Earlier: Terrorism expert Peter Bergen of CNN with lengthy new piece up on their site with evidence that the official claims of NSA snooping halting "dozens" of terror attacks on the U.S. is wildly overblown. He actually--refreshing!--demands evidence and produces what he can find, that suggests that the few known serious plots were stopped by other methods. Perhaps, he allows, we will learn about attacks disrupted abroad. But he remains skeptical that the claims overall are not just defensive hype. Key line: "This suggests that the NSA surveillance programs are wide-ranging fishing expeditions with little to show for them."
Homegrown jihadist extremists have mounted 42 plots to conduct attacks within the United States since 2001. Of those plots, nine involved an actual terrorist act that was not prevented by any type of government action, such as the failed attempt by Faisal Shahzad to blow up a car bomb in Times Square on May 1, 2010. Of the remaining 33 plots, the public record shows that at least 29 were uncovered by traditional law enforcement methods, such as the use of informants, reliance on community tips about suspicious activity and other standard policing practices.
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