There's been substantial criticism of the FBI's terrorist entrapment efforts. Too often, they find out about someone mouthing off about "Death to America", and gear up a sting operation to encourage them to commit some act for which they can be convicted.[1] Most of them are wannabes, not real threats. The FBI director once said of the group convicted of planning to below up the Willits Tower in Chicago that their plans were "aspirational, not operational". In the case of the “Newburgh Four,” a judge said the government “came up with the crime, provided the means, and removed all relevant obstacles,” and had, in the process, made a terrorist out of a man “whose buffoonery is positively Shakespearean in scope.”

It's not entirely the FBI's fault. They're under heavy political pressure to stop every terrorist plot. Every time some nut actually does something, they get criticized for missing them.

[1] http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/07/21/fbi-terrorism-sting...