---attributed to Benjamin Franklin
I grew up on SAC bases that I'm quite confident were painted with a big fat bullseye on Soviet ICBM targeting systems, so forgive me if I have trouble believing the threat we currently face is sufficient for me to cough up my liberties in hope of obtaining a little "security." We faced a much, much more dire threat during the Cold War than today. It makes me sick to see so many of my fellow citizens running scared because of a bunch of maladjusted Muslim extremists.
We're better than that.
We're stronger than that.
And I have no doubt that we will prevail if we don't let a bunch of suicidal maniacs cause us to forfeit our precious liberties, dearly won through the blood shed by our ancestors.
Sorry - the opponent during the Cold War was afraid of getting hit back as hard as he could hit us. Mutual Assured Destruction was a viable means of keeping the enemy somewhat at bay. (And given the atheist nature of Communists - they don’t want to end this life early - since they believe there is nothing after this life.)
On the other hand - our present enemy - exemplified by Islamic Nazism, is willing to kill any women or children as they kill themselves. Their hate is irrational, and Mutual Assured Destruction is a blessing to them, because it might usher in either the Caliphate in this world, or the return of the 12th Iman, and they have a chance to go directly to paradise.
But the article fails to indicate that these “warrantless wiretaps” are focused on tapping phones of non-citizens who have been linked to terrorism. Those opposed to these types of wire taps are basically stating that our country must use the Marquis of Queensbury rules on Islamic terrorists, while they are free to ignore any and all rules of civilized behavior.
Our voters should know which politicians want to extend Constitutional protections, Miranda-type rights to terrorists, whether they are operating inside this country, or outside this country. Sort of like during WWI, when a politician decried any effort at intelligence gathering and spying ... “gentlemen don’t read other gentlemen’s mail.”
To liken this to Ben Franklin’s statement is fairly ignorant of history. We are not sacrificing rights of citizens (unless there is an inherent right to converse with a terrorist without). The Constitution is not a suicide pact, and those people not in this country that don’t respect the Constitution do not deserve ANY protections of the Constitution.
And the New York Times - in leaking the fact that our country was wire-tapping these foreign phone calls - decided to come down on the side of the terrorists. What is the term for someone who aids and abets an enemy of our country? Of course, the NY Times failed to fully cover the story. Why not indicate that often we might capture terrorists with cell phones or computers, and when we track back and look at numbers in the computer, or numbers dialed (or called in) - there might be a reason to go for a wire-tap those numbers. There might be many reasons to keep the program quiet (lest it leak, like it did) ...and there are othen reasons why it might take time to go through a judge (and where in the Constitution does it say a judge needs to approve a wire-tap of a foreign call coming into our country?). But lets not confuse the public with all the facts - there might be a large majority that don’t want to unilaterally disarm, and would vote out politicians stupid enough to parrot the Ben Franklin line (like Bernie Sanders of VT).
Mike
Thank you so much for posting this. So sad to see a bunch of terrified cowboy “conservatives” wetting their pants because of these freaks.
Man up, people! this is NOTHING like the Soviet or Nazi threat, and we didn’t sacrifice these liberties then...