General Discussion
Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsIt comes down to this, what approaches should be done to prevent another 9/11?
bunnies
(15,859 posts)Cali_Democrat
(30,439 posts)quinnox
(20,600 posts)I can think of several nations in history that regularly spied on all their citizens, and none of them were good examples to follow.
XemaSab
(60,212 posts)why are we not willing to accept a relative handful of dead people as a "fair price" for the fourth amendment?
Trying to stop all terrorism forever is literally impossible. Some jackass is always going to find a way.
So why should we give up our freedoms and BUCKETS of tax money to prevent a few people from dying?
We accept mass shootings as a part of life in 2013, so why not occasional bombings?
mike_c
(36,281 posts)Nail, meet Ms. Hammer.
Nay
(12,051 posts)nashville_brook
(20,958 posts)pscot
(21,024 posts)indepat
(20,899 posts)brother's hands are almost completely tied, making meaningful regulation of guns, even assault weapons, virtually impossible. But with the loss of someone at the hands of an occasional foreign terraist under a Democratic president, the cries of soft on terra and weak on national defense would be continuously screamed and streamed by the MSM and the Repukes, making Dems cringe, fearful they'd soil their pants is so labeled. Interestingly, the Bush-Cheney administration was neither labeled soft on terra, weak on national defense, nor derelict in duty in failing to thwart 9-11 notwithstanding the August 6 intelligence briefing warning of an imminent terrorist attack. One would think there were a double standard at work.
librechik
(30,677 posts)instead of acting like we own them.
kentuck
(111,110 posts)Don't ignore it.
still_one
(92,454 posts)Solly Mack
(90,792 posts)I guess they didn't need any of that to get the August 6th memo.
still_one
(92,454 posts)villager
(26,001 posts)n/t
still_one
(92,454 posts)blanket spying, and just based on my impressions, legal or not, I have no doubt others have been involved in similar activities.
The FBI has folders of information on people from j Edgar Hoover days
villager
(26,001 posts)But I'd agree that unConstitutional info-gathering and spying has been going on since the beginnings of the MIC, if not before (i.e., the Pinkertons).
But how sad this administration could stand so little differentiated from Nixon's, on this matter.
mike_c
(36,281 posts)...not in creating a police and surveillance state in the U.S.
datasuspect
(26,591 posts)and stuff.
or try to correct the legacy of colonialism.
still_one
(92,454 posts)On its own
frylock
(34,825 posts)still_one
(92,454 posts)treestar
(82,383 posts)Are there no objections to it?
treestar
(82,383 posts)The methods used to get that information are probably violations of rights and dismantling of the Constitution, too! Some people are just not practical in their zeal to be the victims of an imaginary American Big Brother State run by Obama.
dkf
(37,305 posts)Look at the Bostob situation. They had a proper lead and stuck him on a list of 40,000 where he disappeared.
Tierra_y_Libertad
(50,414 posts)MrSlayer
(22,143 posts)Of course, this police state bullshit was the entire point of 9/11. There is no turning back. We have failed Ben Franklin utterly.
Funny how we don't freak the fuck out when thousands die from gun violence. Or smoking. Or drinking. Or poor health care. But when we receive some blowback from some brown people, it's goodbye civil liberties.
MrSlayer
(22,143 posts)But yeah, they were the scapegoats.
EOTE
(13,409 posts)But even if you accept the official story at face value, we're talking incredible incompetence at minimum. It's amazing how convoluted and unbelievable a story they crafted, yet they all still come out looking like incompetent assholes.
treestar
(82,383 posts)Good grief, 9 more 911s would be horrible. Put in that perspective, who cares about data mining?
I like the idea behind the 4th amendment.
You are the kind of person Ben Franklin told of. I'd risk those thirty thousand people so the other 300 million have actual freedom. I'd die for it personally. It matters that much.
treestar
(82,383 posts)It is a matter of balance. When that poster said he would rather have 9 more 911s, that said something. Just over this metadata collection?
We always give up some freedom for security - we have cops, we stop at red lights. I'd like the freedom to go through them but give that up so as not to get killed in a T-bone accident. It is a matter of degree.
EOTE
(13,409 posts)bullwinkle428
(20,631 posts)chose to ignore the information!
B2G
(9,766 posts)cherokeeprogressive
(24,853 posts)BlueCheese
(2,522 posts)But there are worse things-- losing our freedoms, for example.
Not to be too coldhearted about it, but far more people die in traffic fatalities and gun violence annually than died on 9/11. To give away our most precious freedoms to prevent another 9/11 is overpaying by far.
Rex
(65,616 posts)nt.
Eddie Haskell
(1,628 posts)Then we might put the real perps behind bars.
leveymg
(36,418 posts)There's a better way to target terrorists.
Don't allow them into the US, even the ones the CIA considers to be useful "freedom fighters": e.g., the Mujahadin (WTC '93 bombers), al-Qaeda double agents (the 9/11 attack cell); the numerous and sundry al-Qaeda operatives attracted by Anwar al-Awlaki, and most recently Chechen "freedom fighters" (the Tsarnaev brothers.)
We really have to more closely control the CIA's own operatives, because these account for 90% of all the fatal mass casualty terrorist attacks inside the US during the last several decades.
piedmont
(3,462 posts)the risk that our own blood will be shed.
treestar
(82,383 posts)And quit blaming the government.
DisgustipatedinCA
(12,530 posts)It sounds as though you do. I want to hear it directly though. Do you support the President's spy program against his own citizens?
treestar
(82,383 posts)The President does not have a spy program against his own citizens. The US government does, and Presidents change. This is not a spy program but collecting metadata. Do you support all terrorist attacks against the US happening without any attempt at interference?
DisgustipatedinCA
(12,530 posts)He owns it. Do you support him in this or not? I can do this all day until you're ready to answer the question.
treestar
(82,383 posts)The domestic "spy program" was passed by Congress. You are making it up like the President - the current one- invented it.
I did not like the Patriot Act when it passed, as I did not think it would really help much and was a trade off of liberty for safety. But I don't think all efforts at safety are horrible.
So you will never again blame the government for a terrorist attack and think it would be fine if it had no way to do anything about it, and would accept the attacks without saying the government should have done something?
DisgustipatedinCA
(12,530 posts)He could have stopped it at any time. He did not.
Once again, are you in favor of Barack Obama's domestic spying program against US citizens, or do you disapprove? Now is the time to scare up some courage and see what you're made of. I await your reply.
DirkGently
(12,151 posts)DisgustipatedinCA
(12,530 posts)Insert scary al qaeda story here--nope, still don't give a fuck. You don't spy on the American people in blanket fashion. No way.
Fuck the Stasi.
Fuck the NKVD.
And fuck anyone and everyone who would enable that kind of thing in the United States.
cherokeeprogressive
(24,853 posts)marmar
(77,097 posts)I've got some swampland for sale.......
woo me with science
(32,139 posts)Last edited Fri Jun 7, 2013, 07:44 PM - Edit history (3)
No, it doesn't "come down to" that. It "comes down to" our Constitutional protections and ostensibly free society.
You guys need new material.
AndyA
(16,993 posts)9/11 could have been prevented, if Bush had taken responsible actions based on the briefing he had prior to the attack.
Instead, he did nothing. (Except went on vacation.)
I think more law enforcement is the answer. The planned attacks since 9/11 have largely been prevented by agencies already in place. Give them the budget and the manpower that they need to do their jobs effectively.
Also, instead of nation building everywhere else, we need to do some here at home. Repair our infrastructure to make it less susceptible to an attack, shore up areas of concern that haven't been touched in decades--basically, fix things here.
1-Old-Man
(2,667 posts)tiny elvis
(979 posts)criminals overthrow the gov
http://thecommons4change.blogspot.com/2006/09/al-franken-operation-ignore.html
lihop is mihop