Risk Assessment of Terrorism
 

Excellent article showing relative risks.

http://www.counterpunch.org/goekler03242009.html

"A significant majority of Americans, polls repeatedly tell us, list terrorism as one of their greatest fears. Like most of our media-inspired interests and worries, however, this one has little basis in reality.

In actual fact, unless you’re serving in a war zone, the most dangerous person you’re ever likely to encounter – by several orders of magnitude – is the one you see in the mirror every morning.

Not some shadowy arms dealer peddling second hand nukes. Not some dusky Jihadi with a song on his lips and a suicide belt around his middle. Not some mad scientist, bribed by the forces of evil to cook up a bio-bug capable of ending life as we know it.

Here are the hard facts..."

I liked the following the best:

Imagine, then, what might happen if we simply quit listening to the scaremongers and those who profit from our paranoia. Imagine what the world could look like if we made a conscious choice to live out whatever time we have with courage, compassion, service and joy.

Terrorism is an act of the weak. But so is walking through the airport in our socks.

+1.

And, I'd like to add to acts of the weak;
so is being scared of shampoo,
so is believing your safety is enhanced by a government agent in a faux police uniform with a shiny tin badge comparing your photo ID with your boarding pass. (bonus weakness points for blacklighting and louping your "travel documents")
so is deciding that large sums of cash are contraband

^^

How do we make this mandatory reading for everyone in the US??

That was beautifully written.

Imagine if we channeled just a third of the energy, money, and time we waste on airport security and used it to support smoking cessation, weight loss, exercise, and safer sex?

Instead of pouring money into "virtual strip search" technology, what if we used those funds to look at better screening technologies for detecting colon and prostate cancer, or ischemic heart disease?

If you care about your health and welfare, don't take your shoes off... put them on and start running, jogging, and biking.