the president will not do it of course. the opinion of this, former pbi fbi agent jack quinn, cited in the abc news story, directly involved in the negotiations. he said the families should be allowed to do whatever they can as a civilian to get their victim or family member out of harm s way. that is a guy directly involved in these negotiations. the concern would be this is a slippery slope judge right? of course. there is difference taking official governmental position we encourage families to pay ransom and say we re not going to prosecute them. we can take the position we will not negotiate with terrorists. there is a downside, if the family is doing it behind everybody s back, you don t have benefit of fbi tracing monies to find outsource of terrorism things like that. it s a tough road to say you will prosecute families. andrea these families don t feel communicated with anyway. they may not be losing anything