Tuesday digest
- Going to bed last night, I felt like I was transported back in time with that anxious, quasi-headachey "living nightmare" feeling I had in the days and weeks after the attacks. This was because I had just finished watching "The Path to 9/11", an all-too-damning indictment of the law enforcement agencies who, for various reasons, couldn't and wouldn't prevent the attacks from happening despite several opportunities to do just that. I lay a significant part of the blame at the feet of lawyers who would have evidence revealing terror plots deemed inadmissible in court or unactionable because it was received or obtained "improperly" (wiretaps, anyone?) or information prevented from being shared between agencies because of misplaced concerns regarding privacy or some such notion.
Personally, the saving of innocent lives trumps ANY civil liberty in a time of war.
And, if only for the sake of debate, I am glad also that it FINALLY exposed Bill Clinton's follies in the years leading up to 9/11. As I've said, his time under the microscope was long overdue!!!
More importantly, we have to ask if we're any safer, and I think the answer to that question is a mixed bag. Almost four years after the Madrid bombings and two after the London attacks, urban transit security is pretty much a joke. In Canada, we still don't have our no-fly list together five years after the idea was first proposed and airport workers face minimal screening. Port security is a laughable concept, too. There's no question that significantly more resources have been dedicated to thwarting terror, but not nearly enough, in my opinion, and the reason for that is purely politics. All the free or partially-free day care programs we argued about in the last election here in Canada will be far from top of mind if the Toronto subway were to be attacked, and that makes me just sick. What is the role of government if not to secure the people? We need to get away from this idea of the womb-to-tomb nanny state and recognize that the state's #1 priority has got to be national security.
After all, this is war, and far too few realize what that means.
- The conclusion of Robert Sibley's series in the Ottawa Citizen, here.
- Right Wing News reports that Iraqi captives at Abu Gharaib are pleading for the facility to remain under US management.
By the admission of terror suspects, it seems the new boss isn't quite the same as the old boss when it comes to human rights.
- And hey, did you hear who's playing at Steve Irwin's funeral?
Sting.
posted by Road Hammer @ 1:35 PM
16 comments
16 Comments:
Caught a snippet of W's speech from yesterday on the radio today that caught my ear. He said, and I paraphrase ..."now is not the time to pull out of war. If we pull out and think they will leave us alone, we're sadly mistaken. If we pull out, they will still be after us."
To me that begs a question. If they are gonna be "after us" regardless, why is W. literally wasting thousands of soldiers lives?
If you're asking me, Greenchief, and if you're not, you're going to get my two cents anyways, this is way too complex to explain via a comment section on a blog.
I recommend picking up Friedman's "The World is Flat" for an excellent, readable (and non-dogmatic) explanation of the whole thing.
Have seen that book, and still haven't come across a reasonable argument for today's operation in Iraq, etc.
Sure, I'd choose North Korea over Sweden, you read me right there, B ... come on, do you seriously think that?
For me, it's simply this: civil liberties in the Western context should come secondary to security in a time of war in my opinion.
Greenchief, a debate over Iraq would be counterproductive, but let me just say that I think pre-emption is better than reaction, and like the UN intel showed, given what the world knew/thought at the time, the coalition had no choice but to go in, as the front-runner for the Liberal leadership, Michael Ignatieff, has stated on numerous occasions.
(As for the conspiratorial sloganeering that all too often masquerades as serious discussion on this, I think the "Bush Lied!" schtick is about grade 12 sociology level thinking or even less, so I won't even address it beyond that.)
Sticking around? The neocons say it's important to transform the Middle East into a liberal, democratic place where people can express their grievances at the ballot box rather through madrassa and mosque inspired acts of violence. Even if one thinks that's pie-in-the-sky thinking, now that the coalition is there, if you let Iraq fall into the hands of al-Qaeda (which is exactly what would happen if the troops went home), they will once again have a home base from which to plot and launch their attacks.
Ergo, in my opinion, quitting is not an option, and realistically, we're going to need at least 10-15 years before we're able to tell if this was a worthy venture or not.
Hammer guy, Caygeon has a point here. It's a little contradictory to see Monday's post titled "The Culture of Libery Will Prevail," followed up by a post suggesting that those liberties are negotiable in a time of war.
As for the state of Canada's transportation system re: security, you know as well as anyone that it is impossible to totally safeguard this against security. Not only would it bankrupt our country, it would severely limit personal freedoms. And that would be chaulking one up in the column for the bad guys.
As for sticking around and fighting in Iraq for 10-15 years to see "if it's a worthy venture or not," shows a pretty low regard for human life on both sides of this conflict.
As for grade 12 sloganeering, I couldn't agree more. "Support our troops" (by keeping them in danger and allowing their heads to be shot off by a bunch of crazies who don't care if they live or die and who have a lot more at stake than the Americans) comes to mind.
Ok, then ...
Greenie and bobbie, you guys miss the civil liberties point. I don't think hammer is advocating the total suspension of all freedoms, he is talking about using illegally obtained wiretaps to convict guilty people and save thousands of innocent lives.
I, personally, as a law abiding citizen, don't have that much of a problem with wiretaps besides the grand ideological big brother idea. Realistically, if you aren't plotting mass destruction or some other criminal activity, what do you have to fear from wiretaps? Are you afraid someone might hear you speak lovey-dovey baby-talk to your girlfriend/spouse? (Which is emabarasing, of course)
Let's face it, everything you do on the internet is already being monitored by private corporations that use that info to send you penis enlargement emails...how can they possibly know!!
Saddy, I didn't miss Hammer's point on condoning that government breaks the very laws it sets.
And since you have no objection to having your phone tapped because you have nothing to hide, would you also be okay with being pulled over and having your car illegally searched?
How about having your anal cavity searched? After all, you're law abiding and you don't have anything jammed up there, right?.
And what evidence do you have that wiretaps have saved thousands of innocent lives? The word of a government that illegally spies on its citizens? Very credible.
Greenchief, you don't believe the UK authorities when they say that information obtained via electronic eavesdropping helped thwart last month's attempted attacks?
Some might think you believe that the rights of suspected al-Qaeda members not to have their phones tapped supersedes other peoples' rights, like not having to worry about getting blown to bits in an airplane over the Atlantic.
Let me ask you this: do you have a problem with wiretapping if a judge has seen the evidence and issued a warrant for authorities to proceed based on that evidence?
Let me assure you Hammer, I'm not concerned with the rights of Al Queda members having their personal rights violated. I'm concerned with innocent people having their personal liberties eroded.
And no, absolutely not, I don't have a problem with wiretapping that is conducted legally, with a judge's warrant.
I do have a problem with illegal wiretaps, as I stated. And I have a problem with a government picking and choosing which laws it decides to follow.
So for you, it's a problem when the US Department of Justice decides that certain people need their phones tapped without a judge hearing the evidence first?
Although I don't feel the same way, I can understand your POV.
What if the following occurs: Police arrest a number of individuals based on evidence that undeniably points to an imminent attack. Said individuals are then charged with the intent to commit mass amounts of violence. However, it emerges that this evidence was obtained without a warrant. Would you allow it to stand or would you free the suspects?
I'm not a legal expert or a judge, so I couldn't form an educated opinion about accepting or throwing out evidence. But I would ask, why weren't the proper (legal) channels followed in the first place?
You just made the point that LEGAL wiretaps led to the curbing of a potentially deadly attack. That proves that the system works.
I don't beleive that going through the proper legal channels to obtain a wiretap is going to be the difference between life and a massive death toll.
And I beleive governments should be held at least to the minimum, if not a higher standard for legal and ethical behaviour.
If not, what's the difference between a democratic government and a dictatorship or another form of non-democratic government?
Isn't that the whole point of this war, to spread democracy and liberty? How can you spread it if you aren't even practicing it?
By acting illegally, we're just giving our opponents one more reason to say Western democracy is a sham.
I bring that example because often times, the letter of the law can trump common sense.
There would be times when the proper channels *could* be followed but it might take days or weeks to do so (when the attack is scheduled to take place in a matter of hours).
I also don't think that a would-be terrorist is going to change his mind and think of the West as a great bunch of guys and gals because we show evidence to a judge before tapping phones.
How you treat women/homosexuals/religious minorities is a better judge of how free a society is anyways, rather the intricacies of the Foreign Information Surveillance Act, (which, by the way, allows for warrantless wiretapping in times of war).
If one thinks of this struggle as a "war", then there IS no illegality being committed anyways.
We can't let the perfect be the enemy of the good.
It should also be emphasized that under Canadian AND US wiretapping laws, the only conversations that can be accessed are those where one domestic party is communicating with another party outside of the country. In other words, if I called up Bobcaygeon and said "Let's go for the $12.95er"", that would not be allowed to be accessed because we are both within the country.
What the F are the Pitchforks doing with Gionta?
Worth the asking price?
Closest thing they've had to a 50 goal man in a long time.
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