Well, FlyAAway, I guess we're headed back toward the same discussion I backed out of in another thread. I just can't stand it. My own weakness, I guess. We'll see how long I last this time.
<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Did you lose anyone on 9/11? Was it a friend? A member of your family?
I know what is dangerous and what I am fearful of. I am fearful of people like you, who have not yet had their first bitter taste of terrorism. Your glib attitude is dangerous. Your smugness is dangerous.
I don't see terrorism in the abstract. Imagine the ugly irony of a husband purchasing Christmas gifts for his soon to be twenty-something widow.</font>
Yes, I lost a very good friend on 9/11, the first officer of one of the downed planes. I and my partner spent a great deal of time with him and his partner. Talk about irony (or foreshadowing, or some other literary device I don't remember the correct term for) I remember the four of us walking around lower Manhattan on a weekend trip a few years ago just under the WTC, chatting it up without a care in the world. The memory is gutwrenching, in retrospect.
<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">People like you are dangerous for offering a lame critique of actions designed to protect you. What is your alternative? Where is your perfect plan?
I would not wish it on anyone, but when you taste it firsthand, you will drop your "cutesie" views on terrorism like a hot potato.</font>
I've got no perfect plan. I don't think there is a perfect plan. Even if we suspended ALL our civil rights and gave unfettered discretion to law enforcement to do whatever they like in attempting to fight terrorism, we wouldn't be 100% safe.
And I'm just not willing to do that, or anything close to it. While I've lost a dear friend due to terrorism, I've also had loved ones who have suffered terribly due to overzealous, out of control law enforcement. Have you? Until you have experienced the other end of the spectrum, maybe it's you who doesn't have the necessary life experience to make an informed judgment.
I love my life and want for me and my loved ones to be safe. But I also want that life to be one worth living, one that enjoys the freedoms that make America, despite its many faults, the best nation on Earth. There's a balance to be struck. We can disagree about where that balance point is, but I wish that you'd acknowledge that the liberties our founding fathers guaranteed for us are worth something, and worth preserving as much as possible, even in wartime.
To say it a different way, there are nations that are extremely safe and orderly. Singapore comes to mind. But that degree of safety comes at a high price, a price I and many others are not willing to pay.