Posted 8:25 AM by Gene

When U.S. Attorney Roslynn Mauskopf described the alleged terror plot to blow up Kennedy Airport as "one of the most chilling plots imaginable," which might have caused "unthinkable" devastation, one law enforcement official said he cringed.

The plot, he knew, was never operational. The public had never been at risk. And the notion of blowing up the airport, let alone the borough of Queens, by exploding a fuel tank was in all likelihood a technical impossibility.

And now, with a portrait emerging of alleged mastermind Russell Defreitas as hapless and episodically homeless, and of co-conspirator Abdel Nur as a drug addict, Mauskopf's initial characterizations seem more questionable -- some go so far as to say hyped.

All well and good; but that total buffoon named Reid came close to bringing down a plane -- and how many ne'er-do-wells congregated around Osama? And what about that blind yaya who bombed the WTC? Yes, Der Homeland boys may overstate things, but holy cockroaches, shall we say, understate them.