Since the 2004 election, how many times has the Terror Alert been raised?

Any? Once?

I can remember it getting ramped up every month or so during the campaigns. Strange. Must be some kind of cosmic coincidence.

By the way, you are more likely to be struck by lightning three times in the same spot than you are likely to be killed by a terrorist attack on U.S. soil. But STAY AFRAID!

Olbermman did a good job of exposing this:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/9665308/#051012a

Remember that two of the terror alert timings occured right after Kerry selected Edwards as runningmate, which normally provides a bounce in polls. The second time was when they raised the alert after Kerry's acceptance speech. They didn't raise the alert for the Republican Convention. Tom Ridge even admitted that several of the alerts were not credible.

BTW, the October 2005 New York alert was put out by Bloomberg, not the Department of Homeland Security. While Bloomberg was running for re-election against Democrat Fernando Ferrer, he was already beating Ferrer by a massive margin then that he had no incentive to issue an alert for political reasons.

retired after the '04 election he actually said that terrorism had been defeated.

Then Bush went on his Social Security tour for several months apparently spending his "political capital" that his "mandate" had given him.

we are in a "Flood Warning" state with the usual "...be prepared to move to higher ground ... keep your gas tank full ... don't drive through standing water..."

Reservoirs are full, the two Rivers in the Delta are near flood stage, as are the rivers up north, and it is raining like hell, and the NOAA station(s) in the 160 MHZ band are going berserksville.

But terra alerts? NOPE.

and time each time they raised the alert--the fbi had to drop everything it was doing and go on terror watch instead of doing real investigations. state,county, and local police also had to do the same.

Medics and fire fighters shifts extended. Extra 911 dispatchers called in (Locally we go up to a "General Alarm Fire" level with the EOC fully manned). NGO's (Salvation Army, Red Cross) on alert, etc.

By August we will have another terror alert....or perhaps another attack if you believe in LIHOP. In 2008, if your former asshole classmate George Allen gets the nomination, you can be sure that the alert to be orange.

In Hawaii the state system has "black" at the top that means a terrorist attack has occurred. It's all bullshit.