Hmmmm?
>>All aspects of the world painted by George Orwell have already existed either in Hitler's Third Reich
>>or Stalin's Soviet Union. Yet when someone points out that we're starting down that same road, it's
>>okay as long as >YOU<, personally, don't feel threatened?
I already made it clear that you don't have to be personally threatened to be concerned.
Remember?
>>I have a newsflash for you. Most of the citizens of the USSR were NOT personally threatened by their government.
>>Only the ones that stepped out of line, politically, verbally, whatever.
You are saying that statistically, the citizens were unlikley to be threatened?
Your face should be red.
>>Then people need to learn the ORIGINS of the Third Reich and the USSR and various other totalitarian socialist regimes.
Very well put. Less time spent reading fiction perhaps?
>>I find it fucking astonishing that people like Brandioch will pompously refer another to "1984" as if by doing so some great insight is being performed.......but then that same person will tell you that "we fought the second world war according to the rule of law".
>>Umm, we bombed cities and civilians in WWII. AFTER the war, we treated the prisoners well. We helped our enemies rebuild their countries. We tried the criminals in front of the world. But we killed innocents who's only crime was to be born on the wrong side.
>>But I have a big problem with people who will allow themselves to be scared by this and then at the same time be dismissive of those who fear the violence being threatened......fear those who clearly have been trying to tool up with the means of causing mass destruction.
>And, once again, you are being ruled by your emotion.
I've said that I feel safe from the terrorists. I've said that I don't think I am going to be monitored by the government.
It is woefully inadequate to argue that someone is being emotional after they point out that there is paradox in how
threatened people are allowing themselves to feel. You are the one who is worried. I think your worry is unnecessary.
You don't. I think we are talking about your emotions and your emotional responses.
>>Instead of looking at the situation and thinking about what happened and why and how to prevent it in the future,
>>you're making an emotional decision based on your fear to surrender your rights for "security".
You have not listed ONE right which has been surrendered. Because you have not surrendered.
(The right to have wiretapping be made difficult is not a right you have).
>>I've asked you before what, specifically, you'd "monitor" now.
And I told you.....anything which you find a concern.
>>None of your examples would have changed the attack. Your "solution" wouldn't have stopped the LAST attack, so why do you think it will stop the NEXT attack?
>>The "threat" of being killed by a terrorist is less likely than the "threat" that you'll be killed by a car.
>>Or at LEAST try to see whether the SPECIFIC actions you advocate will, in what way, would have PREVENTED the first attack (and how, specifically) or wold have REDUCED its likelyhood of success.
Even though that "safety" is an illusion. As I have demonstrated by asking you to specify what you'd be monitoring
and how that would have prevented the first attack.
Oh jeesh........you really thought that was worth pursuing?
Yawn. It kinda goes like this:
a) you identify some people you are interested in examining more closely (see below).
b) you monitor their movements using GPS when they rent a car. You note all the people they visit
and put those people under surveillance.
c) you monitor that, coincidentally, several suspected terrorists are arriving at airports at the same time (using GPS).
d) you delay the plane - and discover that they have all bought expensive one way tickets
e) they are given a thorough search
f) the plane is given a thorough search
g) You break up the suspects into smaller groups and tell them they will need to fly on separate planes.
g) you place Federal air marshals on the plane (some in the cockpit some in the cabin)
So.......there's a fairly simple scenario which isn't contrived. It describes WHAT I would have
monitored. I have described HOW it might have helped. No doubt the FBI/CIA/FAA have more tools
than I know about. What else ya got?
[link|http://www.thenewamerican.com/tna/2001/11-05-2001/vo17no23_prevented.htm|http://www.thenewam...revented.htm]
The December 1994 hijacking of an Air France flight from Algiers was carried out by four
members of the "Phalange of the Signers in Blood," a subsidiary of Algeria\ufffds Armed Islamic Group.
The terrorists seized control of the plane and demanded that it fly to Marseilles, where it was
to be refueled for a trip to Paris. The hijackers also demanded that the Airbus A300 a plane of
comparable size to the Boeing 767s that were used to attack the World Trade Center be loaded with
27 tons of fuel, which was three times what was necessary for the short trip.
After debriefing released hostages and working with other sources, French authorities determined
that the terrorists intended either to explode the plane over Paris or ram it into the Eiffel Tower.
Corroborating evidence, in the form of 20 sticks of dynamite, was found by French troops who stormed
the plane and killed the hijackers.
FBI agents tracked Moussaoui\ufffds movements to the Airman Flight School in Norman, Oklahoma, where he logged
57 hours of flight time earlier in 2001 but was never allowed to fly on his own because of his poor skills.
This alone should have set off alarm bells, since a confessed Al Qaeda operative, Abdul Hakim Murad,
had trained at the same school, as part of preparations for a suicide hijack attack on CIA headquarters.
Murad testified about these plans in the 1996 trial of Ramzi Ahmed Yusef, the principal organizer of the
1993 World Trade Center car-bombing.
Several of the September 11 hijackers had either enrolled in or visited the Oklahoma flight school,
as a more thorough investigation determined in the aftermath of the suicide hijackings.
[link|http://www.wsws.org/articles/2002/jan2002/mous-j05.shtml|http://www.wsws.org...us-j05.shtml]
Excerpts:
* On August 13th, a flight school in Eagan, Minnesota, informed the FBI that a student named Zacarias
Moussaoui had asked to take 747 flight simulator training, but that he only wanted to learn how to
steer the aircraft not take off or land. Moussaoui, who was in this country illegally, was arrested
and held for deportation. But, as Novak notes, "no connection was made with the 1995 revelations"
about "Bojinka." In fact, the October 6th New York Times reported that the FBI "held back its own
agents" from investigating Moussaoui.
* The US government was monitoring the electronic communications of bin Laden and his associates
during the extensive period of advance planning which preceded the September 11 attack.
* Several of the September 11 hijackers, including Mohammed Atta, the alleged ringleader,
were under direct surveillance by US agencies as suspected terrorists during 2000 and 2001.
Yet they were allowed to travel freely into and out of the US and eventually carry out their plans.
>>Even though that "safety" is an illusion. As I have demonstrated by asking you to specify.......
When someone declines to take you up on specific request......it doesn't >prove< anything.
I ask you to list the specific rights you were surrendering. You came up with....they can
get wiretaps more easily now.....no talk about your rights and the potential impact
whatsoever. You're describing something you fear will impact you. You have not submitted ANY evidence
of how it will. You have not submitted any evidence of how things are worse now than they were.
(perhaps less FBI agents engaged in red tape?). Hooohooooo...very threatening.
Your ability to point to a government who kept files on famous people is no more relevant than the fact
that we have had goverments who supported slavery.
You recognise that the guy arrested at the canadia border probably prevented a disaster.
Ahhh but that was >before<. So what? It proves that the safety of people can be impacted
by monitoring and vigilance. Become less vigilant and you will become less safe.
Me personally? Maybe not. We've already eastablished that I'm not concerned about me.
You on the other hand are concerned that >YOU< will be monitored. And you think its
likely that you will be monitored. You have no reason to explain why this should be so.
You have no explanation for why, in this case, the statistics confound you time and again....
but in the case of terrorism.......the statistics leave you completely without danger.
Your statistic that you are more likely to be killed by a family member is hopelessly flawed because
America is very violent society. The statistical relationship changes if you use Norway or England as your backdrop.
The idea that people should measure the threat of terrorism to the nation depending on the context in which it occurs...
..is nothing if not novel. If its allowed to prevail....its a sad indictment.
One more time......I'm not worried by either. You're the worried one.
