Originally Posted by scandium

This thing hadn't been raised in the US in so long (not since the last election in '04 if I recall correctly) that I thought it had finally been scrapped - what purpose does it serve?

An investigative journalist asked an Israeli security chief why their country, with its history of terrorism, doesn't use a similar system. The Israeli replied 'Do you check the terror threat level when you get up in the morning? No, of course not, but you can bet the enemy does - why would we want to let our enemy know when our guard is down?'