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Attempted Breach of NSA HQ Checkpoint; One Shot Dead
seven of five writes One man is dead and another severely injured after a shootout at one of the main gates of the National Security Agency located at Fort Meade, Maryland. Two men dressed as women attempted to 'penetrate' the entry point with their vehicle when a shootout occurred, officials said. The FBI said they do not believe the incident is related to terrorism.
Being dressed as women has nothing to do with putting 'penetration' in quotes, unless there is some sort of joke I'm missing. Why is it in quotes?
So in some abstract sense I can see why the NSA could be considered a valid target in some contexts.
But, honestly, trying to gate crash an Army base and then getting into a shooting match with the guards ... well, that's a special kind of stupid.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
Funnily enough the "bad guys" in this situation become a very fuzzy argument.
Why is this here?
Because the NSA, with all its massive data collection, retention, and analysis, did not see this coming.
Now i'm not saying that it is, perhaps it was just a drunken rage or some other non politically motivated random act, the base had over 29,000 people on the inside of the wall. It could have been simply a case of adultery involving a person inside the perimeter. Naturally because of the target we all go to political motivation as the driving factor but until we learn more we can assume any infinite number of factors inspired the event.
It doesn't take a foreign government funding a team of trolls to fill a small page with angry comments about the NSA
They tried to breach one of the most secure locations in the world by crashing an SUV into the gates. If they even had a "plan" going in, I'd imagine it was made with crayons and construction paper. Maybe a couple toilet paper tubes and some elmer's glue if they decided to get extra fancy.
You know, I'm a pretty heavy user of tinfoil with an inherent distrust of government.
But even I don't need to look at this as an abuse of power by the government.
The rights of US military personnel to shoot your stupid self for trying to ram through a gated checkpoint with big giant signs saying "we can and will stop you, by force if necessary" has been established for an incredibly long time.
Most of the last century, I should think. Probably MUCH longer.
Sorry, but this falls entirely in the domain of "if you didn't see this one coming you're an idiot".
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
No kidding ... attempting to force your way into something guarded by armed military personnel and then discovering they're not afraid of you isn't terrorism.
It's a frickin' Darwin award.
I consider that only one of them is dead to be either extraordinary luck, or surprising restraint on behalf of the soldiers.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
I just figured EVERYTHING was ALWAYS called "terrorism" now
No one at Lufthansa or the German government have called the Lufthansa mass murder `terrorism.' The '09 Ft. Hood shootings are still officially classified as `workplace violence' despite all evidence to the contrary, and Nidal Hasan was not charged or convicted has a terrorist. Obama has never gone further than the generalization that "anytime bombs are used ... it's terror" regarding the Boston marathon bombings, and Tsarnaev isn't charged under any terror statutes.
Is someone finally figuring out that if everything is terrorism, then nothing is terrorism?
They've figured it out just fine, as the specific cases I cite prove. The authorities are clearly being conservative with the use of the term `terror' and erroring on the side of `not terror' in their prosecution of violent acts. The problem isn't our authorities labeling `everything' terrorism. The problem is the fictional world filled with hysterical terror-mongers you've nurtured inside your head. It's not real. There is something wrong in there.
Maw! Fire up the karma burner!
By "agent", perhaps you're thinking of the CIA. The NSA doesn't have agents, only analysts and various other white-collar workers. Their charter is to gather and analyze information for other branches of government (such as the CIA), not to act on it themselves.
That said, as I understand the news, the death was actually of one of the attackers. In any event, this gives me an opportunity to climb on my soapbox about something that's been bothering me a lot lately.
[begin soapbox]
Why do we celebrate the deaths of "innocents" so frequently lately? An NSA employee could be a manager, an analyst, a security guard, a janitor, or many other types of employee. Do each and every one of those human beings deserve to die because of actions you disagree with that were taken by the organization as a whole?
Coincidentally, I read today about some grisly testimony from the Boston Marathon bombing of innocents who lost their lives or were seriously wounded. This mentality of "any person who belongs to a group I don't like deserves to die" may seem appealing at first, but it becomes less so when you realize that you probably also fit into some group that someone else disagree with.
Or, to paraphrase John Kennedy, "Ich bin ein infidel".
[end soapbox]
Because everyone is the good guy in their own eyes. Even the worst oppressive dictators don't view themselves as oppressive dictators - they are just trying to do the best for their people,
If you think that Saddam or Bennito or Idi or Fidel thought they were doing the best for their people, you are sadly mistaken. They knew what they were doing, and they knew who the intended beneficiaries were.