We Are All Spaniards

Terrorism must be stopped, whatever the cost.
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
OK. First you surrender your pilot certificate, next your plane will be
confiscated. Eehh. It's for security, for the homeland. Then we will make
plans for the Hotel. What about a camp?

I was referring to financial costs, not personal freedoms.

(...) Rest assured that all Americans stand with you, that we will
remember our allies,

what if it happened in Germany? They didn't agree with the invasi^err
liberation of Iraq and have not signed this ominous letter to the leader
of
the western world.

I suspect such an attack on Berlin would so shock the German people that
they would realize their misjudgment regarding the war on terrorism. In
the end, we would support them as allies.

ah well. I just jumped on another OT post. sorry.
(And BTW you are not spaniard. Your roots are in central Europe, most
likely in Germany.)

Symbolism and metaphor escape you yet again. Keep working on it -- you'll
get it sooner or later.
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"

( "whatever the cost"
I was referring to financial costs, not personal freedoms.

There is a point at which financial costs become limits on personal freedoms.
Perhaps not for you, but for many. And then, soon, even for you.

Jose




--
(for Email, make the obvious changes in my address)

There is a point at which financial costs become limits on personal
freedoms.
Perhaps not for you, but for many. And then, soon, even for you.

So, your alternatives are...what? Declare victory and come home? Give the
terrorists what they want? (Whatever that is?)

It was this kind of thinking that gave the world Hitler, Tojo, Stalin, Mao,
Pol Pot, Idi Amin, Saddam...

We need to close ranks on the issue of terrorism, both nationally and
internationally, or the terrorists have already won.
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"

"Jay Honeck" wrote in message
news:BYL4c.7889$_w.240908@attbi_s53...
There is a point at which financial costs become limits on personal
freedoms.
Perhaps not for you, but for many. And then, soon, even for you.

So, your alternatives are...what? Declare victory and come home? Give
the
terrorists what they want? (Whatever that is?)

It was this kind of thinking that gave the world Hitler, Tojo, Stalin,
Mao,
Pol Pot, Idi Amin, Saddam...

We need to close ranks on the issue of terrorism, both nationally and
internationally, or the terrorists have already won.

Like the closing in of the ranks against Irish terrorism? Americans were the
biggest funders of the Irish terrorists along with Col Gadaffi.

So, your alternatives are...what?

Realistially? None.

We need good surveillance, but in such a way that it is not easy enough (and
won't become easy enough) to simply watch everyone, lest we start to gather up
drug lords, child molesters, nudists, litterbugs, journalists, and athiests in
the same net, to be fed to the next administration, whose beliefs may differ
from present ones.

We need good defenses, but not so good that it takes longer to get on the
subway than it does to walk the length of Manhattan.

We need the freedom to fly where we want, but it must be impossible to fly over
a train in a 150 and drop ordnance on the lead car, in sync with fifty other
150s (and a manly Tomahawk up in Alaska).

We need to keep an eye on our neighbors, for anything unusual, but at the same
time keep their beady eyes out of our own living rooms, bedrooms, and studies.
We need to be able to borrow books out of the library without fearing that our
reading habits will become known to the government, the insurance company, the
bank, and the medical profession.

And we need to actually have the time to do all of these things after working
another sixteen hour day, fifteen hours of which go to pay the taxes for having
two hundred million people try to find sixteen who have blended in with our
society for twenty years and who, when they receive a cell phone call, are
ready for their seventy nine virgins.

In short, we must find a number that is both greater than six and less than
four.

IT is not sufficient to find a number that is greater than four and less than
six. That's what we have now, and is why we are dealing with TFRs that cover
thousands of cubic miles and don't do squat.

Think of it this way. You are being attacked. You have a gun. What do you do
with it? Shoot the attacker? (Oh, the attacker is a bacterium and it's been
multplying in your system for a while now)

Jose

--
(for Email, make the obvious changes in my address)

"Teacherjh" wrote:
Realistially? None.
[snip]
Think of it this way. You are being attacked. You have a gun.
What do you do with it? Shoot the attacker? (Oh, the attacker
is a bacterium and it's been multplying in your system for a
while now)

Well put. There is no effective defense against determined terrorists
who have worldwide support, short of a massive security clampdown at
home affecting every phase of life. Every inhabitant of the country
would have to be intimately available to the government security
apparatus, perhaps via imbedded micro chips or similar technology.
Border security would need a colossal budget. Anything short of that
(invading other countries, putting TFRs around football stadiums, hiring
more airport security, etc.), is vain political window dressing.

We are in a religious war. We didn't choose it, but we've got it.
These barbarians cannot be appeased, even should we be so foolish as to
try. They don't want peace, they want power: they want hegemony over
the entire Muslim world, including enclaves like Chechnya and Kashmir;
they want the total exclusion of Western cultural influence from every
Islamic country.

As you said, there is no realistic, i.e. practical, way to defeat these
murdering fanatics. We will keep hunting them down and killing them,
but there will always be plenty of eager replacements in the pipeline.

This is going to be a very ugly period in history. The spokesman
claiming responsibility for the Spanish bombings said "You love life, we
love death." That pretty neatly sums up the two sides in this war. In
such a struggle, the side that loves life is at a tactical disadvantage.
--
Dan
C172RG at BFM
(remove pants to reply by email)

"Dan Luke" wrote in message
...

We are in a religious war. We didn't choose it, but we've got it.


Really? Maybe we should take "separation of church and state" more
seriously here and break that link. Say what you will about these people
attacking us, but they are not stupid and they see the strong Christian
leaning of the US government administration.

Yes, I blame them for these cowardly acts, and no, I do not think they have
any justification for their barbaric acts against innocents, which is
against even their own religion. But let's be realistic here - anybody who
doesn't see the Bush administration, with its "faith-based" initiatives and
connection to the very right wing Church as crossing the line toward making
the US a Christian country must be fairly blind or strongly believe that
this direction is the Right Thing To Do.

There are Islamist extremists who see it very much as a religious war. They
twist their religion's desire for "justice" to justify their acts. But the
way we respond, and the very nature of our government, affects how Muslims
see us and impacts very directly on the extremist's support structure and
thus whether this war winds down or grows.

Yes, I blame them for these cowardly acts, and no, I do not think they
have
any justification for their barbaric acts against innocents, which is
against even their own religion. But let's be realistic here - anybody
who
doesn't see the Bush administration, with its "faith-based" initiatives
and
connection to the very right wing Church as crossing the line toward
making
the US a Christian country must be fairly blind or strongly believe that
this direction is the Right Thing To Do.

While I am uncomfortable with the religious right wing of the Republican
Party, I'm hard-pressed to list anything concrete Bush has done in their
favor.

I suppose you could list the ban on partial-birth abortion as happening
under his watch, but this procedure is so barbaric that most people --
Democrat or Republican -- shudder at this type of abortion. I see that law
as being outside of partisan politics -- but that's just me, I suppose.

And the Judge who tried to place the Ten Commandments on the front lawn of
the town courthouse (down South somewhere -- I forget) was summarily drummed
out of office...

While it is true that Bush is obviously a devout Christian, which may change
the *perception* of the U.S., I don't see that the country -- or the laws of
the U.S. -- have changed in any pro-Christian way under his watch.

If anything, the country went waaaaay conservative during the Clinton
presidency.
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"

"Peter Gottlieb" wrote:
We are in a religious war. We didn't choose it, but we've got it.


Really? Maybe we should take "separation of church and state"
more seriously here and break that link. Say what you will about
these people attacking us, but they are not stupid and they see the
strong Christian leaning of the US government administration.

We can't break that link no matter what we do, short of becoming a
fundamentalist Islamic republic. I contend that Al Qaeda would not have
changed a thing had Al Gore been elected.


- anybody who doesn't see the Bush administration, with its
"faith-based" initiatives and connection to the very right wing
Church as crossing the line toward making the US a Christian
country must be fairly blind

In fact I do see that, but it's mostly irrelevant to our terrorism
problem.

There are Islamist extremists who see it very much as a religious war.
They twist their religion's desire for "justice" to justify their
acts. But
the way we respond, and the very nature of our government, affects
how Muslims see us and impacts very directly on the extremist's
support structure and thus whether this war winds down or grows.

I agree completely. We face the challenge of making shrewdly calculated
responses against our enemies, lest we hand them cheap propaganda
victories.
--
Dan
C172RG at BFM
(remove pants to reply by email)

In article , "Peter
Gottlieb" wrote:

But let's be realistic here - anybody
who
doesn't see the Bush administration, with its "faith-based" initiatives
and
connection to the very right wing Church as crossing the line toward
making
the US a Christian country must be fairly blind or strongly believe that
this direction is the Right Thing To Do.

or they don't see boogey men behind the actions of those they hate.

--
Bob Noel