Security vs. Liberty

It does not matter what liberty has to say, the facts are, the security services will and do target the obvious security risks in our societies. Its not about liberty, its about logical evaluation of the known risks. Would a Muslim enter a bar full of right wing skin heads? He is making a logical assumption that he might just get his head kicked in. Its not a matter of making a prejudice decision, we all make them, all the time,we evaluate our safety and take the appropriate path. Its unfortunate that its young muslims at this precise moment but Germans , Japanese Irish have all had their times of targeted interest.

It does not matter what liberty has to say, the facts are, the security services will and do target the obvious security risks in our societies.

But they do not, it is quite clear. The official security services are intimidated by the civil liberty organizations which are afraid of law suits from organizations like the ACLU. What has the young Muslim in a bar have to do with it?

The young Muslim making choices is the same as what the security services do, make valued judgements on safety.

... the best way to lessen the chance of such incidents ...

Wouldn't the best way be to deal with why some of the people of a particular group want to do such a thing? It is generally easier and better to avert a problem at its source, rather than waiting until the problem becomes large. If people can be prevented from wanting to blow up airplanes, wouldn't that be better than dealing with people who do want to do such things? Granted, that is a long term solution, and not one that deals with the current potential bombers, so other methods will be needed for those who do want to blow up airplanes. But don't you think it might be best to try to eliminate the desire to blow up airplanes? To do that generally requires that one understand why people want what they want. Of course, that requires thinking, and most people would rather die than think (Russell's comments on this subject come to mind...).

There is a cause (or, rather, group of causes) for people wanting to blow up airplanes, and addressing that is the best long term solution to the problem.

That is, of course, a nice thought. But first of all, by the time we deal with why people want to blow up planes, planes will be blown up. In the second place, there is no guarantee that we will be able to deal with these people. It may very well that the clash is too great to deal with, just as it was with Hitler. And, in the meantime, planes will be blown up. We were not particularly interested in understanding why Hitler (or Stalin) wanted what they wanted. We just knew we could not let them have it. And the same seems to be true of the radical Moslems. At any rate, while we are thinking (if we are) of a long term solution, we had better get on with a short term solution. Otherwise, a lot of people are going to die. And I suggest that this president get off the golf links, and begin doing what he was elected to do.

Granted, that is a long term solution, and not one that deals with the current potential bombers, so other methods will be needed for those who do want to blow up airplanes.

Blowing up planes is safety? And even if that were true, what has that to do with it?

where did you get the idea about a Muslim blowing up a plane?

From television, and the newspapers. What has the Muslim bar scene to do with that Northwest flight, and the attempt to blow it up? Is there supposed to be a connection? Indeed, what on earth are you talking about?

Why dont you make an effort instead of replying without actually trying to understand another's perspective. It has nothing directly but only how security services need to react and how we all react to danger.

What is it a perspective on? I thought you might have been replying to my post, since you quoted my post. But i suppose that was jumping to conclusions. Did what you wrote have anything to do with what I wrote, or was it just stream of consciousness. Next time you reply to my post would you please preface it with, "This has nothing much to do with what you said, but......"?

The question you posed was a matter of how the security services act without jeopardizing liberty. The question of one more Muslim attempting to bomb a plane is only the cause of you present question, not the entire problem we all face. Do you want me to comment on this one Muslim or the overall situation you decide , come on tell me.

Relevant would be whether we should profile young male Muslims who want to get on commercial jets. What we have to do is to deal with the civil liberty fanatics.

That's my dry, accountant's way of delineating the task. I know it's a very complicated task in which it's hard to be objective. But it can be done.

Just looking at history, it seems very likely that our extreme concern and fear of terrorism is greatly overdrawn. We have done this before. Our government took anti-terrorist action against some of the citizens who fought for the Bill of Rights. It enacted the Alien and Sedition Act suppressing free speech. It interred our Japanese-American citizens. And, of course, it has recently violated our rights of privacy under the authority of the so-called Patriots Act (developed without any semblance of an assessment such as that I have described.

My own assessment is very subjective, but I simply can't understand the big fuss and bother over terrorism. Terrorism - sometimes also called freedom-fighting - has been around a long time and will probably be around a long time to come. We lose a few hundred lives to terrorism each year. We lose a plane full of people every few years. We panic. Instead of flying, some of us travel on the highways where we lose vast numbers of lives each year. One violent loss of a life is a tragedy; a few hundred losses are a great tragedy; one or two hundred thousand losses is a gigantic tragedy.

In my personal assessment, I also try to judge the likelihood of success, Which works better: our counter-violence or our peace-making approach? I look at the illiterate, jobless, ragged troops that have little choice other than to fall in behind the terrorist leaders. I see much success to be had from more peaceful negotiations and selective counter-violence.

I'm not a frequent visitor to this fine discussion group; so I apologize for any great redundancy.

i would be interested in the statistics as to how many people died in planes as a result of pilots who hadnt had enough sleep or badly maintained air craft or bad weather and pigeons in the motors compared to bombing incidents. and also compare it to (percentage wise of course) how many people die in plane travel as opposed to highway travel. seems to me there is a lot of scary stuff that needs fixing and some of it would be relatively easy.

so if people become afraid and ground all the planes, that would work, wouldnt it? but guess what, a new threat would surface, because terrorists would then be encouraged that their tactics worked.

anyway, profiling muslims or arabs or bearded young men traveling alone is easy enough to overcome-they can recruit young women and children, travel as families, shave and carry bibles, how will you find them then? clearly we are not looking at a means of solving the problem or stopping the threat or promoting world communication.

i would be interested in the statistics as to how many people died in planes as a result of pilots who hadnt had enough sleep or badly maintained air craft or bad weather and pigeons in the motors compared to bombing incidents. and also compare it to (percentage wise of course) how many people die in plane travel as opposed to highway travel. seems to me there is a lot of scary stuff that needs fixing and some of it would be relatively easy.

so if people become afraid and ground all the planes, that would work, wouldnt it? but guess what, a new threat would surface, because terrorists would then be encouraged that their tactics worked.

anyway, profiling muslims or arabs or bearded young men traveling alone is easy enough to overcome-they can recruit young women and children, travel as families, shave and carry bibles, how will you find them then? clearly we are not looking at a means of solving the problem or stopping the threat or promoting world communication.