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Your article doesn't support your claim that the 'federal government has never really prevented a terrorist attack'. And a lot of that was highly motivated reporting itself by people like Glenn Greenwald who was basically denying that things like ISIS were real threats at all in 2014 and then went full victim blaming for things like Charlie Hebdo the year after (it was harder after the Bataclan).

Will you next claim that the police have never really prevented a murder?

I gave a link as a reference of how the Federal government operates. I did not think that I needed a whole bibliography to prove something that is very easily verifiable.

Not only that you think the reporting is not reliable because of the reporter without pointing out what is wrong with the actual report.

But I'll humor you.

- Here is the judge calling the US government the co-conspirator in the same case: https://ny1.com/nyc/all-boroughs/news/2023/07/27/judge-quest...

- The Gretchen Whitmer kidnapping plot:

- https://www.rawstory.com/plot-to-kidnap-michigan-governor/

- https://reason.com/2022/04/08/gretchen-whitmer-kidnapping-pl...

- The liberty city seven: https://www.nbcnews.com/id/wbna22249838

- The cleveland bomb plot: https://truthout.org/articles/cleveland-anarchist-bomb-plot-...

- Sami Osmakac: https://archive.is/NINN0

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These are all the cases that had some investigative reporter poking, or the jury/judge seeing through the bullshit. Here is initial reporting on recent cases. The "Iranian Agent" sent to "Assassinate Donald Trump"(emphasis mine):

>Asif Merchant traveled to New York in June for the purpose of meeting with men he thought he was recruiting to carry out the killings, even paying a $5,000 advance to two would-be assassins who were actually undercover law enforcement officers, federal officials said

https://www.ksat.com/news/politics/2024/08/06/pakistani-man-...

The woman arrested for "plotting to bomb the NY state capital":

>According to the criminal complaint, an FBI confidential source drove Bowie to the Home Depot in Rensselaer and gave her $200 to buy bomb parts. It’s not clear if they told her what items to buy.

https://cbs6albany.com/news/local/feds-say-capital-bombing-t...

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This is not some fringe idea even here on HN. Here is a clear fed trying incite people to commit violence: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49629430

This common in most internet forums. It is called fedposting: https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que... https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/fedpost

I hope all of these sources are of sound character by your standards. Now I would ask you; can you give me an example of the FBI catching a terrorist that:

a) They did not recruit, or b) Did not provide materials, or c) did not provide the target

AS for the police in the US, they are indeed very bad at preventing crime. Though that is due to multiple reasons, mostly policy related, rather than institutional malfeasance like the FBI.