So the Feds apparently have a database on all travelers

i am not doing that - im just calling those who commit terrorism terrorists.

not calling you a liar, but you seem far too knowledgeable to not know about the cia's involvment in iran and overthrowing mossadeq. you dont think what the cia did in iran in 53 constitutes terrorism?

why dont you give me your definition of terrorism? you have stated what is not terrorism, but you wont describe what you think it is.

your WWII and serbia examples, although they certianly terrorized the victims, are not "terrorism" in the traditional sense, as it was wartime. (i wouldnt argue that civilians are legitimate targets in war either though). however, when an intelligence agency goes into a foreign country whom their country is not at war with and covertly carries out bombings against innocent people in order to overthrow elected leaders, is that not terrorism? judging by your standards, i guess you would say that whomever carried out 9/11 are not terrorists?

the fear of a police state is unfounded? where have you been the last 5 years? did you ever imagine that our government would be spying on us and invading our privacy to the degree that they are now? warrantless wiretaps anyone?

why did bush feel the need to lie to us when he said that there are no warrantless wiretaps, when there were?

"Now, by the way, any time you hear the United States government talking about wiretap, it requires -- a wiretap requires a court order. Nothing has changed, by the way. When we're talking about chasing down terrorists, we're talking about getting a court order before we do so. It's important for our fellow citizens to understand, when you think Patriot Act, constitutional guarantees are in place when it comes to doing what is necessary to protect our homeland, because we value the Constitution."

and why no comment on john yoo? do you think bush had the authority to have a childs testicles crushed infront of his parents too?

 

No, although this is one of the main problems encountered when trying to define terrorism - how to account for non-state internal resistance. International conventions also carve out space for internal resistance groups fighting in their own territory. It will become quickly apparent if you read some of the literature on efforts to define terrorism that there are all kinds of problems doing so - who gets to interpret what is what, etc. My definition is a work in progress so feel free to make comments but I am not claiming it is the definitive solution to the quandry of defining terrorism.

Defining terrorism so broadly functionally does the same thing. Aside from that you are not defining what terrorism is, just repeating that they commit terrorism

I'm not sure what you could possibly say I am lying about - I only said I was not conceeding your charges of bombing etc. I already said no, it did not constitute terrorism, although it may have been an act of war.

Again I think you're mischaracterizing my posts. I haven't refused to describe what it is. In fact I even started the discussion about how to define it. I start with the core issue which to me is the actor: a sub or supranational group. The what is something like: that takes violent action, usually against a civilian population, to achieve a political or religious objective.

But we didn't declare war on Serbia, right? You answer is actually in line with my definition though. A state action is different than a sub or supranational action. A state makes war on other states - a terrorist commits terrorism. A state can sponsor terrorism by providing material support for terrorists, but I think it makes the issue much clearer if you consider an act by a state in this category either as an act of war, war crime, or crime against humanity.

Why is that any different than dropping bombs on Serbians to get them to kick Milosevic out (again I haven't seen any proof of 'bombings' in Iran in 1953 so I am just assuming that for arguments sake).

Not sure why you'd say that. You have a supranational group committing an act of violence against a civilian target for political or religious objectives. The are not an internal resistance group acting internally as recognized by International Conventions. They are a perfect example of what I would call a terrorist group.

I was living in London for awhile, the Virgin Islands and now back in Texas. What about you?

I think if you look historically there have been much more restrictive times. While some of the actions are reason for concern I don't worry about a slippery slope - as I already said - there are other healthy democracies with far more government surveillance than ours and by definition they are not police states.

No idea - to keep them secret?

Don't know anything about john yoo. Barring legislation banning torture then I am not sure what the legality of the issue is vis-a-vis Executive Orders. Not sure what this has to do with a traveler's database though.

 

So internal resistance groups fighting on their own territory aren't terrorists so Iraqi insurgents aren't terrorist then.. Your definition of terrorism seems pretty subjective.

 

SC, do you think you can come up with a non-subjective definition, lol? There are over 100 definitions out there. I think my definition clears up some, not all problems. I would say under my proposed definition that the Iraqi insurgents who attack US military or Iraqi government personnel and infrastructure are not terrorists. However, those like Al Quaeda in Iraq and indigenous Iraqis who blow up mosques, place IEDs in markets etc are terrorists.

 

Terror

-ism

To me the word seems pretty self explanitory. You only hit problems when you seek to change the word for politiccal reasons. If you seek to make a definition that would inherently preclude any specific group from possible consideration of using it, that strikes me as an inherently political definition.

I was watching a very fine show today on the History Channel about Confederate terrorism durring the Civil War.

 

Yeah, it's pretty useful to know the 8 year old next door is a terrorist because he chases the neighbors cat. So jo mama, under those enlightening guidelines I won't contest that the CIA is a terrorist organization. After all, most of the major movie studios are terrorist organizations when you think about it with those horror movies and all. Those people who run haunted houses at Halloween are terrorists! In fact, I'm a terrorist when I hide around the corner and scare my wife! Woo-eeeee, this is fun!

 

I guess you didn't bother to look at the links? How is it using the incitement of terror as a doctrinal or philosophical tool when the 8 year old attacks the cat?

 

Terror is a pronounced state of fear, an overwhelming sense of imminent danger.

+

The English suffix -ism was first used to form a noun of action from a verb.

or

+

action, process or practice (e.g. voyeurism)

=

an 8 year old attacking a cat, a horror movie, or me scaring my wife. I guess I did read the links. But maybe you were just being too subtle...

Also, I didn't see the phrase 'doctrinal or philosophical tool' in those definitions. Maybe you can specifical quote it to show us where is says that. It does say: "Many isms are defined as an act or practice by some, while also being defined as the doctrine or philosophy behind the act or practice by others." But there again an 8 year old terrorizing others qualifies as a terrorist if he does it with any frequency, so that must not be what you were referring to.

 

[rquoter]
Many isms are defined as an act or practice by some, while also being defined as the doctrine or philosophy behind the act or practice by others. Examples include activism, altruism, despotism, elitism, optimism, sexism and terrorism.

[/rquoter]

 

Same here.

 

Yeaaaaaah, and? That's the same quote I provided, it doesn't say 'doctrinal or philosophical tool,' and doesn't exclude johnny the cat chaser from being a terrorist.

Also, it's pretty funny to declare the word is self explanatory then link to two different webpages that have different definitions in the double digits!

 

Sure.
Terrorist-One who uses violence directed at non-combatants for political and or strategic gains.

Its only in the sense that people want to keep it perjorative do we go through all these semantic twists. Its like the term "warrior" at times it has been used as a perjorative in reference to undisciplined fighters, primarily Native Americans, but it has also been used as a term of respect. Overall though an objective use of it is as someone who fights in a war so you could say that both the Nazis and the Allies were warriors. So if someone uses terror for a political end then they are a terrorists. Anything else and you're divorcing the act from the actor and then in the realm of euphemisms like freedom fighter. My point is whether you support the cause or not bombing civillians to force a change in the government is terror. The one who does the bombing is a terrorist.

 

It's not a question of government waste or tracking movements - it's just data collections and computer multi-variate analysis. That's the whole point of these kinds of systems - you take out issues like trust or whatever. You take out the human factor of prejudice. Is someone going to go through that database and look for certain people - probably not - because it's such a massive data set...and the programs are designed so that those who process the data aren't always aware of anything but the piece of data they are entering.

Then tools do a multivariate analysis to identify high treat group - and the computer flags those people as being ones to be monitored a bit more carefully. That's it. Now, if these people were rounded up and all - that wouldn't be right....but what's wrong with focusing our energy on those that are statistically more likely to be involved in something shady.

No harm done.

It's just like a segmentation analysis done in marketing. This stuff has been done for years. If you think your privacy is real - well it is. But your info is well known to marketers and is used to deliver targeted advertising all the time. The mail you receive, that ads you are served, the offers you get from your bank, and the list is endless.

 

It's still subjective unless there are no limits to application. Everyone is a terrorist: the UN, nation states, insurgents, and soldiers. Action like civil disobedience; public protestors, peta paint throwers; "activities such as a peaceful student rally against the deregulation of university fees in which some members caused limited property damage could fall within the scope of the definition. So too could a long-running nurse’s industrial dispute in the public hospital sector (given that “creat[ing] a serious risk to the health or safety of the public” qualifies as a form of damage)."
onlineopinion.com

Really - that's interesting since you can't find an organization that calls themselves terrorists because it is universally seen as pejorative. The step of removing its pejorative nature defeats the purpose of the act - if its just descriptive then it loses its moral basis for undesirability.

Aren't you precisely divorcing the act from the actor? If they use terror for a political end they are terrorists so who they are is unimportant in your view. OTOH divorcing the two ignores the fact that legitimacy is directly related to who the actor is - vigilantes become the same as police. It blurs legitimacy. Our system is based on the nation-state and equating a nation state with an Al Quaeda puts them at the same starting point, which they aren't.

I think you neuter the term when you make it descriptive instead of normative. Allies were terrorists in WWII, the UN were terrorists in Serbia. The Boston Tea Party was terrorism. OK, well I support those actions as do most people. If terrorism isn't bad, if its just another action then bombing Serbia and 9/11 are the same thing. I couldn't disagree more. What is the point of removing the pejorative nature of the term and why shouldn't it be pejorative?

 

When citizens aren't protected from their government then the government is the only one who define terrorists.

Politicians have a definition of terrorists- the group we are fighting.

Terrorists carried out the Boston Tea party

Watch the movie 'The Patriot' and figure out who are the terrorists.

Civil liberties, personal freedoms, individual responsibility are the only things that ensure that terrorism is not government defined and government sponsored.

Todays definition of terrorism is unconventional warfare, the use of intimidation, retributrion and fear through acts of violence to wage war.

This can be applied to any group from a small gang to a government.

The destruction of civil liberty and freedom, the growing power of government over individuals, the rise of statism is terrorism in its highest form- tyranny. Tyranny both breeds terrorists and acts itself in kind.


The sad state of America is when you are occupying a sovereign nation all of your collateral damage- physical, emotional, and personal yields terror to the victim.

That is why we lose, lose in Iraq and why the average American can't understand what's the big deal with giving up rights, responsibilities, freedoms, and liberties to the government.

 

basically, the way you define terrorism depends in large part on whether or not it is the state doing it? can there be any such thing as "state-sponsored terrorism" in your definition? you are applying different standards for different groups.

if a group of muslim extemists hijacks a plane and flies it into a building they are terrorists, but if a state-sponsored group hijacked a plane and flew it into a building that would be an act of war, not terrorism?

if al-quada did this they would be terrorists, but when a government entity covertly takes violent action against a civilian population in order to achieve a political goal (removal of a democratically elected leader) they are not simply because they are state-sponsored?

deep in the heart of texas! london, huh? that would explain why you dont really mind all the privacy invasions - you were living the the worlds biggest surveilance society. smile - you are on camera!

absolutely - historically speaking, true freedom is very rare. america was on the right path - it is a shame we are going backwards.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Yoo
he is best known for his work from 2001 to 2003 in the United States Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel.
He contributed to the PATRIOT Act and wrote controversial memos in which he advocated the possible legality of torture and that enemy combatants could be denied protection under the Geneva Conventions.

His positions on executive power, collectively termed the Yoo Doctrine or Unitary Executive theory, are controversial since it is suggested the theory holds that the President's war powers place him above any law.

In explaining the Yoo Doctrine, Yoo made the following statements during a December 1, 2005, debate in Chicago, Illinois, with Notre Dame Law School Professor Doug Cassel:

Cassel: If the President deems that he’s got to torture somebody, including by crushing the testicles of the person’s child, there is no law that can stop him?
Yoo: No treaty.
Cassel: Also no law by Congress. That is what you wrote in the August 2002 memo.
Yoo: I think it depends on why the President thinks he needs to do that.

actually, john yoo's comments tie into the broader argument i would make which is that our government is totally evil and unworthy of trust, especially when it comes to spying on american citizens. any government that thinks they can sexually torture children is beyond redemtion, imo.

if the president thinks that he has the authority to have a childs testicles crushed than that tells me that he thinks he has dictatorial powers - yoo might as well have said bush can snort cocaine and bbq jewish babies on the whitehouse lawn. afterall, he can do whatever the hell he wants right?

torture/spying on americans - it all amounts to the fact that we have a president who thinks he is above the law (and so far, i suppose he is).

 

comparing a child chasing a cat to people killing each other - nice!

 

The problem though is that such systems are only as good as the people entering the data, interpretting the results and running the system. The government bureaucracy is far from infalliable and on top of that given the state of IRS and FBI computers is also far from the cutting edge of technology. While I agree there is a lot of great analysis and datamining tools out there that said you are counting on the same government that screws up even simple tax returns to implement that.

That's true but at the same time Best Buy can't arrest me and ship me off to Gitmo. I agree we have a limited amount of privacy but if we are smart enough we can control that by careful choices. (aren't you the big advocate of Internet anonymity?) At the sametime you can't compare the power of marketers to the power of government. A marketer can track me to target market baked beans to me. The government can track me to declare me an unlawful combatant. The outcome of potential abuse from one is far far worse than the other.

 

I'm just really curious.

Is there anything that the Bush Admin could mandate for security, that wouldn't merit the Trader_Jorge and pals chorus of "Darn right, we need to be doing that"

I mean....if they started strip searching all passengers are we so cowardly that even that would be ok?

 

I will agree that the definition and amount of people who could be considered terrorists is broader but at the same time the key term there is violence. "Civil disobedience" by definition isn't violent nor a peaceful rally isn't violent. Paint throwing is debatable. Note I didn't say "damage" I said "violent" there might be accidents that cause damage but those are done without intent.

That's an excellent point and will agree with you that "terrorist" is used almost solely in the perjorative sense the problem there though is that to come up with a consistent definition then we go into all sort of semantic twists that IMO dilute the meaning of the term in the first place. For instance the Contras are freedom fighters while Hezbollah are terrorists when they both do many of the same actions and are non-state organizations fighting against states. If one isn't a terrorists even though they are very similar then what is a "terrorist" it is a term that has no inherent meaning other than whatever user of the term decides it is.

Not divorcing the act at all but tying it to it. OTOH it seems to me the inability to call a state action that is the same as a non-state action "terrorism" is divorcig the act. FOr that matter you yourself have said that all non-state actors who use violence for political ends aren't necessarily terrorists. So what is it? In the end the more the meaning is parsed down the more the actions gets divorced from the actor. What I see in your attempts at definition is a deconstruction of the meaning of the term.

Because by its nature it is a descriptive term and the attempts to keep it perjorative dilute the meaning of it by removing the focus on the act to making it purely about a subjective opinion on the actor.

I will say that language is fluid and there is no reason why it shouldn't be perjorative still as someone who believes the structure of language should be respected and not totally liquid that the act needs to be considered and you shouldn't divorce the act to the point that there can be no agreement on the term. If its all about the actor then generally no one is a terrorist since there is no universal agreement on the morality of the actors. One could, and there are those who do, just as easily say Al Qaeda aren't terrorists since they are defending Islam from the secular world.