The baseless claim that voter ID is a Republican plot to depress the votes of minorities, who disproportionately support Democrats, certainly isn’t made by those Democrats who overwhelmingly control the Rhode Island legislature that passed voter ID. State representative Jon Brien, a Democratic sponsor of the bill, said it was wrong for party leaders to “make this a Republican-versus-Democrat issue. It’s not. It’s simply a good-government issue.” Brien added that “we as representatives have a duty to the citizenry to ensure the integrity of our elections, and the requirement to show an ID will ensure that integrity.” State senator Harold Metts, a black Democrat whose support of Rhode Island’s voter-ID bill angered the ACLU and other leftist organizations, said he was “more interested in doing the right thing and stopping voter fraud.” And polling shows that the so-called leaders of the civil-rights establishment who oppose voter ID are actually out of touch with their constituents, who recognize that voter fraud often hits hardest in minority communities.
Election data in Georgia demonstrate that concern about a negative effect on the Democratic or minority vote is baseless. Turnout there increased more dramatically in 2008 — the first presidential election held after the state’s photo-ID law went into effect — than it did in states without photo ID. Georgia had a record turnout in 2008, the largest in its history — nearly 4 million voters. And Democratic turnout was up an astonishing 6.1 percentage points from the 2004 election, the fourth-largest increase of any state. The black share of the statewide vote increased from 25 percent in 2004 to 30 percent in 2008, according to the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies. According to Census Bureau surveys, 65 percent of the black voting-age population voted in the 2008 election, compared with only 54.4 percent in 2004, an increase of more than ten percentage points.
For those who might reply that this was because Barack Obama was on the ballot, think again. Mississippi, with an equally large black population and no voter ID, had its Democratic turnout increase by only 2.35 percentage points. Georgia’s registration records show that while only 42.9 percent of registered black Georgians voted in 2006, when there was no photo-ID requirement, 50.4 percent voted in the 2010 congressional elections — an increase of more than seven percentage points. Georgia’s secretary of state recently pointed out that, compared with 2006, voter turnout in 2010 “among African Americans outpaced the growth of that population’s pool of registered voters by more than 20 percentage points.”
Indiana witnessed similar results. In the state considered to have the nation’s strictest voter-ID law, turnout in the Democratic presidential primary in 2008 quadrupled from the 2004 election, when there was no photo-ID law. In the general election, the turnout of Democratic voters increased by 8.32 percentage points from 2004, the largest increase in Democratic turnout of any state. Neighboring Illinois, which has no photo-ID requirement and is Obama’s home state, had its Democratic turnout increase by only 4.4 percentage points — barely half of Indiana’s increase. In the 2010 election, Indiana was one of the states with a substantial increase in black turnout: “The black share of the state vote was higher in 2010 than it was in 2008, a banner year for black turnout,” according to the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies. The black share of the total vote went from only 7 percent in 2008 to 12 percent in 2010.
Numerous studies — including those by the Heritage Foundation, the University of Missouri, the University of Delaware, and the University of Nebraska–Lincol
Ballot stuffing (or even voting two or more times) is very rare. So rare as to be a non-issue. Despite claims to the contrary.
Sorry, but you are quite simply wrong about that.
. . . two Troy city officials, the city clerk and a councilman, along with two Democratic political operatives, have pled guilty to forging absentee-ballot signatures and casting fraudulent ballots in the 2009 Working Families Party primary. The WFP is the political party associated with ACORN.
One of the citizens whose votes were stolen was stunned at what happened. She said that she was “sure this goes on a lot in politics, but it’s very rare that they do get caught.” This voter was right on the money with that observation — fraud is so easy to commit in our election system that it is rare that fraudsters get caught and even rarer that they get prosecuted.
. . . one of the Democratic operatives who pled guilty, Anthony DeFiglio, told New York State police investigators “that faking absentee ballots was a commonplace and accepted practice in political circles, all intended to swing an election.” And whose votes do they steal? DeFiglio was very plain about that: “The people who are targeted live in low-income housing, and there is a sense that they are a lot less likely to ask any questions.”
That is exactly what former Alabama congressman Artur Davis said recently when he admitted that he was wrong to oppose voter-ID requirements. Davis says the “most aggressive” voter suppression “is the wholesale manufacture of ballots, at the polls and absentee, in parts of the Black Belt” of Alabama, which is an area of very poor black communities. These are the very areas where the NAACP claims voter fraud does not happen. The NAACP opposes all reasonable measures to safeguard the voting process for its own constituents, even going to the extent of defending vote stealers, as the NAACP did in Greene County, Ala., in the mid-1990s. Small wonder one of its local officials was recently sentenced to five years in prison for voter fraud in Tunica County, Mississippi. - Yes, Virginia, There Really Is Voter Fraud
And more . ..
In contrast, a subsequent media analysis showed that at least 2000 votes were cast illegally in Florida in the 2000 presidential election. Since the margin of victory in Florida was 537 votes, the fraudulent votes were sufficient to affect the outcome of the election.
That’s not an isolated example. Evidence adduced at various commission hearings suggests numerous instances of actual voter fraud. The cases involve organizations and individuals who register ineligible voters, dead people, and fictional characters. In an infamous Ohio case during the 2004 presidential election campaign, a canvasser paid with crack cocaine registered Dick Tracy, Mary Poppins, and scores of other equally noteworthy characters.
Again, these aren’t isolated cases. A major 2001 voter registration drive in St. Louis’s black community produced 3,800 new voter cards. When some of the names appeared suspicious, elections officials investigated all of the cards and determined that every single one was fraudulent. Dogs, the dead, and people who simply didn’t want to register were among the new registrants.
The problem isn’t only that canvassers are being paid to produce manifestly fraudulent voter registrations; it’s also that voter rolls throughout the country are being padded with hundreds of thousands of false and fraudulent names. For example, testimony by John Sample before the Senate Rules Committee showed that Alaska had 503,000 people on its voter rolls but only 437,000 people of votin
What is much harder is to make it both easy to vote and make it difficult to cast a fraudulent vote. Preventing fraud is an important consideration as more and more elections in the US are decided by razor thin margins, well within the margin of being decided by fairly trivial fraud.
In the United States, the only thing that showing contempt for the president will get you suspected of is being a member of a different political party than the president.
So, you start off talking about Baltimore, and then quote from a story about the plot in Seattle, and then don't acknowledge either the change of location or the facts. The goal of the plot in Seattle, noted in your link, was:
Mujahidh suggested going into the MEPS with machine guns and grenades and killing everyone there. -- source
Not really a case of simple firearms possession, is it? The gap between the facts and what you report is pretty large. But what about the story from Baltimore?
BALTIMORE—Antonio Martinez, aka Muhammad Hussain, 22, of Baltimore, a U.S. citizen, pleaded guilty today to attempted use of a weapon of mass destruction against federal property in connection with a scheme to attack an armed forces recruiting station in Catonsville, Md. Martinez was arrested on Dec. 8, 2010, after he attempted to detonate what he believed to be explosives at the armed forces recruiting station . . . . . . Martinez admitted that the bomb was intended to kill military service members who worked in the building. . . . - source
So, despite your "LOL", it turns out to be true, not FUD. The man actually admitted it.
Sure, there will ALWAYS be idiots who want to do something like that. What you read on that page is standard FUD.
You are correct, there will always be idiots, and it does help to read the page.
Glendower. - I can call spirits from the vasty deep. Hotspur. - Why, so can I; or so can any man: But will they come when you do call for them ? (1 Henry IV, 3.1)
The grandparent might have us believe there are no witches. You would have us believe there are no terrorists, just panic and hysteria. And yet, when our enemies, men who once walked upon the earth, such as Bin Laden and Al-Awlaki, called them, terrorists came or formed among us. Now they are arrested and tried regularly. This isn't myth, this isn't panic. this is fact. We ignore it at our peril.
FBI’s Top Ten News Stories for the Week Ending January 27, 2012 Denver: Man Arrested for Providing Material Support to a Designated Foreign Terrorist Organization Baltimore: Man Pleads Guilty to Attempted Use of a Weapon of Mass Destruction in Plot to Attack Armed Forces Recruiting Center Washington Field: Man Pleads Guilty to Shootings at Pentagon, Other Military Buildings
So am I going to guantanamo for saying "Fuck the US president" ?
No, that will only get you on the progressive lecture circuit.
If you want to go to Guantanamo you will have to join Al Qeda or an affiliate, conduct terrorist attacks (blowing up school buses, ambushing police officers, killing elected officials, that sort of terrorism. Note: that is terrorism, not, "terrorism". ) and be captured instead of killed. Even then your chances are slim since Guantanamo has never held even 1,000 people ever. I don't think your chances are good.
In a stunning development, Canadian researches have determined that nearly all Islamist extremist terrorism is in fact carried out by Muslims. Progressives express disbelief and outrage.
And the moral of the story is? Dont travel to the US.
The #1 reason why the US was quickly ruled out as my holiday destination this year is because of the horror stories like this.
When I read statements like yours I'm often left wondering, why do you think the American security services will single you out of the other 64 million travelers to the United States per year? And do you truly believe that nobody is arrested due to misunderstanding or mistake in your or other countries?
According to new data released today by the Commerce Department, the U.S. can expect 6-8 percent average annual growth in tourism over the next five years, and this year, 64 million foreign travelers are projected to visit the United States -- New Report Forecasts Strong U.S. Travel and Tourism Growth During Next Five Years
Well, anything except actual threats. We are continually told on Slashdot that they don't exist despite continuing arrests and convictions. The lack of terrorist attacks isn't because there aren't terrorists, or that they don't wish to attack, but because they have been generally foiled to date due to good intelligence, hard work, and luck.
South of the border: FBI’s Top Ten News Stories for the Week Ending January 27, 2012 Denver: Man Arrested for Providing Material Support to a Designated Foreign Terrorist Organization Baltimore: Man Pleads Guilty to Attempted Use of a Weapon of Mass Destruction in Plot to Attack Armed Forces Recruiting Center Washington Field: Man Pleads Guilty to Shootings at Pentagon, Other Military Buildings
Keep in mind that Al Qeda has called off attacks that would have likely killed hundreds or thousands of people because they weren't spectacular enough for their tastes. ( New York Subway Plot and al-Qaeda's WMD Strategy )
The US has had so little terrorism in the last decade that metrics for that are mostly have an N of zero.
It really depends on the metric, doesn't it? In reality there has been a pretty constant stream of terrorism related arrests and convictions, with many plots being foiled. Here are some recent examples:
Denver: Man Arrested for Providing Material Support to a Designated Foreign Terrorist Organization
Jamshid Muhtorov was arrested by members of the FBI’s Denver and Chicago Joint Terrorism Task Forces on a charge of providing and attempting to provide material support to the Islamic Jihad Union, a Pakistan-based designated foreign terrorist organization. Full Story
Baltimore: Man Pleads Guilty to Attempted Use of a Weapon of Mass Destruction in Plot to Attack Armed Forces Recruiting Center
U.S. citizen Antonio Martinez, aka Muhammad Hussain, pled guilty to attempted use of a weapon of mass destruction against federal property in connection with a scheme to attack an armed forces recruiting station in Catonsville, Maryland. Full Story
Washington Field: Man Pleads Guilty to Shootings at Pentagon, Other Military Buildings
Yonathan Melaku, of Alexandria, Virginia, pled guilty to damaging property and to firearms violations involving five separate shootings at military installations in northern Virginia between October and November 2010, and to attempting to damage veterans’ memorials at Arlington National Cemetery. Full Story
1.Tampa: Florida Resident Charged with Plotting to Bomb Locations in Tampa
A 25-year-old resident of Pinellas Park, Florida was charged in connection with an alleged plot to attack locations in Tampa with a vehicle bomb, assault rifle, and other explosives. Full Story
2.Baltimore: Former Army Solider Charged with Attempting to Provide Material Support to al Shabaab
A man who secretly converted to Islam days before he separated from the Army was charged with attempting to provide material support to al Shabaab, a foreign terrorist organization, and was arrested upon his return to Maryland after traveling to Africa. Full Story
San Diego: Woman Guilty of Conspiring to Provide Material Support to al Shabaab
Nima Yusuf, 25, a resident of San Diego, pled guilty to conspiring to provide material support to al Shabaab, a foreign terrorist organization. Full Story
Terrorists (at least the bottom-rank terrorists who commit the actual attacks) are almost always people marginalized by society who feel that they have nothing left to lose.
Both before and after the 9/11 attacks, numerous studies have looked at the economic and educational backgrounds of Islamic terrorists. One investigation by Princeton-trained economist Claude Berrebi analyzed 335 members of the Palestinian terror groups, Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad. The terrorists surveyed were mainly shahids, or "martyrs," who had died while waging jihad against Israel between 1987 and 2002. Berrebi discovered that 16 percent of those terrorists could be classified as poor, compared to 31 percent of the male Muslim population (between the ages 18 and 41) in the Palestinian territories as a whole. Conversely, 33 percent of the terrorists could be considered “well off,” compared to only 20 percent of Palestinian adult males in that same age group. And another 10 percent of the terrorists were “very well off” according to the survey, as opposed to virtually 0 percent of Palestinian males overall who fit that same description. The study also indicated that the Palestinian terrorists were generally more highly educated than the typical male in the Palestinian population at large.
Given the evidence, Berrebi concluded: “If there is a link between income level, education and participation in terrorist activities, it is either very weak or in the opposite direction of what one intuitively might have expected.”
Another study by terrorism expert Marc Sageman examined 102 Islamist radicals involved in global jihad. Like Berrebi, Sageman could find no correlation between poverty and terrorism; only about a quarter of the jihadis he looked at hailed from impoverished backgrounds. “[M]embers of the global Salafi jihad,” Sageman writes in his book Understanding Terror Networks, “were generally middle-class, educated young men from caring and religious families, who grew up with strong positive values of religion, spirituality and concern for their communities.”
The relative affluence of Islamic terrorists is by no means a new phenomenon. Indeed, a much earlier study -- of Islamist radicals in Egyptian prisons (and elsewhere) -- was conducted in the late 1970s by the Egyptian sociologist Saad Eddin Ibrahim; his findings were consistent with the more recent ones discussed above. “The typical member of the militant Islamic groups,” Ibrahim discovered, could be “described as young (early 20s), of rural or small-town background, from the middle or lower-middle class, with high achievement and motivation, upwardly mobile, with a scientific or engineering education, and from a normally cohesive family.” Ibrahim went on to conclude that the Islamist radicals he analyzed “were significantly above the average of their generation” in education, financial background, and motivation. Other studies further buttress these conclusions.
Founding Fathers were largely considered to be terrorists by the British.
No, they weren't. They were considered rebels against the Crown by the British, and revolutionaries and patriots in the US and their states. The Founding Fathers of the United States wanted a new government structure, not to massacre civilians. The penalty the British would have imposed may have been death in both cases, but I think most people would agree that founding a republic is a different type of act entirely from mass slaughter of civilians.
When we stopped hunting down and killing their leaders?
When we start hunting down our own citizens and executing them without so much as a single accusation laid against them for nothing more than them exercising their free speech?
The men represented in this video, who were shot down en mass by the Federal government without benefit of indictment or trial, and Al-Awlaki, share a common trait. Do you know what it is?
Al-Awlaki, like the Confederates, took up arms against the United States and made himself the enemy during wartime. He aided those trying to kill Americans. Killing Al-Awlaki was a completely legitimate act of war that did not require charges, indictment, trial, or sentencing. It isn't a question of criminal law, but war. And yes, the Congressional Authorization for Use of Military Force is the legal equivalent of a declaration of war - that is settled law. If he actually wanted to be judged in a court of law, he could have surrendered.
People strongly involved in religion always let me this strange impression that they are hiding something, as unable to really disclose what they think.
Completely understandable. Take a look at this page. Approximately 8-12% of men of European descent will have problems seeing what is on these charts. That have what is commonly referred to as "color blindness" in some form. People with full sight can easily see what is written there. They probably won't be able to show or really describe the difference in a meaningful way to someone who is color blind. The people that can see it aren't hiding something because they can see the writing. It isn't a conspiracy against those with color blindness. In a similar fashion, some people are spiritually blind, until they are enabled to see. The interesting thing is that God is still able to use people who are spiritually blind to fulfill his purposes.
The difference is that George Washington wanted to restore and build upon a classic liberal democracy which the King had infringed upon, and for which reconciliation didn't seem possible*. Bin Laden wanted to destroy a classic liberal democracy with constitutional guarantees of personal liberty and turn it into a severe Islamic state through coerced religious conversion and imposition of the harsh Taliban style of Islamic law as favored by Al Qaeda.
Another difference is that George Washington engaged British armies on the field of battle to achieve his aims. Bin Laden repeatedly sent his minions on missions to engage in mass slaughter of civilians in office buildings, hotels, and markets to achieve his aims.
Osama Bin Laden was a terrorist. George Washington was an American patriot, a rebel against the British Crown, and not a terrorist.
If it makes you feel better, Bin Laden would have ultimately wanted the British Crown to fall, something the Americans didn't want. The fate for Britain, as well as the rest of the world, would be the same as for the United States.
I would have thought all this was clear. Are you still baffled?
* I seem to recall the Parliament took some stern actions against more than one British monarch over the years as well.
We've a long history of terrorists. If George Washington, Thomas Jefferson and Patrick Henry were alive today they'd all be on the no-fly lists.
Well, you've not only managed to engage in vile libel against some of the key founders of the United States, brave and honorable men, but you've also managed to get some very simple things completely wrong. They joined their states in a revolution against King George the III of Great Britain. They were trying to change the government reporting structure, not engage in mass murder of innocent civilians. They wouldn't have been on "no-fly lists", they would have been taken into custody if found and hanged for rebellion, for treason against the Crown. They weren't anti-government, they wanted a different government (the Continental Congress vs the Crown of Great Britain). You are very badly confused. You ennoble people trying to engage in mass slaughter of Americans, Britons, Europeans, Australians, and many others when you utter such nonsense.
It is indeed a pitiful foolishness to confuse the meaning and consequences of "Give me Liberty, or give me death!" versus "Allah Akbar!!".
The demands Bin Laden was fighting for included that the US convert to Islam, and scrap the Constitution and institute Islamic Sharia law.
Keep in mind, the struggle against real, not imaginary rhetorical terrorists, continues.
Denver: Man Arrested for Providing Material Support to a Designated Foreign Terrorist Organization
Jamshid Muhtorov was arrested by members of the FBI’s Denver and Chicago Joint Terrorism Task Forces on a charge of providing and attempting to provide material support to the Islamic Jihad Union, a Pakistan-based designated foreign terrorist organization. Full Story
Baltimore: Man Pleads Guilty to Attempted Use of a Weapon of Mass Destruction in Plot to Attack Armed Forces Recruiting Center
U.S. citizen Antonio Martinez, aka Muhammad Hussain, pled guilty to attempted use of a weapon of mass destruction against federal property in connection with a scheme to attack an armed forces recruiting station in Catonsville, Maryland. Full Story
Washington Field: Man Pleads Guilty to Shootings at Pentagon, Other Military Buildings
Yonathan Melaku, of Alexandria, Virginia, pled guilty to damaging property and to firearms violations involving five separate shootings at military installations in northern Virginia between October and November 2010, and to attempting to damage veterans’ memorials at Arlington National Cemetery. Full Story
1.Tampa: Florida Resident Charged with Plotting to Bomb Locations in Tampa
A 25-year-old resident of Pinellas Park, Florida was charged in connection with an alleged plot to attack locations in Tampa with a vehicle bomb, assault rifle, and other explosives. Full Story
2.Baltimore: Former Army Solider Charged with Attempting to Provide Material Support to al Shabaab
A man who secretly converted to Islam days before he separated from the Army was charged with attempting to provide material support to al Shabaab, a foreign terrorist organization, and was arrested upon his return to Maryland after traveling to Africa. Full Story
Because Intelligence agencies and prosecutors self-select on what cases they take to court. No sense going through the trouble unless you are fairly certain you will get the warrant.
Slashdot Mirror
Do you actually have any facts or arguments to add to the discussion?
Not a Race Card
Ballot stuffing (or even voting two or more times) is very rare.
So rare as to be a non-issue. Despite claims to the contrary.
Sorry, but you are quite simply wrong about that.
And more . . .
Good point. The best you can do is to get the facts out and try to make a good argument.
Not a Race Card
Voter ID Is Not Jim Crow
What is much harder is to make it both easy to vote and make it difficult to cast a fraudulent vote. Preventing fraud is an important consideration as more and more elections in the US are decided by razor thin margins, well within the margin of being decided by fairly trivial fraud.
Dancing Israelis
Debunking the 9/11 Myths: Special Report
In the United States, the only thing that showing contempt for the president will get you suspected of is being a member of a different political party than the president.
That's it.
A weapon of mass destruction on Baltimore? LOL.
When you read http://skyvalleychronicle.com/GENERAL-VALLEY-NEWS/FORMER-L-A-MAN-PLEADS-GUILTY-IN-PLOT-TO-ATTACK-SEATTLE-MILITARY-PROCESSING-CENTER-846631 [skyvalleychronicle.com] which is nicely standard FBI fodder, what you read is that somebody tried to buy a gun.
So, you start off talking about Baltimore, and then quote from a story about the plot in Seattle, and then don't acknowledge either the change of location or the facts. The goal of the plot in Seattle, noted in your link, was:
Mujahidh suggested going into the MEPS with machine guns and grenades and killing everyone there. -- source
Not really a case of simple firearms possession, is it? The gap between the facts and what you report is pretty large. But what about the story from Baltimore?
BALTIMORE—Antonio Martinez, aka Muhammad Hussain, 22, of Baltimore, a U.S. citizen, pleaded guilty today to attempted use of a weapon of mass destruction against federal property in connection with a scheme to attack an armed forces recruiting station in Catonsville, Md. Martinez was arrested on Dec. 8, 2010, after he attempted to detonate what he believed to be explosives at the armed forces recruiting station . . .
. . . Martinez admitted that the bomb was intended to kill military service members who worked in the building. . . . - source
So, despite your "LOL", it turns out to be true, not FUD. The man actually admitted it.
Sure, there will ALWAYS be idiots who want to do something like that. What you read on that page is standard FUD.
You are correct, there will always be idiots, and it does help to read the page.
Glendower. - I can call spirits from the vasty deep.
Hotspur. - Why, so can I; or so can any man:
But will they come when you do call for them ?
(1 Henry IV, 3.1)
The grandparent might have us believe there are no witches. You would have us believe there are no terrorists, just panic and hysteria. And yet, when our enemies, men who once walked upon the earth, such as Bin Laden and Al-Awlaki, called them, terrorists came or formed among us. Now they are arrested and tried regularly. This isn't myth, this isn't panic. this is fact. We ignore it at our peril.
FBI’s Top Ten News Stories for the Week Ending January 27, 2012
Denver: Man Arrested for Providing Material Support to a Designated Foreign Terrorist Organization
Baltimore: Man Pleads Guilty to Attempted Use of a Weapon of Mass Destruction in Plot to Attack Armed Forces Recruiting Center
Washington Field: Man Pleads Guilty to Shootings at Pentagon, Other Military Buildings
FBI’s Top Ten News Stories for the Week Ending January 13, 2012
Tampa: Florida Resident Charged with Plotting to Bomb Locations in Tampa
Baltimore: Former Army Solider Charged with Attempting to Provide Material Support to al Shabaab
FBI’s Top Ten News Stories for the Week Ending December 9, 2011
Seattle: Man Pleads Guilty in Plot to Attack Military Processing Center
FBI’s Top Ten News Stories for the Week Ending December 2, 2011
San Diego: Woman Guilty of Conspiring to Provide Material Support to al Shabaab
More here.
So am I going to guantanamo for saying "Fuck the US president" ?
No, that will only get you on the progressive lecture circuit.
If you want to go to Guantanamo you will have to join Al Qeda or an affiliate, conduct terrorist attacks (blowing up school buses, ambushing police officers, killing elected officials, that sort of terrorism. Note: that is terrorism, not, "terrorism". ) and be captured instead of killed. Even then your chances are slim since Guantanamo has never held even 1,000 people ever. I don't think your chances are good.
In a stunning development, Canadian researches have determined that nearly all Islamist extremist terrorism is in fact carried out by Muslims. Progressives express disbelief and outrage.
And the moral of the story is?
Dont travel to the US.
The #1 reason why the US was quickly ruled out as my holiday destination this year is because of the horror stories like this.
When I read statements like yours I'm often left wondering, why do you think the American security services will single you out of the other 64 million travelers to the United States per year? And do you truly believe that nobody is arrested due to misunderstanding or mistake in your or other countries?
My suggestion is that you don't read any medical textbooks.
Well, anything except actual threats. We are continually told on Slashdot that they don't exist despite continuing arrests and convictions. The lack of terrorist attacks isn't because there aren't terrorists, or that they don't wish to attack, but because they have been generally foiled to date due to good intelligence, hard work, and luck.
North of the border:
Canadian Charged in Iraq Bombing
Few Details Given as 4 Canadians Are Held in Terrorist Plot
Alleged terrorist arrested at Pearson
Canadian police arrest couple on terrorism charges
Government links boat passengers to terrorism, arrests made
Terror Arrests Reveal Reach of Canada's Surveillance Powers
South of the border:
FBI’s Top Ten News Stories for the Week Ending January 27, 2012
Denver: Man Arrested for Providing Material Support to a Designated Foreign Terrorist Organization
Baltimore: Man Pleads Guilty to Attempted Use of a Weapon of Mass Destruction in Plot to Attack Armed Forces Recruiting Center
Washington Field: Man Pleads Guilty to Shootings at Pentagon, Other Military Buildings
FBI’s Top Ten News Stories for the Week Ending January 13, 2012
Tampa: Florida Resident Charged with Plotting to Bomb Locations in Tampa
Baltimore: Former Army Solider Charged with Attempting to Provide Material Support to al Shabaab
FBI’s Top Ten News Stories for the Week Ending December 9, 2011
Seattle: Man Pleads Guilty in Plot to Attack Military Processing Center
FBI’s Top Ten News Stories for the Week Ending December 2, 2011
San Diego: Woman Guilty of Conspiring to Provide Material Support to al Shabaab
More here.
Keep in mind that Al Qeda has called off attacks that would have likely killed hundreds or thousands of people because they weren't spectacular enough for their tastes. ( New York Subway Plot and al-Qaeda's WMD Strategy )
On week days he also short sheets their beds.
The US has had so little terrorism in the last decade that metrics for that are mostly have an N of zero.
It really depends on the metric, doesn't it? In reality there has been a pretty constant stream of terrorism related arrests and convictions, with many plots being foiled. Here are some recent examples:
FBI’s Top Ten News Stories for the Week Ending January 27, 2012
FBI’s Top Ten News Stories for the Week Ending January 13, 2012
FBI’s Top Ten News Stories for the Week Ending December 9, 2011
FBI’s Top Ten News Stories for the Week Ending December 2, 2011
More here.
Terrorists (at least the bottom-rank terrorists who commit the actual attacks) are almost always people marginalized by society who feel that they have nothing left to lose.
Not really, no.
POVERTY, EDUCATION, AND TERRORISM
Founding Fathers were largely considered to be terrorists by the British.
No, they weren't. They were considered rebels against the Crown by the British, and revolutionaries and patriots in the US and their states. The Founding Fathers of the United States wanted a new government structure, not to massacre civilians. The penalty the British would have imposed may have been death in both cases, but I think most people would agree that founding a republic is a different type of act entirely from mass slaughter of civilians.
Make the NFL foot this whole security bill.
The special security is already paid for. It's funded through something we call "taxes".
When we stopped hunting down and killing their leaders?
When we start hunting down our own citizens and executing them without so much as a single accusation laid against them for nothing more than them exercising their free speech?
The men represented in this video, who were shot down en mass by the Federal government without benefit of indictment or trial, and Al-Awlaki, share a common trait. Do you know what it is?
Al-Awlaki, like the Confederates, took up arms against the United States and made himself the enemy during wartime. He aided those trying to kill Americans. Killing Al-Awlaki was a completely legitimate act of war that did not require charges, indictment, trial, or sentencing. It isn't a question of criminal law, but war. And yes, the Congressional Authorization for Use of Military Force is the legal equivalent of a declaration of war - that is settled law. If he actually wanted to be judged in a court of law, he could have surrendered.
People strongly involved in religion always let me this strange impression that they are hiding something, as unable to really disclose what they think.
Completely understandable. Take a look at this page. Approximately 8-12% of men of European descent will have problems seeing what is on these charts. That have what is commonly referred to as "color blindness" in some form. People with full sight can easily see what is written there. They probably won't be able to show or really describe the difference in a meaningful way to someone who is color blind. The people that can see it aren't hiding something because they can see the writing. It isn't a conspiracy against those with color blindness. In a similar fashion, some people are spiritually blind, until they are enabled to see. The interesting thing is that God is still able to use people who are spiritually blind to fulfill his purposes.
The difference is that George Washington wanted to restore and build upon a classic liberal democracy which the King had infringed upon, and for which reconciliation didn't seem possible*. Bin Laden wanted to destroy a classic liberal democracy with constitutional guarantees of personal liberty and turn it into a severe Islamic state through coerced religious conversion and imposition of the harsh Taliban style of Islamic law as favored by Al Qaeda.
Another difference is that George Washington engaged British armies on the field of battle to achieve his aims. Bin Laden repeatedly sent his minions on missions to engage in mass slaughter of civilians in office buildings, hotels, and markets to achieve his aims.
Osama Bin Laden was a terrorist. George Washington was an American patriot, a rebel against the British Crown, and not a terrorist.
If it makes you feel better, Bin Laden would have ultimately wanted the British Crown to fall, something the Americans didn't want. The fate for Britain, as well as the rest of the world, would be the same as for the United States.
I would have thought all this was clear. Are you still baffled?
* I seem to recall the Parliament took some stern actions against more than one British monarch over the years as well.
I... (/me holds hand to ear piece) what's that? The Saturn V rocket was developed by... oh. Uh...
Just think of it as a form of reparations.
We've a long history of terrorists. If George Washington, Thomas Jefferson and Patrick Henry were alive today they'd all be on the no-fly lists.
Well, you've not only managed to engage in vile libel against some of the key founders of the United States, brave and honorable men, but you've also managed to get some very simple things completely wrong. They joined their states in a revolution against King George the III of Great Britain. They were trying to change the government reporting structure, not engage in mass murder of innocent civilians. They wouldn't have been on "no-fly lists", they would have been taken into custody if found and hanged for rebellion, for treason against the Crown. They weren't anti-government, they wanted a different government (the Continental Congress vs the Crown of Great Britain). You are very badly confused. You ennoble people trying to engage in mass slaughter of Americans, Britons, Europeans, Australians, and many others when you utter such nonsense.
It is indeed a pitiful foolishness to confuse the meaning and consequences of "Give me Liberty, or give me death!" versus "Allah Akbar!!".
The demands Bin Laden was fighting for included that the US convert to Islam, and scrap the Constitution and institute Islamic Sharia law.
Keep in mind, the struggle against real, not imaginary rhetorical terrorists, continues.
FBI’s Top Ten News Stories for the Week Ending January 27, 2012
FBI’s Top Ten News Stories for the Week Ending January 13, 2012
FBI’s Top Ten News Stories for the Week Ending December 9, 2011
If you are on the "No fly list" you don't get the cavity search because... why? YOU DON"T GET TO FLY.
The more posts I read on this topic the clearer it is that the default is apparently stupidity.*
*Which as the post above shows is "+5 Insightful"
"Requiring a warrant" is a joke. The FISA courts approve about 99.5 percent of requests: http://epic.org/privacy/wiretap/stats/fisa_stats.html
Because Intelligence agencies and prosecutors self-select on what cases they take to court. No sense going through the trouble unless you are fairly certain you will get the warrant.