Nate
2004-02-05 23:37:31 UTC
Making a war on terror elects people on the right of the political spectrum.
Creating a war on drugs elects people on the right of the political
spectrum. But the question that we need to ask isn't, "Are conservatives
tougher than liberals?" The question we need to ask is, "Is this war
winnable with security?" And the short answer is, it's not winnable with
security, and that is self evident. All you have to do is back away from
the emotionalism of this issue and take a look at Israel.
Are they tough on terrorism? Every time there's a bombing, they retaliate.
They've bombed Syria recently. They go into the Gaza and they go into the
West Bank and they blow up the homes of the young men and women who engage
in suicide bombings. Every time there's a suicide attack, every time there'
s a terrorist attack, and these attacks are terrorist attacks - they're
attacks on civilians. Ever time, they retaliate.
In front of every building in Israel, there is an armed guard with a machine
gun. Everyone who gets on a bus is watched by every person on that bus.
You can go nowhere in Israel without being checked. Israel is creating a
police state to solve their problems with security. Has it worked? Would
you want to live in Israel today? Do you think Israel, for all its
security, is safer today than it was twenty years ago? If you do, I've got
a bridge I'd like to sell you in Brooklyn.
Security isn't the answer to this problem. Look at the United States. We
can increase security to the point that we have betrayed the principles this
country was founded on, but we can't stop terrorism without installing, for
all practical purposes, a Stalinist dictatorship. Benjamin Franklin once
said, "They that give up essential liberty to obtain temporary safety,
deserve neither liberty nor safety."
It can't be stopped. Every major building in the United States is a width
of a sidewalk away from somebody who wants to rent a truck from Ryder and
start going to places like Home Depot and buying fifty-pound sacs of
nitrogen fertilizer. That's what Timothy McVeigh did. You've only got to
buy twenty bags of fertilizer to have a bomb the size Timothy McVeigh used
to blow up the Murrah federal building in Oklahoma. Could you drive that
truck up next to a big building without being stopped? Could you drive it
across the sidewalk without being stopped? Could you lock up the truck and
walk away from it without being stopped? I think you could. And that's if
you're not a suicide bomber. If you wanted to live and do it you could get
away with it.
Creating a war on drugs elects people on the right of the political
spectrum. But the question that we need to ask isn't, "Are conservatives
tougher than liberals?" The question we need to ask is, "Is this war
winnable with security?" And the short answer is, it's not winnable with
security, and that is self evident. All you have to do is back away from
the emotionalism of this issue and take a look at Israel.
Are they tough on terrorism? Every time there's a bombing, they retaliate.
They've bombed Syria recently. They go into the Gaza and they go into the
West Bank and they blow up the homes of the young men and women who engage
in suicide bombings. Every time there's a suicide attack, every time there'
s a terrorist attack, and these attacks are terrorist attacks - they're
attacks on civilians. Ever time, they retaliate.
In front of every building in Israel, there is an armed guard with a machine
gun. Everyone who gets on a bus is watched by every person on that bus.
You can go nowhere in Israel without being checked. Israel is creating a
police state to solve their problems with security. Has it worked? Would
you want to live in Israel today? Do you think Israel, for all its
security, is safer today than it was twenty years ago? If you do, I've got
a bridge I'd like to sell you in Brooklyn.
Security isn't the answer to this problem. Look at the United States. We
can increase security to the point that we have betrayed the principles this
country was founded on, but we can't stop terrorism without installing, for
all practical purposes, a Stalinist dictatorship. Benjamin Franklin once
said, "They that give up essential liberty to obtain temporary safety,
deserve neither liberty nor safety."
It can't be stopped. Every major building in the United States is a width
of a sidewalk away from somebody who wants to rent a truck from Ryder and
start going to places like Home Depot and buying fifty-pound sacs of
nitrogen fertilizer. That's what Timothy McVeigh did. You've only got to
buy twenty bags of fertilizer to have a bomb the size Timothy McVeigh used
to blow up the Murrah federal building in Oklahoma. Could you drive that
truck up next to a big building without being stopped? Could you drive it
across the sidewalk without being stopped? Could you lock up the truck and
walk away from it without being stopped? I think you could. And that's if
you're not a suicide bomber. If you wanted to live and do it you could get
away with it.
--
http://www.gentlemanjim.net/
http://www.gentlemanjim.net/