)was senselessly blown up in front of spectator’s and his mom as she watched her daughter lose her leg!!! Did you have loved ones that died or we’re injured?? What if that was any part of your family then what remarks would you have then?? This was a massive show of force,no doubt. But the next time someone want’s to make a pressure cooker bomb or shoot a young police officer probably won’t happen here in Boston!! Me and my family laid flower’s today at Copley Plaza and donated money to The One fund Boston today. What have you done orther than disgrace the name’s of the people who have died?

Very insightful article, but I have a few critiques of it.


You never mentioned the 19-year-old’s brother in the article. The reason why people “cowered in their homes…” wasn’t mainly because they were afraid of the danger posed by the 19-year-old, but rather was because they wanted the people responsible for the bombings to be caught. So the 26(I think)-year-old’s participation in the bombings was part of the reason for the cowering.

b) “Bostonians could have sent a powerful message of courage to the world yesterday by continuing with their lives as usual.”

I considered that people should have just continued their lives as usual (the opposite of what happened), since we can probably assume that they wanted attention (due to their choice of places to bomb) so refusing to give them attention may have been wise. However, the fact that people did not continue their lives as normal show that they do not accept these bombings as “normal” events and also shows that they cared about the victims.

I’m glad that people didn’t continue their days as usual, I just think that the way they choose to make their days different wasn’t the best. Rather than shut down everything and stay indoors people could have gone out into public spaces and had moments of silence or something. There are ways to change your day so as to show that you respect and care for the victims without closing everything down and staying inside as if you are under martial law.

Your consperacy theory makes for a good laugh.
Marshall law wasn’t declared. People volintarily stayed indoors at the request of the law enforcement, so they could better look for the guy. They didn’t storm into peoples homes without permission. Everyone interviewed said they invited them in.
Get a grip on reality sometime.

Easy to use “teenager” with a pressure cooker that scared everyone for your points..

Truth is, we didn’t really know who or what was behind the attacks. As far as Boston knew, there could have been hundreds of people involved. It was war on our streets and the government acted in a way that there was a possible invasion of terrorist. Its easy to go back and say the government overacted now. Some of your points are valid, but please take the facts we knew afterwards out of it.

Then again, everyone is a critic..

The “boys in blue” didn’t make a specticle of the loon, the media did.
If someone has a gun to my head My choice to comply or not hasn’t been removed. I can still choose to resist.

I really have a hard time with people that think the reaction in Boston was some kind of government plot. A way to test what Americans will put up with after horrific events of mass terror. I was personally impressed that they found the suspects so quickly, to me it seems like the system working. I love the tagline to the meme that talks about how in a real fascist state you would never see a police officer bring milk to a family during a lock-down. I understand the fear of government overreach, we see it happen in other countries all the time. We need to be mindful and well informed so we can help to make sure that it does not happen here in the US. That being said it is important to put things in context. Do you really believe that if enough people in the Boston area felt like their rights were being violated they would not have made a stand against it? The actions at the marathon were horrific in nature. Would you not have been freaked out by them? I mean it was a marathon for Christ sake. If it was one person who was murdered and they locked down the metropolitan area then that would have been some over kill. To think that this show of strength makes us weak is sadly misguided. It shows out strength and resolve, the skill of our law enforcement and the strength of our people. The constitution is a wonderful document, and I believe it to be the basis for the best system of government our planet has yet to see. That being said it of course is a living document and it’s not full of absolute rights, and never should be.

They wanted to get us to accept Police State Lock Downs, door to door searches, (with no warrants), and police abuse during these searches. And to thank them for doing so. They succeeded. America land of the free has been dead for years. Resistance is futile. You will be assimilated.

A handgun is a poor choice for home protection. A section of the article is writen based on the assumption that a person armed with an AR15 would find it useless when faced with an overwhelming force in the defence against tyranny. As if an AR15 is a magic weapon that can somehow change the odds when faced with such a force. Arm every person in a neighborhood with a gun, any gun, even .22 rifles and try to occupy that area with a paramilitary force and see what happens.

Those of us that know history do not need advice on defending liberty from pseudo patriots that talk tuff then bend to the will of an out of control government in the name of security or justice. We know poorly equiped forces have stalemated even defeated overwhelming odds in the past. The Afghanistanis were destroying multi million dollar Soviet attack choppers with $10 worth of rope during the war between those two nations. The real difference is that the Afghanistanis were a rugged people willing to fight in defence of their homeland.

It would be very foolish of any enemy of this nation to view what happened in Boston as a sign that America could be occupied by another nation. It would, however, seem a green light for our government to do whatever it wishes in the name of some false sense of security.

I thought this was going to be about how people didn’t “honor” the lockdown. I live in Boston and we had a grand’ol time, going to brunch early on and a party later. Of course, I was on the other side of town so I was willing to go out. If I had been on the side of town where a known armed terror suspect was running around loose I wouldn’t really want to go outside anyways.

I’m not saying I agree with the infringement of rights (I thought the entire city being locked down was definitely overkill, and those Watertown raid videos are quite disturbing), but the lockdown did at least prevent businesses from reprimanding anyone who would rather have played it safe and stay inside then go to work. Government infringing on people’s rights is always an issue but people don’t seem to make as much noise about businesses and corporations infringing on individual rights which is just as much as an issue in my book.


You don’t live in Boston, you weren’t there, and you have no idea how the search was handled. In short, you’re talking out your ass. Talk to some people who live in Boston, do a little research about how the search was handled and the number of actual arrests for violating the shelter-in-place order, and try using something other than youtube videos published completely without context as the proof of your righteous anger. (In other words, you know, facts.) Otherwise, your opinion, while I’m sure very exciting for you to write, is irrelevant to the conversation.

I wonder how many people who had their homes searched are now facing criminal charges for victimless crimes? They were forced by arms to violate their 5th ammendment rights. With all the seized property it might end up being a net gain for the city government.

Although I agree in theory with much of what you said, I have an issue with the average citizen being an effective public safety agent. As we saw, there was some Saudi national who was by the bomb and ran away like everyone else, but someone (presumably a white male) tackled him while he was running because he was “acting suspiciously.” Although a police state isn’t ideal, it’s better than leaving it to “Average Joes” tackling everything brown that moves.

You have misunderstood something I wrote. I do not suggest vigilante justice, except in only the extremest cases (such as on an airplane in flight). I only suggest that the average joe can continue to serve more effectively in a lookout role than 9,000 paramilitaries in humvees. This suggestion is supported by the reality of the Boston Lockdown.

The guys with the guns were just doing what they were told because they believed they were doing something to protect their city. You can’t blame them. You’re an idiot if you think that they would just let a cop killer that was in a shoot out just get away and let people go about their day so that he could mix right in with them. Not everything is a conspiracy and there sometimes has to be drastic measures to make sure shit gets done. You all would want a terrorist walking around amongst you just to prove you’re not scared of getting your legs blown off? Fuck that.

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