RE: [MLUG - DISCUSSION] airport security

["McNutt, Justin M." <EMAIL:PROTECTED>]

 

Thanks for the reply, these are all good points that are supported by the facts. So Bush's administration is clearly guilty about knowing about the attacks. Now what should he had done had he known?

 

Unless I am unaware of anything, Clarke's warning was general in nature. Everyone claimed that attacks were coming and that the weapon might be planes. But there was no intellegence at the time that said these planes, or these people were going to perform the attack. So the question comes down, with a general threat of attack, that attack involving planes, what should the president have done to act on those vague warnings?

 

I would argue now that thanks to changes like the patriot act and the office of homeland security, we are more on top of things. Is it perfect? No, but at least now people are acting on the oddness that occurs like you described. The question still stands, would the American people dealt with the creation of Homeland Security office, the long airport lines, the Patriot Act passage, the monitoring of phone calls BEFORE the attacks? The battles are being fought now against these things AFTER the attack. 
 

The answer to that is that some things should be reactive.  There are some things that cannot be prevented, and your phrasing above is perfectly valid.  It's like saying, "The mayor of New York was warned that graffiti in the subways would be a problem, and it still occurred!"  Well, no shit, Sherlock.

 

In this case, a lot of the rational arguments regarding the 9/11 attackers actually come down to better enforcement of existing immigration policy.  We're still suffering from that problem today, as demonstrated by the giant debate regarding Mexican immigrants.  As a people, we want to abide by the words engraved on the Statue of Liberty, but at the same time, we're going so far in that direction that it puts us at risk.

 

As for the "reactive" stance, I think that is necessary.  You don't (generally) go and attack countries pre-emptively.  You don't arrest people before a crime has been committed, just because they might do something (there are a few exceptions, but let's stick to the general case).

 

With that in mind, the increased airport security is not only theatre, but it's a huge waste of time and effort for very little gain and only serves to violate our civil rights and waste tons of money.

 

All of that money and all of those personnel need to be redirected to the one underfunded, overworked section of the administration that could have prevented the problem in the first place:  immigration.  Let's leave the citizenry that we're trying to protect alone and focus on the real problem.

 

(As an American Muslim, I love pointing out that despite the fact that there are millions of muslims here in the U.S., many of whom are not native-born, not a single one of the 9/11 attackers fell into that category.  They had to import 20 guys from somewhere else.  It kinda shows that "real" muslims aren't interested in violence.  We like the U.S., and blowing up stuff is against the law, both religious and secular.)

 

--J 

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