"It is better that ten guilty persons escape than that one innocent suffer." - William Blackstone, Commentaries on the Laws of England This principle is embodied in the presumption of innocence at the very heart of the justice system. How in the world can you frame this in terms of liberal vs. conservative? How you can you, as a citizen presumably concerned with principles of justice be so dismissive of this injustice?
The lack of terrorism against the US on US soil indicates that the response has been effective. This is some of the dumbest logic I've seen. There were no Al Qaeda terrorist incidents on U.S. soil for 8 years previous to 9/11 as well. So is that an indication that security before 9/11 was just as effective as after? You really should learn more about how Al Qaeda operates and the time horizon of their operations if you want to honestly discuss effectiveness of our response.
Homer: "Not a bear in sight. The Bear Patrol must be working like a charm." Lisa: "That's specious reasoning, Dad." Homer: "Thank you, dear." Lisa: "By your logic I could claim that this rock keeps tigers away." Homer: "Oh, how does it work?" Lisa: "It doesn't work." Homer: "Uh-huh." Lisa: "It's just a stupid rock." Homer: "Uh-huh." Lisa: "But I don't see any tigers around, do you?" Homer: "Lisa, I want to buy your rock."
The lack of terrorism against the US on US soil indicates that the response has been effective. Cough, cough. Anthrax. Cough, cough <insert snide zinger in caps here>
Dude, if you wanna hand in your liberties and American rights because Bush didn't do his job, you go right ahead. But I'm not gonna stand by and watch Ashcroft wipe his ass with the U.S. Constitution and then bark "Terrorist!" whenever someone reaches under the stall for a square. Am I complaining? You're god-damn right I'm complaining. I'm an American, and no nutball politician is gonna take my 225-year-old Constitutional rights from me. If the constitution is good enough for Thomas Jefferson, it's good enough for John Ashcroft. It sickens me how so-called patriots are spreading their legs and giving the government anything they want just because they're told to.
GreenVegan, what is your solution to the terrorist problem? Is it a decreased level of security? Don't give me the convenient cop-out answer that others have resorted to -- asking for an inquiry is an *intermediate* step, not a solution. I have seen no solutions offered in this thread. Zero. Clearly, this man was of a special case. He fit the known profile of terrorists -- a man of Middle Eastern descent living in Canada and travelling often. This is a very specific group of people that could potentially pose a risk to Americans. A heightened level of security for these people is something that I strongly support. I support this for my own safety, and for your safety as well. We all must make sacrifices in order to live in this new era of terrorism -- an era that Jefferson simply could not have predicted. Am I wrong to think that it is better to have one man endure a year of torture than to have 3,000 blown up? No, I am not.
Damn, just imagine how many terrorists we're actually creating with all these "security" measures. We're taking perfectly harmless productive people who happen to be Muslim or of Arab descent or what have you, and giving them no choice but to hate us.
This "new era of terrorism"? Are we living in the same world? In 2001, five times as many Americans died from AIDS than from terrorist attacks. Since then, there have been exactly ZERO terrorist attacks on American soil, but tens of thousands have died from AIDS. Shouldn't this instead be a new "era of AIDS"? The fact is, we've been duped into believing terrorism is this giant lurking monster that is about to cut all our throats. It's not! You have a greater chance of being killed by a falling anvil than being a victim of a terrorist attack. And yet, with these miniscule odds, we have entirely changed our national policy, priorities and dialogue. Why? Fear. We're much more malleable and acquiescent when we're told a terrorist will blow up our house if we don't allow John Ashcroft to search our house without a warrant. If we're scared of an outside boogeyman, we do what our government says, quit asking questions, and forget about other relatively important issues like education, health care and the dirty air we breathe. It's insulting to our intelligence. Don't get me wrong -- there's absolutely going to be another terrorist attack. Better security is needed and prevention should be among our top priorities. But is stripping us of our Constitutional rights, and subjecting countless of Americans to torture and long-term captivity the answer? Absolutely not. I don't have the answers, but attacking Americans is the job of terrorists, not our government. Until Americans quit playing the victim, our government will use terrorism to justify anything and everything they do.
He fit the known profile of terrorists -- a man of Middle Eastern descent living in Canada and travelling often. That's your profile of a terrorist? Wow, why not just say he was male and therefore fits the profile of a terrorist? We all must make sacrifices in order to live in this new era of terrorism Looks more like you're saying this guy should make a sacrifice for you. What exactly did you sacrifice here, since you don't fit the "Canadian who travels" profile?
Wow, that is almost the same kind of logic that was used to justify the interment of Japanese-Americans during WWII. Just replace terrorists with sympathizers/spies. And keep in mind that the U.S. later admitted what they did to those Japanese-Americans were wrong and apologized. Their rights as Americans were sacrificed for the "safty" of other Americans. Just where do we draw the line between defense and the protection of our basic rights because if we don't recognize them, our basic rights could be gone. On the comments that all Americans must make sacrifices in order to live in this new era, I just have to say that if this trend of profiling certain groups continues, certain Americans will be sacrificing more of their rights than other Americans.
Am I wrong to think that it is better to have one man endure a year of torture than to have 3,000 blown up? No, I am not. How many civil liberties are you willing to sacrifice before you consider it too much? Is there a threshold? What role in your opinion should the Constitution play? Should we have any protections under it? How much of it do you consider obsolete? Where do you put the line that should not be crossed at? Or is there? Does your position change if a Democrat defeats the current Republican Admin in 04?
When I read what you are seeing above, it took me a while to regain my senses. Surely this is a joke?
In a weird way, this reminds me of the death penalty argument. Our current system puts a small but non-zero percentage of innocent people on death row, when one points this out, the same argument is used by proponents of the death penalty. Of course it's not exactly the same thing, just similar.
That's right, nobody who actually mistreated this person should take any responsibilty for their actions. Instead let's whine, 'the terrorists made us do this to an innocent man. It wasn't our fault, we aren't responsible for what we do anymore... waaah waaah waah.'
Yes, you are, unless that innocent man does it voluntarily. The reason is that terrorists don't win if they blow up ten times that number of people, but terrorists do win when we start throwing out due process, and the United States Constitution. I often hear conservatives grip when liberals comlain of casaulties in war. 'If this is a war then we have to expect casualties.' Yet the reason why we have these casualties should ideally be to defend our freedoms and our constitution. But if at the first sign of trouble we toss everything this country out the window then we've already lost. I think it's better that those that die, don't die in vain, but tossing away the liberties granted to us by our founding fathers. Toughen up TJ, be willing to sacrifice to defend our constitution.
Heightened security is one thing, handing the guy over to the Syrians is another. TJ, you're making it sound like the guy was just harassed by our security measures. This goes way beyond that. I wouldn't be happy if he was profiled and ended up missing flights or inconvenienced, but that could be chalked up to security measures and the necessities of verifying his info. This is totally unacceptable.
True to form, the liberals have still not provided any solutions to the problem. Just more idle complaining, chicken little civil liberties commentary, slippery slope arguments, and broad generalizations. It's no wonder America won't elect the Party of Pessimism to office.
I don't think you were talking to me since I'm not liberal, but I think some suggestions are pretty easy. 1) Don't send people to Syria when we know they'll be tortured 2) Don't send people to Syria when we know they'll be tortured 3) Don't send people to Syria when we know they'll be tortured 4) Don't send people to Syria when we know they'll be tortured Just hold them and question them. This will happen to other people from other nations and then we'll be more isolated than we already are.
