Jeffrey E. Salzberg Well, if it's a homegrown person group as in Japan, sure, maybe. Though I think NYC isn't the biggest target for homegrown persons right now either. As for the rest of the country, homegrown terrorism is probably the biggest concern. Either way, as far as Islamic terrorism goes, Europe probably has a larger Muslim population than we do here. We do have a sizeable one, somewhat similar in size to our Jewish population I guess, but I think recruiting them here (something that has to be done by foreigners) proves more difficult. Many Muslim families have been here for decades or even centuries and on the whole aren't that badly integrated into American life and identify themselves Muslim-American just as much as your everyday Baptist would consider himself Christian-American. There is no idenbreasty conflict, and mosques aren't a shocking thing to see even in U.S. suburbs. Then again, I think most Muslims you do see would look eastern European, Near Eastern, or Ralph Nader-ish more than anything, too. :-D You really wouldn't jump and say, "Whoa, that's a Muslim," which some people do when they see the right shade of brown skin. When it comes down to it, I suspect agents anyway need to be exported to the U.S. and that's not always that easy. These guys aren't exactly always getting along with their home states and have trouble finding valid documentation. At times, they probably are tribal enough that they don't even put that much stock into the idea of having a home state. I mean, look at a map of the middle east. It's mostly just lines drawn by the pre-World War II imperialist club; there's not much to identify with. None of that means there isn't a threat, and it certainly doesn't mean abandoning reasonable caution, but I think they want something more spectacular here than just a couple of dead commuters. At the very least a symbol plus a lot of dead people.
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