Do You Feel Safer?

[newbie]

I certainly don't. And I'll bet the granny at the airport who had to undergo a search and have her homemade jelly confiscasted doesn't either. And how about these gems:

* Security under Bush and GOP?

* Not Enough Troops...Body Armor...or armed Humvees in Iraq.

* Four times as many terror attacks in 2005.

* Two billion cut from law enforcement.

* Iran developing nuclear weapons. Just 6% of containers inspected.

* Millions more illegal immigrants.

* North Korea has quadrupled its nuclear arsenal.

link

I think the following essay from Rosa Brooks sums up the situation nicely.

link

[KrustyKidd]

Safer? Do you feel safer?

Thousands of people felt safe enough to go to work in the Towers that morning.

Militant Islam used to be a "niche ideology," as Brookings Institution fellow Ivo Daalder put it. But today, thanks to the invasion of Iraq and the Bush administration's nasty little habit of torturing detainees, militant Islam is an ideology with millions of adherents. That doesn't make me feel safer.

Niche Ideaology? Who are these morons? Iran, 1979, Al Qeda in 88', WTC in the nineties, Cole, Towers, embassies etc.

We're forcing exhausted reservists into back-to-back tours of duty, and military recruiters are struggling to meet their quotas. That doesn't make me feel safer.

Of course it doesn't. You never knew there was a threat so now you do you blame the government for not handling it properly and instead of backing them up, you blame them for it. With clowns like you at home, it's a wonder anybody can stop terrorism.

On Wednesday, Bush defended what he euphemistically referred to as an "alternative set of procedures" for detainees who remain "defiant" in the face of ordinary interrogation methods. These "alternative" techniques have included mock executions, "water-boarding" (simulated drowning) and induced hypothermia. Do we think this is going to win any hearts and minds in the Islamic world?

And your suggestion is to just sit and wait for them to come and negotiate with us in return for letting them take over the Middle East? Brilliant!

The Bush administration doesn't even seem capable of heeding its own advice on how to fight terrorism. Since 9/11, the administration has insisted that the war on terror is "a new kind of war." In an earlier era, the classic war was between two or more states with clear governance structures, defined territories and armies under hierarchical command. The goals were clear: You sought to take over the enemy state's territory, destroy its military and, if necessary, oust its leadership. Once that was done, the enemy's surrender was more or less inevitable, the war was over and the victor could head home.

New kind of war in that democracy is the tool to be used to thwart the enemy. So, instead of allowing people to wallow in a corrupt regime and join Jihadists out of nothing to lose they can now gain a life to work with. Very novel actually.

But Bush has insisted, in countless speeches, that fighting terrorism requires "new ways of thinking" because "doctrines designed to contain empires, deter aggressive states and defeat massed armies" aren't appropriate for combating global terrorist networks. It's an excellent point — and our anti-terror efforts are backfiring in part because the administration keeps ignoring it.

How so? First you bitch because the US didn't run a steam roller over Afganistan and western Pakestan killing tens of thousands of villagers to kill Bin Landen and now bitch because they have over ninety countries cooperationg with them in the war on terror globally.

The predictable result? Afghanistan is again deteriorating into violence and instability. The Taliban is back, suicide bombings are on the increase and U.S. troops are dying in Afghanistan at a faster rate than before. That doesn't make me feel safer either.

Deteriorating because NATO troops are not making enough headway. Are you serious that Afganistan would have been better off and us safer if AL Queda ran the place again? What a moron.

Then there's Iraq. Why did we go to war in Iraq, a state that had nothing to do with 9/11? Well, when your only tool is a hammer, everything looks like a nail.

To get rid of a thorn called Saddam, install democracy within the troubled region, give the US a non Saudi base with which to place pressure on any government within the area to take care of their Al Queda infestations. This worked very well as SA did take that action almost immediately.

Effective counter-terrorism means more than just beating the war drums. If we really want to make this nation safer, we need to get serious about human intelligence — gained not through torturing the people we capture but through investing in the linguistic and cultural skills we'll need to understand the Islamic world.

Yes, it means investing money, having elections, negotiating with nations, supporting nations in their own anti terrorism actions.

And we need to address the political grievances that drive ordinary people to support terror in the first place.

Ya, like living under a murderous dictator or oppressive regime you clown.

Some great essay.

Hey Newbie,

Iran developing nuclear weapons. Just 6% of containers inspected.

So you don't think going through the UN in negotiations with Iran is the right way to go? Wanna attack don't you. Kill ten or fifteen million Iranians?

6% is a lot and more than enough to thwart the threat there. Wanna look like an idiot and call me on it?

* North Korea has quadrupled its nuclear arsenal.

You want to attack don't you? See all those Liberal South Koreans on the border die in a day don't you?

[newbie]

6% is a lot and more than enough to thwart the threat there. Wanna look like an idiot and call me on it?

Fine, if you live near a port where hundreds of containers come in and you can live with only 6 out of the 100 being inspected go fo it. I prefer the container being scanned electronically in the foreign port before being shipped myself.

[KrustyKidd]

Fine, if you live near a port where hundreds of containers come in and you can live with only 6 out of the 100 being inspected go fo it. I prefer the container being scanned electronically in the foreign port before being shipped myself.

Tell me what matter a terrorist might try to smuggle in using a container. In my mind, it would have to be something they cannot find readily available here to use as a weapon of sorts correct?

Second, secrecy. they undoubtably do not wish this item or items to be s=discovered and hence have probably taken great care to hide what they are shipping from a lot of people in the ports they shipped from and to along with the loaders and manufactureres of whatever it is.

Next, they have had to constitute this item from afar meaning they hade to transport it in secret to the port they shipped from and undoubably have had to pay off a lot of people.

Inevitably there is a group waiting for this item (s) to use when it arrives. Laying low and in secret for months if not years at great expense to the organization all waiting for the time when material and people can use it.

So, what is in that container has taken a lot of money, effort, risk and [prayer to get there. If it is discovered the game is up and they lose something more valuable than their lives. A sweating person filling out a manifest jor, a wron g answer at a checkpoint could blow the whole thing. ANd, there is a one in twenty chance they will have the container opened and the whole scheme blown to hell with arrests, cells being destroyed that have worked together for years, the entire shipping rat trail exposed. One in twenty. Great odds for a weekend frolic but terrible for a years wages and spending the rest of your life in an Ifidel jail for.

Now, what if the container has only a part of what is needed and there is a second one on it's way? That makes the dicovery of the plot ten to one or, ten percent. Now, that's opening them up to have a look. WHat about x raying, dogs, radioactive measuring etc. Wow, starting to look like not worth it to ship dsomething to get your Jihadist buddies discovered. Then, when they start talking, they rat out the shippers details when given some harsh language in a cell. A lot of risk to mission and self just to ship it via container. I should think that most terrorism tools will be home grown ie: US manufactured guns and explosives if at all. If somthing is shipped by this means it would have to be so irreplaceable that it means a lot. To risk it for a five to ten percent chance of blowing the entire plot along with losing the cells involved on both sides of the trasaction that that risk is unacceptable. So, please give me a scenario of something that is worth that kind of risk for an organized Jihadist group.

[newbie]

So, please give me a scenario of something that is worth that kind of risk for an organized Jihadist group.

You forget the patience these folks have. And and all scenarios are open game in the imagination of a jihadist.

[KrustyKidd]

You forget the patience these folks have. And and all scenarios are open game in the imagination of a jihadist.

So, you are afraid. Now, please answer the question of what

is worth that kind of risk for an organized Jihadist group.

Or else just say your are afraid of nothing or something that you don't have a shmick about. Then go onto saying how the US government doesn't know how to protect you from something that you can't tell us what it might be and how you are more at risk now from something you don't know about than you were before from something you don't know about.

[newbie]

"... Then go onto saying how the US government doesn't know how to protect you from something that you can't tell us what it might be and how you are more at risk now from something you don't know about than you were before from something you don't know about.

[B. Max]

More problematic is the enemey from with in. How to defeat both at the same time is a must.

http://archives.zinester.com/14807/106573.html

Our real enemy is within us, in the immense constituency of the half-educated narcissists pouring from our universities each year -- that glib, smug, liberal, and defeatist “victim culture” itself, that inhabits the academy, our media, our legal establishment, the bureaucratic class. The opinion leaders of our society, who live almost entirely off the avails of taxation, make their livelihoods biting the hands that feed them, and undermining the moral order on which our solidarity depends.

David Warren

© Ottawa Citizen

[KrustyKidd]

So newbie, still wondering what it is you are worried about getting through the ports. Please explain.

[newbie]

So newbie, still wondering what it is you are worried about getting through the ports. Please explain.

I think you missed the point. How safer are we when only 6% of containers are inspected? I don't care if its drugs, bombs or poison gas, etc. We aren't any safer and in fact we are more constricted and a lot less freer.

[KrustyKidd]

I think you missed the point. How safer are we when only 6% of containers are inspected? I don't care if its drugs, bombs or poison gas, etc. We aren't any safer and in fact we are more constricted and a lot less freer.

I think you missed the point. 6% is enough to provide a deterrent. To protect you 100% every container would have to be inspected crippling the economy to the point where there really wouldn't be much to attack anyhow. As a quick parallel, if the police were to provide protection rather than a deterence, every man, woman and child would have to be guarded by a personal police officer. I suppose that you would decry that your rights were being infringed on but, as it is, one officer per thousand people is more than enough to provide the deterence and surity that commiting a crime will probably get you caught.

As for not being safer, I see that in the years since 911, with every terrorist wanting to harm the US at home, not one has done so. I would say that the deterence is sucessful. Try sleeping pills if you can't sleep.

[newbie]

I think you missed the point. How safer are we when only 6% of containers are inspected? I don't care if its drugs, bombs or poison gas, etc. We aren't any safer and in fact we are more constricted and a lot less freer.

As for not being safer, I see that in the years since 911, with every terrorist wanting to harm the US at home, not one has done so. I would say that the deterence is sucessful.

I think you have to look at the big picture. When I say "we" I'm talking about western society. Al-Qaeda is on the move all over the world. Since 911, there have been attacks in Britian, Bali, and Spain. There wasn't this on this magnitude before 911. Our ports (North America) are extremely vulnerable. To say that Al-Qaeda has been deterred is premature. Like I said earlier, they are a very patient organization.

[KrustyKidd]

Like I said earlier, they are a very patient organization.

So patient that they will wait, plan, accumulate material to carfully set it up in a foregn land for years, set up operatives here, then, in secret, make sure the stuff is loded onto a container, bribe the right people to have it shipped in secret and then, contact all involved to wait for the stuff to arrive. Then, when they are ready to recieve it, hope that none of the hundred or so people involved have been compromised they risk a one in eighteen chance the whole two year long operation will be dicovered simply by a physical inspection. Got it.

No wonder you are shivering. You have no idea of what these people have to do to set up an operation and the risks involved without a random check. BTW, did you ever get together with Black Dog? He doesn't think there is any threat whatsoever from these people. In fact, he denies the existance of any organized group. What do you think of that?

[newbie]

Like I said earlier, they are a very patient organization.

So patient that they will wait, plan, accumulate material to carfully set it up in a foregn land for years, set up operatives here, then, in secret, make sure the stuff is loded onto a container, bribe the right people to have it shipped in secret and then, contact all involved to wait for the stuff to arrive. Then, when they are ready to recieve it, hope that none of the hundred or so people involved have been compromised they risk a one in eighteen chance the whole two year long operation will be dicovered simply by a physical inspection. Got it.

Consider the planning done for 911.

BTW, did you ever get together with Black Dog? He doesn't think there is any threat whatsoever from these people. In fact, he denies the existance of any organized group. What do you think of that?

We all have opinions.

Edit: Krusty, many of us on the left has opinions and beliefs that can align with some thoughts on the right.And we don't have to "toe the party line." I don't believe everything the left presents, but I favour them over the right. Just more things in common I guess.

[KrustyKidd]

Consider the planning done for 911.

Exactly. Now, insert a container into the plan and it gives them a one in eighteen chance of evberybody, including the hundred or so support people getting caught. That is my point exactly not to mention losing the valuable machne, commodity or whatever inside the container. In fact, with the trail of goods being longer and with a materieal reather than a fluid person, the chances would probably be a lot higher.

Krusty, many of us on the left has opinions and beliefs that can align with some thoughts on the right.And we don't have to "toe the party line." I don't believe everything the left presents, but I favour them over the right. Just more things in common I guess.

Thanks for the insight.