Posted on 12/02/2005 9:54:26 PM PST by Jay777
The searches are inconvenient and slow people up, so nobody "gladly" submits to them. But they're necessary and don't stop people from going about their lives.
I see. And next year you'll be saying, "Taking our shoes off is only a minimal inconvenience. We do it because our masters tell us to."
I always wear loafers when flying. So it is a small incovenience...
Good boy! Do you also sit up and beg?
As much as anyone, probably even more, I would like to live in a low risk world. The fact of the matter is, we don't live in a low risk world.
It appears that the notion of probable cause is dead, just like so many other parts of the Constitution.
I wonder when the cheerleaders for the War On Terror (which I Constitutionally support) will realize that the terrorists have already won if we implemet routine police state policies like this.
Dooesn't anyone recall (I paraphrase) the President (and many Congressmen) saying, in the aftermath of 9/11, that if we turn our country into a Police State and ignore the Constitution and do, for instance, searches without probable cause ('reasonable suspicion' is unconstitutuional bullshit), and, eventually, checks as to whether our "papers" are in order, then THE TERRORISTS HAVE ALREADY WON!
We CANNOT create a tyrannical State in the name of the War On Terror. It, and all other wars, are subject to the strict interpretation of the Constitution. No one seems to be willing to do the real, Constitutional work required to win this WAR. Instead, the tyrannical, compromising shortcuts flow liberally from all sides. (See the abomination known as the PATRIOT Act for examples.)
How soon that principle has been conveniently forgotten; and, aditionally, most authoritarians apparently endorse the same bullshit arbitrary searches for *private* transportation as well.
"Those who exchange essential liberty for a little temporary security, deserve neither" - Ben Franklin
PROBABLE CAUSE for searches: live it; learn it; love it; THE FOURTH AMENDMENT (even if it means another terror attack) Bring on all the terrorist attacks out there, if necessary, before destroying our Freedoms with artbitrary law.
The terrorists HAVE ALREADY WON if we ignore the Constitution and embrace such tyranny, IMHO. The President himself said so.
Profile the high-risk suspects, like Muslims, foreign nationals, etc., for God's sake, in a time of War, and stopping terror will be much more successful.
I would like to live in freedom. We don't live in freedom. Freedom is a much higher priority for me than safety; for you, and most people, the opposite is true. In short, "people are born to be slaves."
Please define your use of the word "slaves."
Un-free.
By that definition anyone who owes/pays taxes, has a family, a mortgage, or any other obligation is "un-free" either by choice or by law.
I get it.
If you have nothing to hide, then you have nothing to worry about when the police stop and search you.
If a terrorist carrying a bomb that will be used to blow up a subway car sees that he will be searched and found out, wouldn't he (she) just detonate the bomb at the checkpoint rather than just surrender? Damage could still be inflicted, right?
Maybe they ought to search people up on the street before they go down to the subway. But then the terrorist would have a big target as people lined up to go through that checkpoint, right?
Where does it stop? When do you say 'ENOUGH'?
Which finally brings us to the nub: you don't know what freedom is, so of course you can't regret losing it--or even know whether it's been lost. Ther's no such thing as "un-free by choice". "Freedom" is the power to choose. If you enter into a voluntary contract, you are under obligation--but you are perfectly free. If on the other hand I hold a gun to your head and force you to enter into a contract, then I have taken away some of your freedom.
Ironically, I believe in security measures, possibly including random searches, as long as they are voluntary. In the case of the subway, that means that the subway must be privatized. As private property, the owner can set conditions upon entrace, and the consumer can decide whether to accept those conditions or take his business elsewhere. If the subway owner makes bad decisions, his business will collapse, and he will be bought out.
When the government makes bad decisions, the business can't collapse: they will merely expropriate more funds from unwilling "donors" and continue funding it.
You put your finger on the nub: these freedom-sapping measures don't even produce the promised safety. Anyone who wants to get a bomb onto a subway can easily enough do so, search or no search. Parts can be split across multiple couriers and hidden inside boom boxes, for example.
I've taken my jacknife on enough planes to know that airport security is a joke. (In my case, the knife is part of my keyring, and I keep forgetting I have it in my pockets until too late.)
I have to work. Fine, I don't share your definition of freedom. Conversely, you don't share my priorities. I happen to live in a place where there is more latitude to do as I please and more opportunity than almost any place else on the planet -- and we remain a target of some very bad people. I, for one, appreciate and admire the guys who work to keep us safe.
Enjoy being less free than your grandparents. Enjoy selling your grandchildren into soviet-style slavery. Talk about selfish, though.
I hate when Bush says that our troops are fighting for our freedom in Iraq. More accurately, I'd say that they are fighting for our safety.
The terrorists can only kill us, they cannot take our freedom. Only our own government can take our freedom from us and is also perfectly willing to kill us too if we resist their efforts to make us feel safe. They also do their best to disarm us so that we cannot even defend ourselves in the event of a terrorist (or criminal) attack.
Though it hasn't happened since 9/11, we do need to be alert because terrorists can strike anywhere and anytime. But the bottom line is that our own government deserve much more scrutiny than it has been getting. The government is our servant, not our master.
On a recent thread, I described how easy it was to enter a 'secure federal installation' without showing any ID. By observing the 'security measures' for less than an hour, I saw how easy it would be to defeat it and enter the facility with ANYTHING that I wanted to get inside.
'Security' in this country is a huge and expensive and dramatically ineffective joke, but does work fairly well as a jobs program and training ground for jack boot wannabees.
You don't have to blow up government facilities to create terror. In fact, our unguarded civilian facilities provide more than an ample supply of targets. Why haven't they been hit?
I'm not really sure what it means that we have not been attacked successly since 9/11. Is it luck? Is it lack of interest? Is it a lack of will or capacity?
I really don't know if this is a good thing or not.
It's sad to see so many freepers celebrating government intrusion.
What a load of Bovine Scat.
"All Property, indeed, except the Savage's temporary Cabin, his Bow, his Matchcoat, and other little Acquisitions, absolutely necessary for his Subsistence, seems to me to be the Creature of public Convention. Hence the Public has the Right of Regulating Descents, and all other Conveyances of Property, and even of limiting the Quantity and the Uses of it. All the Property that is necessary to a Man, for the Conservation of the Individual and the Propagation of the Species, is his natural Right, which none can justly deprive him of: But all Property superfluous to such purposes is the Property of the Publick, who, by their Laws, have created it, and who may therefore by other Laws dispose of it, whenever the Welfare of the Publick shall demand such Disposition. He that does not like civil Society on these Terms, let him retire and live among Savages. He can have no right to the benefits of Society, who will not pay his Club towards the Support of it."Benjamin Franklin
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