Anthrax Attacks and the System That Perpetrated Them

[Peter Lemkin]

some interesting comments on her blog http://anthraxvaccine.blogspot.com/2008/...-will.html :
:captain:
Anonymous said...
In February 2002, even before his subpoena arrived, Ivins submitted a sample that violated the protocol, the officials said. And because FBI officials concluded that the protocol violation would make Ivins’ sample inadmissible in court, the bureau destroyed it. In April 2002, Ivins gave the FBI a second sample, which did not match the RMR 1029 parent strain.'

http://www.latimes.com/news/la-na-anthra...6651.story

So there was a casual request first for samples. There is nothing here to say he was first here notified about the "protocol". He probably prepared it the previously established manner.

The fact that he gave the FBI the correct strain at first, then a different one, is not the sign of guilt, but innocence. A guilty man would not have supplied the correct strain. Furthermore a guilty man would not compound attracting attention to himself by then substituting a different strain at the second request. With deep irony the FBI charges Ivins with trying to confuse them.

Maybe Ivins made a mistake. Maybe the FBI did, they have a clear record on that, esp. in this case. Maybe it isn't so clear that the two "strains" are so different, and the genetics isn't so solid.

The FBI seized the flask we are told. Isn't it interesting that we hear over and over that the "first sample" sent to Arizona matched the attack anthrax, but nothing like "we confirmed it with tests on germs from the seized flask."

Perhaps it mutates over time.

Anyway, downgrade to "questionable" because once the Feds get out of their mindset, tell the world, and the world tells them back their scenario makes Ivins look more innocent not more guilty, they have to make a quick retreat. And that's why this scenario will be discarded, even criticized and withdrawn by the FBI itself, because it makes Ivins look innocent and they won't be able to close the case, what they want more than anything else.

Also consider in light of the "number or flasks" dispute whether there were ten or twenty flasks. More? Surely Detrick had more than one "blend" or substrain of Ames. This enhances the possibilities for confusions or mistakes.
August 19, 2008 10:41 PM

Does it make any sense that they couldn't use the first sample to convict anyone of the anthrax attacts, but they're using the back up sample from that same strain to convict Ivins? Maybe I'm missing something here, but that's how it appears to my untrained eye.
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Tuesday, August 19, 2008
The FBI Admits It Has No Case Against Ivins


The FBI has admitted that it has no case against Ivins.

As summarized in an article today in the Washington Post:
The FBI has had a difficult time making its case to a skeptical public and scientific community. A hair sample snagged from a Princeton, N.J., mailbox linked to the attacks turned out not to match that of Ivins.

Some Congressional critics have questioned whether one man could really have carried out the elaborate attacks.

But FBI officials continue to press their case.

"I don't think we're ever going to be able to put the suspicions to bed," said Vahid Majidi of the FBI Weapons of Mass Destruction Directorate. "There's always going to be a spore on the grassy knoll."


This is very telling.

The FBI could have said "we will prove to Congress, the scientific community and the public that only Ivins could have done it".

But they didn't.

Instead, the FBI is trying to discredit the many top anthrax scientists who question the government's case against Ivins by using the "grassy knoll" conspiracy-theory smear.
If they had a case against Ivins, they would have presented it, instead of resorting to Bill O'Reilly style smear tactics.

"As always, in Establishment Media World, nothing is more insane or radical than refusing to believe every word the Government says. Even after Iraqi mushroom clouds and the whole litany of Government falsehoods, the establishment hallmark of Seriousness and Sanity is accepting the Government's word. When it says Iraq was behind the attacks, then it was. When they said Hatfill was the culprit, he was. Now that they say that Ivins is, he is, and only "conspiracy theorists" -- comparable to those who disbelieve we landed on the moon -- would question that or demand to see the actual evidence. The FBI is relying, understandably so, on their mindless allies in the media to depict its case against Ivins as so airtight that no real investigation is necessary."

- Glenn Greenwald