Now that the Orange Alert is over, this article from Mary Lynn F. Jones (via CalPundit) is a little out of date:
By maintaining the same high alert level for three straight weeks, the government has effectively boxed itself into a situation where we may be stuck at orange forever. As a result, it's time to color the terror alert system useless, once and for all.But I do think it's strange that they waited as long as they did to lower the threat level. Communications have apparently decreased considerably, and we haven't seen a terrorist attack. On the other hand, they may have to raise the level again soon, if there is a threat of attacks to coincide with our invasion if Iraq.It seems likely that we will never go to green, or "low risk," because after September 11, the government will never again be able to essentially guarantee that we're free from the risk of an attack. Same goes for blue, or "guarded." Government officials appear worried that if we return to yellow, or "elevated," something bad will happen and they'll get blamed for telling us to relax a bit....All of which is to say that we are now looking at spending the majority of our lives at orange.
UPDATE: According to my econ prof, experts recommend a threat level that equates the likelihood of a threat with the chances of some real event - wrecking your car, or being struck by lightning - so that people will have a better idea of what to prepare for. The problem with this, of course, is that terrorist acts aren't random events, and it's much harder to judge the likelihood of success when you have such a small data pool.
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