5 ms·

This is like saying lets have a lottery every year that picks 3000 people and send them over to the middle east. My point is people have to be pushed to answer

by Sven7 13y ago

This is like saying lets have a lottery every year that picks 3000 people and send them over to the middle east. My point is people have to be pushed to answer the question on how to tackle terrorism to take this debate in a constructive direction. Ofcourse governments will do dumb things but the terrorism problem is a hard one.

smsm42 13y ago
If the Middle East is Tel Aviv, I'm ready to go today. Provided the ticket is paid, of course, those are so damn expensive lately.
AnthonyMouse 13y ago
The terrorism problem is a manufactured one. You want to fight terrorism? Fine, your budget is proportional to the budget we use to solve other types of murder based on the number of lives it costs us, and you can use the same methods. If you don't agree you'll have to distinguish terrorism from other types of murder in a defensible way, otherwise we should be treating them equally.
- Sven7 13y ago
  Finally someone with a realistic solution that can be politically acceptable. Amazing to watch how defensive people get over a question. So thank you, for showing everyone else who has been downvoting me into oblivion, the right way to react to questions that make one uncomfortable. And in the end, this debate will only move forward over reasonable solutions. Not fancy speeches on privacy and freedom. Which I have had more than enough off.
  - zainny 13y ago
    Other people have in fact been pointing out this very fact/approach as well, you just chose to ignore them. Coming in at the last moment and saying "Finally!" is just dense and completely transparent.
    - Sven7 13y ago
      Hilarious :) What else are you upset about?
- twoodfin 13y ago
  What is this obsession with body counts? To bang again on my favorite drum, many, may more Americans were dying of polio or coal mining accidents in 1941 than German or Japanese bombs. That doesn't mean it was stupid to enter World War II. Obviously those who have chosen to deliberately kill civilians in spectacular ways are not right now a danger akin to imperial Japan or Nazi Germany. But will it really take a dirty bomb, a successful mass infection/poisoning, or god help us a nuke to stop this silly argument? It's bizarre to me that one of the anti-anti-terror arguments of choice reflects that hilariously dystopian scene in the film Brazil, wherein the staff and patrons of a restaurant that has just been bombed attempt to paper over the incident by completely ignoring it, as innocent people suffer and die.
  - AnthonyMouse 13y ago
    >Obviously those who have chosen to deliberately kill civilians in spectacular ways are not right now a danger akin to imperial Japan or Nazi Germany. Obviously. Which is the point. >But will it really take a dirty bomb, a successful mass infection/poisoning, or god help us a nuke to stop this silly argument? These are movie theater plots. "Mass poisonings" are a very poor attack vector because as soon as they're identified they get publicized and people stop consuming the adulterated product, which minimizes the impact. Spreading infection has similar constraints, is difficult to contain (i.e. the attacker can't prevent it from spreading to his own family/country), and it is vastly more difficult to obtain weaponized infectious materials than poisons. And dirty bombs are a media fabrication. Here's the money quote from Stratfor: "By its very nature, the RDD is contradictory. Maximizing the harmful effects of radiation involves maximizing the exposure of the victims to the highest possible concentration of a radioisotope. When dispersing the radioisotope, by definition and design the RDD dilutes the concentration of the radiation source, spreading smaller amounts of radiation over a larger area."[1] [1] http://www.stratfor.com/weekly/20100421_dirty_bombs_revisited_combating_hype http://www.stratfor.com/weekly/20100421_dirty_bombs_revisite... Which leaves The Bomb. But terrorists can't build nuclear weapons. States can barely do it. So if your concern is nuclear terrorism, the solution doesn't require you to catch the terrorists, all you have to do is limit the availability of weapons grade material. Which is a completely different problem with completely different solutions that don't involve domestic surveillance or foreign wars, is required to prevent state-level nuclear proliferation regardless of terrorism anyway, and mostly just involves being the highest bidder if weapons grade material ever becomes available on the black market. >It's bizarre to me that one of the anti-anti-terror arguments of choice reflects that hilariously dystopian scene in the film Brazil, wherein the staff and patrons of a restaurant that has just been bombed attempt to paper over the incident by completely ignoring it, as innocent people suffer and die. I don't think anybody is arguing that there should be no response to a terrorist act. But why can't the response be to bring the terrorists to justice as international criminals, and not to let it change the fabric of our society?
fnordfnordfnord 13y ago
>My point is people have to be pushed to answer the question on how to tackle terrorism It barely deserves a response. Practically nobody dies of terrorism. >to take this debate in a constructive direction. To derail the debate with FUD?
- mpyne 13y ago
  "Practically nobody" has been caught up in NSA shenanigans either. What people are worried about is the possibility of this destroying our Republic, but we've actually watched the planes fly into the Twin Towers. So one of these concerns is more concrete, if that's all you're worried about.
  - fnordfnordfnord 13y ago
    >So one of these concerns is more concrete, Right, we're clearly remiss in prosecuting gov't overreach.

by Sven7 13y ago

smsm42 13y ago

If the Middle East is Tel Aviv, I'm ready to go today. Provided the ticket is paid, of course, those are so damn expensive lately.

AnthonyMouse 13y ago

The terrorism problem is a manufactured one. You want to fight terrorism? Fine, your budget is proportional to the budget we use to solve other types of murder based on the number of lives it costs us, and you can use the same methods. If you don't agree you'll have to distinguish terrorism from other types of murder in a defensible way, otherwise we should be treating them equally.

Sven7 13y ago
Finally someone with a realistic solution that can be politically acceptable. Amazing to watch how defensive people get over a question. So thank you, for showing everyone else who has been downvoting me into oblivion, the right way to react to questions that make one uncomfortable. And in the end, this debate will only move forward over reasonable solutions. Not fancy speeches on privacy and freedom. Which I have had more than enough off.
- zainny 13y ago
  Other people have in fact been pointing out this very fact/approach as well, you just chose to ignore them. Coming in at the last moment and saying "Finally!" is just dense and completely transparent.
  - Sven7 13y ago
    Hilarious :) What else are you upset about?
twoodfin 13y ago
What is this obsession with body counts? To bang again on my favorite drum, many, may more Americans were dying of polio or coal mining accidents in 1941 than German or Japanese bombs. That doesn't mean it was stupid to enter World War II. Obviously those who have chosen to deliberately kill civilians in spectacular ways are not right now a danger akin to imperial Japan or Nazi Germany. But will it really take a dirty bomb, a successful mass infection/poisoning, or god help us a nuke to stop this silly argument? It's bizarre to me that one of the anti-anti-terror arguments of choice reflects that hilariously dystopian scene in the film Brazil, wherein the staff and patrons of a restaurant that has just been bombed attempt to paper over the incident by completely ignoring it, as innocent people suffer and die.
- AnthonyMouse 13y ago
  >Obviously those who have chosen to deliberately kill civilians in spectacular ways are not right now a danger akin to imperial Japan or Nazi Germany. Obviously. Which is the point. >But will it really take a dirty bomb, a successful mass infection/poisoning, or god help us a nuke to stop this silly argument? These are movie theater plots. "Mass poisonings" are a very poor attack vector because as soon as they're identified they get publicized and people stop consuming the adulterated product, which minimizes the impact. Spreading infection has similar constraints, is difficult to contain (i.e. the attacker can't prevent it from spreading to his own family/country), and it is vastly more difficult to obtain weaponized infectious materials than poisons. And dirty bombs are a media fabrication. Here's the money quote from Stratfor: "By its very nature, the RDD is contradictory. Maximizing the harmful effects of radiation involves maximizing the exposure of the victims to the highest possible concentration of a radioisotope. When dispersing the radioisotope, by definition and design the RDD dilutes the concentration of the radiation source, spreading smaller amounts of radiation over a larger area."[1] [1] http://www.stratfor.com/weekly/20100421_dirty_bombs_revisited_combating_hype http://www.stratfor.com/weekly/20100421_dirty_bombs_revisite... Which leaves The Bomb. But terrorists can't build nuclear weapons. States can barely do it. So if your concern is nuclear terrorism, the solution doesn't require you to catch the terrorists, all you have to do is limit the availability of weapons grade material. Which is a completely different problem with completely different solutions that don't involve domestic surveillance or foreign wars, is required to prevent state-level nuclear proliferation regardless of terrorism anyway, and mostly just involves being the highest bidder if weapons grade material ever becomes available on the black market. >It's bizarre to me that one of the anti-anti-terror arguments of choice reflects that hilariously dystopian scene in the film Brazil, wherein the staff and patrons of a restaurant that has just been bombed attempt to paper over the incident by completely ignoring it, as innocent people suffer and die. I don't think anybody is arguing that there should be no response to a terrorist act. But why can't the response be to bring the terrorists to justice as international criminals, and not to let it change the fabric of our society?

fnordfnordfnord 13y ago

>My point is people have to be pushed to answer the question on how to tackle terrorism It barely deserves a response. Practically nobody dies of terrorism. >to take this debate in a constructive direction. To derail the debate with FUD?

mpyne 13y ago
"Practically nobody" has been caught up in NSA shenanigans either. What people are worried about is the possibility of this destroying our Republic, but we've actually watched the planes fly into the Twin Towers. So one of these concerns is more concrete, if that's all you're worried about.
- fnordfnordfnord 13y ago
  >So one of these concerns is more concrete, Right, we're clearly remiss in prosecuting gov't overreach.