(no subject)

[cnoocy]

This is a political entry, so please don't feel you have to read it.

I can understand the belief that the threat of terrorism is a new sort of challenge.

From that, I can fully comprehend the belief that new tools are needed to meet that challenge.

And it is not unreasonable to state that the chief executive needs to be able to react quickly to new threats.

Taken a little further, one could assert that the executive should be able to ignore laws as necessary.

And therefore that when he chooses to do so, that he should not be held accountable.

One could say that. But to say that is to say that terrorism is too strong an enemy for a free society to deal with.

I don't.

Comments

Blargh

[aatish2.livejournal.com]

In my (let's face it not-so-humble) opinion, I think the problem here lies with viewing "terrorism" as something new (since 9/11) and external to our society from which we (U.S. residents / citizens) must protect ourselves.

Terrorism is not external to the U.S.

Prior to 9/11, the most acute terror-provoking events in the U.S. were the acts of white, american males (cue pictures of the KKK, unabomber and oklahoma bombings). Additionally, Columbine and similar shootings have provoked terror on an unprecedented level. Yet we did not pass the Patriot Act in the face of any of these. To get the Act passed, America had to be convinced that terror was the product of some outside "axis of evil."

The silent truth is that terrorism is a natural consequence of the freedom and globalization of knowledge and goods. As these occur, the ability of an individual (of any ethnicity, nationality or race) to cause harm increases.

When all you could get your hands on was a sword and a horse (and that too with great difficulty), there wasn't a whole lot a single person that did not control an army could do to hurt the world. When you can get your hands on the recipe for a toxin via the web or a book, buy all the necessary ingredients at walmart, take classes at the local vocational academy on water purification and locksmithing and then poison an entire city - and do all this for less than $4k, that's a bit different.

The problem is that Bush and his supporters react to this changing world by attempting to reverse the tides of freedom. This is, as history has repeatedly shown us, impossible and dumb.

Instead, the logical conclusion is that if every individual can cause more harm, then we as a society must do more to raise the level of contentment and happiness for individuals around the world. Fundamentally this amounts to creating more resources globally so that the rest of the world (and portions of our own society) can come somewhere close to the obscene quality of life the American middle-class enjoys.

There is a single factor which influences the availability of more resources than any other - energy. Hunger is a transport and distribution, hence energy problem. Clean water is a desalinization and purification, hence energy problem. Much of the political hell of the middle-east is an energy problem.

If we can innovate a cheap, renewable source of energy and make that technology freely available to the world (!note! freely, not with a bunch of U.S. fiats and dictates attaches), we will make a serious dent in terrorism. Given where we are technologically, this is a very real possibility within 3-4 decades given the right funding. Of course, U.S. spending on alternate energy research has been steadily declining since the 80s. At the same time our spending on health care has more than quadrupled. We live longer, consume more and worry less about renewable energy. Hmmm. Wonder why.

We need an Apollo Project focused on solar/wind/fusion energy. In my opinion, this is the best way to fight "terrorism."