



Message in a Wattle
In December 2003, elevated terror alert levels led to the cancellation of nearly 30 international flights. What prompted this action? CIA analysts believed Al-Jazeera was broadcasting “secret messages…hidden in the moving text at the bottom of the screen, known as the ‘crawl.’” We pick up with an interview between NBC’s Lisa Myers and former homeland security chief Tom Ridge:
Myers: The CIA thought it had found dates and flight numbers hidden in the “bar code” of the Al-Jazeera crawl?Ridge: Yeah…
Myers: Did that strike you as a little bit bizarre?
Ridge: Bizarre, unique, unorthodox, unprecedented.
Unprecedented to him maybe. Not too us. The crazy dude who works at our corner liquor store has been espousing a similar theory for years. The only difference? He thinks the terrorists communicate with each other via CBS, hiding their secret messages in the facial wrinkles of the 60 Minutes staff.
Bogus Analysis Led to Terror Alert [NBC]
An Interview with Tom Ridge [NBC]
READ MORE: Media
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