ABSTRACT
The September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon traumatized Americans. Two weeks later, Attorney General John Ashcroft confirmed that Americans had reason to panic. Terrorists lived among us, he announced. Our borders and coastlines were vulnerable. Most chilling of all, he warned that new attacks could come within the week. A month after the attacks, The Washington Post reported that, during a classified briefing, FBI and CIA officials informed select Congress members that new attacks were “100 percent” likely (Milban & Slavin, 2001).1 Meanwhile, new anthrax attacks were in the news, and administration officials were giving conflicting messages about the dangers of anthrax and whether the anthrax attacks were linked to the September 11 attacks.2 The Post’s science and medicine writer wrote that public officials’ delicate balancing act of “trying to express uncertainty and reassurance at the same time” was “sowing chaos and confusion” (D.Brown, 2001, p. B3). A New York Times/CBS News Poll reported that a majority of Americans believed another terrorist attack was very likely, that the government was not doing enough to prepare for a biological attack, and that government officials were
not telling Americans everything they needed to know about anthrax (Berke & Elder, 2001).
