> believers and non-believers alike. Look at what they did to Afghanistan, and
> tell me how 1920s Chicago compares to that.
The principle is similar: local thugs who stepped in where national authorities could not or did not step in, who had only the most minimal local support, who combined tactical shrewdness and business sense with a penchant for terrifying violence, etc. Al-Q could get away with more than Al-C, is all. Brecht's "Arturo Ui" may have been wrong about Hitler, but got Osama right.
-- Dennis