[Infowarrior] - more on... - Fmr Mi5 head: UK gov exploiting terror fears

[Richard Forno]

Begin forwarded message:

> From: "J. H. van Baal" <baal.jhv at comcast.net>
> Date: February 17, 2009 8:25:05 AM EST
>
> this is exactly why I was underwhelmed by the alarmist article the  
> other day by the chap at the Navy Postgraduate School.
>
> Are terrorists a threat to us?  Statistically, no, no more than  
> being struck by lightning or if you live in certain neighborhoods a  
> drive-by shooting.
>
> The real problems are to be found on Wall Street, in the jobs now  
> done overseas, the bad mortgages, the black heart of G W Bush, the  
> accounting skills of Bernie Madoff.
>
> Yes, "terrorists" killed however many people in Mumbai.  More people  
> than that die in Mumbai every day from hunger, and from preventable  
> diseases.  But is that newsworthy?
>
> Yes, people died in the events of 11 September.  Physicians kill  
> many more thousands of people than that every year in America.  So  
> do cigarettes and prescribed drugs.  I don't mean to diminish the  
> deaths of terror victims in any way.  I do want to point out that if  
> one filters out the media circus nature of these rare occurances,  
> what do we really have in terms of human mortality?  I know this  
> sounds harsh and unfeeling.  But think about it.
>
> The consequences of unbridled capitalism are far worse than the  
> media events associated with "terrorism".
>
> And is the phenomenal cost associated with antiterrorism really  
> worth the expenditure in terms of return?  Is the existence of a  
> brain dead organization like the TSA really justified?
>
> Antiterrorism is by nature a police action.  Military response is  
> inappropriate.  Iraq is a complete disaster.  Afghanistan is none of  
> our business.  Osama should be been pursued by international police  
> action, not by military intervention, before G W Bush singlehandedly  
> destroyed the world's sympathy.  AlQaida is not a country, it's an  
> organization. Afghanistan is not a country either, come to think of  
> it.   War is declared by one country against another.  The war on  
> terror is no more likely to succeed than the war on drugs, another  
> sad farce.
>
> Joseph