Safety not worth the price

Mesa Legend (Mesa Community College) ^ | 12/24/03 | Ryan Baily

[Nonstatist]

No amount of security is worth my freedoms,

Then you won't mind if I club you on the head and steal your wallet?

[GluteusMax]

No amount of security is worth my freedoms,

Then you won't mind if I club you on the head and steal your wallet?

So long as you don't mind a .45 round in the forehead.

[Dan Evans]

There was a time when it was legal to carry a gun on a plane. We didn't have hijackings then and if we allowed it again it will stop any more hijackings.

[sinkspur]

And an event occurring doesn't necessarily make it any more likely to occur in the future. Someone blowing up a plane doesn't mean that "people blow up planes now."

This idjit obviously wrote this before last Wednesday, when "flying planes into buildings now" were averted at the last minute.

[sinkspur]

There was a time when it was legal to carry a gun on a plane. We didn't have hijackings then and if we allowed it again it will stop any more hijackings.

If all alcohol is removed from planes, and all flyers are given a breathalyzer before boarding, I'll agree with you.

Drunks and guns don't mix.

[FreeInWV]

Then you won't mind if I club you on the head and steal your wallet?

Do you mind if me and my friends look through your your financial and medical information? Maybe sneak into your house, look under your bed and see where you went on your computer? My friend Roy thinks you look "suspicious".

[Johnny Gage]

HELMETS FOR EVERYONE!

[elbucko]

...because freedom is possibly the only commodity more precious than life itself.

Freedom is precious because it make life worth living. The national preoccupation with security is a national neurosis that is not doing the country any good and causes the very decisions that jeopardize our security.

[thoughtomator]

First among freedoms is the right to life. If it does not act to stop our enemies from killing us, what reason does government have to exist? And what freedom will really exist when an enemy can end your life arbitrarily? Living in cowed fear is not freedom.

[Triple Word Score]

For our own good, they removed any privacy that we think we have in favor of allowing the government to take any measures it deems necessary to discern any malicious intent any of us may harbor....

If there was anything of substance after this, this reader will just have to do without it. Privacy for the average law-abiding citizen has been absolutely unaffected by post-9/11 legislation. Meetings in mosques known to harbor anti-American mullahs still go unmonitored.

This article is horse manure.

[sinkspur]

Privacy for the average law-abiding citizen has been absolutely unaffected by post-9/11 legislation.

This deserves to be repeated.

[elbucko]

This article is horse manure.

I agree. It would seem that the whole reason to write the article was to express some of the writers insecurities, namely:

And no amount of gun-toting servicemen or phone-tapping FBI agents will make me less afraid.

Its an anti Bush / Ashcroft screed, disguised as bravado.

[Protagoras]

"No amount of security is worth my freedoms,"

Then you won't mind if I club you on the head and steal your wallet?

Those two activites usurp rights (freedoms) and therefore I'm guessing any thinking person would mind.

[Busywhiskers]

"Is life so dear and peace so sweet as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? Forbid it almighty God! I know not what course others may take, but as for me, give me liberty or give me death." -Patrick Henry, 1775

"Those who would give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety." -Ben Franklin

[sinkspur]

The national preoccupation with security is a national neurosis that is not doing the country any good and causes the very decisions that jeopardize our security.

This is nonsensical. How does being more aware of preventing planes from flying into buildings jeopardize or threaten anybody's freedom?

[Protagoras]

Living in cowed fear is not freedom.

I agree. The things the government does to instill fear in people destroy freedom. The IRS, the local politicions who attempt to rule every aspect of your life at gunpoint if necessary are only two such examples.

[RightWhale]

First among freedoms is the right to life.

Consider that is not first or foremost, but one of three conditions, all of which must be present in the life of a man. Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, all three, none first before the others.

[FLAMING DEATH]

"It is the habit we have developed of sacrificing personal freedom and convenience in favor of increased security, almost always in reaction to an isolated incident which we are afraid to treat as such."

Sounds a lot like:

"They that can give up essential iberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety." -- Benjamin Franklin

[Protagoras]

Privacy for the average law-abiding citizen has been absolutely unaffected by post-9/11 legislation. This deserves to be repeated.

This deserves to be dismissed.