Issue in a nutshell.

Post #22,580 by mmoffitt 12/28/01 10:06:40 AM Reply	Issue in a nutshell. The only real question for us on this is: A. Free B. Safe (Pick only one) bcnu, Mikem -I'd have a sig, but we Americans have to "watch what we say, watch what we do now."
Post #22,603 by mhuber 12/28/01 12:33:19 PM Reply	I disagree The question has been framed (repeatedly) in terms of balancing liberty and safety. But while that makes a nifty basis for debate, the negative correlation hasn't been well demonstrated. Does anyone really think Ascroft's crimes are making us safer? Just because the question is interesting doesn't mean it is the right question for the real situation. Every time a violation of liberty is proposed or imposed, the question is "freedom vs safety" but in many situations a better question would be "will this even inconvenience (much less stop) a terrorist?" Frankly, Ashcroft, like certain Palestinean leaders and the loony left, is using the attacks to advance his own agenda regardless of what really happened. Still, it's been a nice break from "for the children". The trade-offs are really more about economic costs vs safety, convenience vs safety, and I suspect, The Coalition vs safety. ---- "You don't have to be right - just use bolded upper case" - annon.
Post #22,609 by mmoffitt 12/28/01 1:44:50 PM Reply	We aren't that far apart. But, there is a relationship between liberty and safety. Bolshevik Russia was a "safe" place. You had KGB agents stopping "hooligans" on the street. Asking them where they were going, what they were doing, etc. At age 9 (and most importantly as an American there) I never felt safer. I remember going out on my own at night frequently once I spoke enough Russian to get by and never feeling afraid as I frequently did in my own neighborhood in Southern California. That was a culture that did "give up essential liberty" and was "safer". Here, today, I think the best example of the relationship between safety and security is commercial air travel. Commercial air travel gives you the "liberty" to go virtually anywhere. The only way to make it "safe" is to keep the planes on the ground, i.e., sacrifice the liberty of free movement. We have the right to feel secure in our persons. Now, however, we must sacrifice that right, just a little, to get on the airplanes. Have you seen the pictures of people in airport lines with their shoes in their hands? How far off are cavity searches? The bottom line is that no security system has ever been developed that cannot be circumvented. But one thing remains true: the mere presence of liberty involves some risk. The more liberty you have, the greater the risk you must be willing to assume. Conversely, you can be safe if you lock yourself up in your home, have your food delivered (and tested, of course), but you will lose all your liberty. For me, I have accepted that in order for me to live freely, I must assume some risk. Specifically, that owing to my nation state's ineptness in matters foreign, there are a lot of people out there who do not like us. But, if I am to remain free, I must also grant them freedom (at least while they're in my country). Failure to do that diminishes everything good about this country. And, let's get some perspective here: I am far more likely to be killed in an automobile than I am by a terrorist - even if I fly into the busiest airports every day of my life. These assaults on privacy - which is an extension of liberty, are disgusting to me, even if they make me "safer". What good is safety in the absence of freedom?
Post #22,633 by Ashton 12/28/01 4:42:35 PM Reply	Re: We aren't that far apart. Specifically, that owing to my nation state's ineptness in matters foreign, there are a lot of people out there who do not like us. Yes. Exactly. And what 'we' (as if there Were such a beast) have thus far failed to notice even slightly: not all of those, 'despise us for no real reason'. We predictably 'buffer' every criticism from within and without as.. mostly envy-derived. We actually believe (and it is a religious conviction, no more no less) that "Ours IS the Best of all Possible Worlds". Already. Worse, we are certain! that it is also the Only Possible Way for all others to live. If they buy lots of the stuff from us, natch. This while our massive ignorance of how-it-is that others, in fact live: is documented fact, makes us a laughing-stock - as we confound our own 'plans' by not merely inept marketing but.. patronizing and transparently self-serving, utterly sanctimonious rhetoric. Our cities are dying, our infrastructure crumbling - not seriously refurbed since the NRA of the depression; meanwhile we call it "PC" to notice the exponential rise of man-made pollutants in ALL of our sources of 'clean' water - to name just One of 'our problems' only addressed late-night on weird PBS stations or in academia. Methinks that so long as we remain This fullofourselves, stubbornly anti-clueful about even well-explored atrocious behavior and disdainful of every other culture on the planet - We Ain't Seen Nothin Yet, with this little foray after The Evil One and our Quixotic [YAN.. YAN..] laughably inane War Against Evil\ufffd. Yes! the asshole Did Say That "for us" - and They Applauded that suppurating piece of doggerel as-if from a Founding Mother. I Saw It. Maybe it's so fucked-up, it's now become beyond discussion .. as we allow the mercantilists, the despicable 'governing' 3-5% to daily disembowel YAN formerly useful Word. Never mind 'Them'. Reform begins with 'US' - but it hasn't even begun.. in any serious way. And 'dialogue' isn't at all about asinine labels like Libruls and Reactionaries - via which we spin our wheels endlessly - in a slime with a coefficient of friction of 0.0000001 (nulling any possible chances for actual communication). A. Maybe it's Santa Claus's fault - we sainted the primary hawker of More Stuff. Time for retirement? Yet? Most folks in the world barely own the pot they piss in, but they can tell when we're pissing on them: it all smells the same.

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