There is no evidence that they only would have done this if they had C4 with LEDs in neat packages.

Blatantly contradicts:

It’s not an argument against presumption of innocence or even security theater.

Those people aren’t harder to find. Just look for the blown up bridge. Or Federal building. Or subways. Or commuter trains.

Were there a lot of incidents like this happening that I missed?  Last I checked, the last successful terrorist attack on US soil was more than 10 years ago.   So if these types aren’t hard to find could you please point us to a few examples?

(c) download the Anarchist Cookbook,

OMG, there must be like 12 million 14-year-old terrorists plotting to blow up bridges all across the US.

Anyone with a dedication to real liberty, government transparency & accountability, etc, will certainly feel that there’s a long record of failures of all three branches of government to actually uphold and defend the Constitution.

Anyone who actually cares about the founding principles of this nation is a threat to the power of the people who are currently running it or have been running it for the last 10 years.

good luck with that.

I think it’s all stretching things a bit too far trying to defend guys who went as far as they possibly could have to actually blow up a bridge and kill people.

I’m not defending the suspects so much as I’m condemning this kind of entrapment operation. The taxpayers are now on the hook for a lengthy investigation, a series of trials and who knows how many years of incarceration for a bunch of stupid stoner kids who weren’t really threatening anyone until the FBI turned them into would-be terrorists.

To take your “not fantasy” example, will any person charged with attempted murder with a gun they got through Fast and Furious be able to claim they were entrapped? After all, the gun came from the government. Without the gun, they never would have tried to shoot someone.

I think it’s all stretching things a bit too far trying to defend guys who went as far as they possibly could have to actually blow up a bridge and kill people. I don’t know what else, short of blowing the bridge up, you want these guys to do to show their intentions.

In this case, I am using the Rolling Stone piece, which is VERY pro-convicted, for most of the facts I’m citing. I mean, I don’t know how I could use a more favorable set of facts without making them up. I don’t know what to tell you. This case looks like a good case even based on an article trying to prove that it’s not a good case.

…every “attempt” case is essentially playing out a “fantasy scenario.”

When a person obtains a gun, shoots at someone else and misses it isn’t a “fantasy scenario,” it’s an attempted murder. 
This case is fundamentally different: the government didn’t find a group of people in the middle of attempting anything. They found a group of people who could be manipulated into attempting an act of terror if they were 

1. Actively encouraged to do so, and 
2. Provided with bombs that were well beyond their ability to create or obtain on their own.

Aimless, penniless stoners randomly encountering a guy eager to hook them up with some C-4 and remote detonators? Fantasy scenario.

The question to me is whether these guys would not have undertaken this action without the FBI. The article doesn’t make much of a case for that to me. If you (a) have a long history of advocating violence against the police, (b) talk about taking more direct action than Occupy, (c) download the Anarchist Cookbook, THEN (d) set a (fake) bomb to blow up a bridge, it’s hard for me to see the point at which the FBI’s involvement becomes a “but for” factor. This actually seems like a predictable outcome to me.

As I have said elsewhere here, there are plenty of times the FBI seems to have overstepped and participated in ridiculous security theater. I don’t see any evidence that this is one of them.

Plenty of white men named John have gone on to become embezzlers – should we spend hundreds of hours per person trying to convince everyone named John to take advantage of easy money, just so we can snap up the weak-willed ones?

But do you accept the position alleged here that the FBI’s informant manipulated these people into a plot they would not have formed on their own?

Keep in mind, there is no limit to how ungrounded, gullible and alienated you can be, no criminal level of gullibility.  So, if you accept that prior to being manipulated by the FBI’s informant no conspiracy to blow up a bridge existed, then what threat did the FBI just protect us from?

The Rolling Stone article is my main source of facts in this argument. That piece clearly takes a side (with the convicted) and still basically supports the convictions. I get that DHS is out of control, that most of the “security” we see is bullshit, and that the FBI is perfectly capable of wasting time chasing people who aren’t doing anything wrong. I just don’t see where those factors apply to THIS case. THIS case looks like a good catch by the FBI.

And also, in response to another comment, every “attempt” case is essentially playing out a “fantasy scenario.” That’s just the way it goes. The person tried to commit the crime and was not able to. I guess we can advocate abolishing “attempt” but I don’t think we want to do that.

There is no evidence that they only would have done this if they had C4 with LEDs in neat packages.

You seem to be arguing against the presumption of innocence.

There is no evidence that they only would have done this if they had C4 with LEDs in neat packages. Absent that evidence…

Are you seriously suggesting that “we can’t prove they wouldn’t have committed a crime if left to their own devices” is justifiable rationale for this kind of security theater? Heck, let’s just throw out “innocent until proven guilty” all together.

At best, that’s a post hoc argument.

You’re making an argument based on fantasy scenarios of who would or wouldn’t do things.

Could the FBI manipulate you into blowing up a bridge?

Irrelevant. None of it would have happened if it weren’t for the FBI.

It seems to me that there are probably millions of malleable, aimless misfits who would have walked away when someone talked about blowing a bridge up

Good point! I guess we’ll never know for sure until the FBI tries to entrap everyone.