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Patriot Act author warns EU against dragnet response to terror

politico.eu

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Re: Patriot Act author warns EU against dragnet response to terror

#61

Post by ameen »

mahouse wrote: post #57
ameen wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or Indifference? IS never really threatened U.S. or Western interests, the Paris attacks were the first time they reached so far. They (along with the Syrian regime) have been butchering Syrians by the thousands. Btw, the Daesh captive was Nicolas Henin, and he's actively campaigning against airstrikes [1] as that's exactly playing into their sick plans. And he speaks that they're deluded enough to think they'll find…

Do literally all Muslims despise the IS? After thousands of Turkish football fans starting chanting "allahu akbar" during the minute of silence for the Paris attacks, I would not agree. Who are the Muslims that support the IS?

A common misconception, further distorted by the Media.

http://www.101greatgoals.com/blog/an-explanation-for-why-tur...

TL;DR: Cultural difference. In Turkey, the "moment of silence" is used to chant for those who died in the attacks. They were not saying "Allahu Akbar", they were saying “Şehitler ölmez, vatan bölünmez”.

Translation: “Martyrs, they do not die (they are immortal), homeland (land, our land) is indivisible." Those who die in the attacks are considered martyrs, not those responsible. "Homeland" in this instance would be considered France.

Coming to your final point, every Muslim I know whether they practice or not hates terrorists. Earlier (those in rural regions) they had been fed propaganda that these were freedom fighters who had been discredited as terrorists since they were seen as fighting western aggression and invaders. Once they were shown instances of Marines/U.S. Army helping out/rescuing civilians in war-torn countries their entire perception is overturned, first it's disbelief that they would help the civilians, and later they understand that they're just humans looking for a better world as well and had only been doing their duty, and that countries & civilians pay the price for their leaders' arrogance & sins.

Re: Patriot Act author warns EU against dragnet response to terror

#62

Post by mseebach »

mkaziz wrote: post #47
DougWebb wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There was an article posted here a few weeks ago, written by a man who was held captive by ISIS for a long time. He said that he learned their ultimate goal has nothing to do with our culture or freedom. They believe armageddon is coming, that it is literaly going to be a big battle in a particular town in Syria near the Turkish border, and that the West is the enemy (descendants of the Roman empire) that their Mosle…

I didn't read the article, but my gut instinct would be that the people this man was held captive by were foot soldiers. They are frequently illiterate people who are fed such "prophecies" as truth. I do contend with your statement about ISIS continuing to exist because of western compassion. If the West had the means to destroy them (without harming millions of innocent civilians), the compassionate thing to do woul…

> If the West had the means to destroy them (without harming millions of innocent civilians), the compassionate thing to do would be to do it ASAP.

That exactly what the west thought they could do in Afghanistan and Iraq, and it turned out that it is a lot more complex than, well, a lot of smart people expected.

That said, were western militaries not still smarting from those wars, there would probably have been boots on the ground a long time ago, in the hope of some sort of Balkan-war outcome.

Re: Patriot Act author warns EU against dragnet response to terror

#63

Post by dragonwriter »

DougWebb wrote: post #37
mkaziz wrote: post #9

In my mind, the erosion of privacy and freedom - some of the most vaunted principles of the West - is the ultimate triumph of terrorist organizations like ISIS and Al-Qaeda. They can't beat us by strength of arms, so instead they're stunting our culture.

There was an article posted here a few weeks ago, written by a man who was held captive by ISIS for a long time. He said that he learned their ultimate goal has nothing to do with our culture or freedom. They believe armageddon is coming, that it is literaly going to be a big battle in a particular town in Syria near the Turkish border, and that the West is the enemy (descendants of the Roman empire) that their Mosle…

> He said that he learned their ultimate goal has nothing to do with our culture or freedom. They believe armageddon is coming, that it is literaly going to be a big battle in a particular town in Syria near the Turkish border, and that the West is the enemy (descendants of the Roman empire) that their Moslem army must defeat.

While I don't doubt that that is what was revealed to him while he was captive, I will note that there are three potentially very different things that that could be, that can be very hard to distinguish:

1) The actual goals of the Daesh leadership,

2) The propaganda the Daesh leadership uses to motivate its foot soldiers,

3) Deliberate fabrications presented by captors to captives for propaganda, misinformation, or other purposes.

Re: Patriot Act author warns EU against dragnet response to terror

#64

Post by fragsworth »

sandworm101 wrote: post #55
mkaziz wrote: post #9

In my mind, the erosion of privacy and freedom - some of the most vaunted principles of the West - is the ultimate triumph of terrorist organizations like ISIS and Al-Qaeda. They can't beat us by strength of arms, so instead they're stunting our culture.

ISIS and AlQaeda aren't the ones taking freedom from the west. Similar organizations have existed for hundreds of years without such impact. If it wasn't ISIS it would be something else. The source of erosion is internal. So too is the blame.

Good luck trying to fix the source of the problem when information spreads as quickly as it does today. Any attempt to put terrorist attacks in perspective, or to calm people's reactions, is met with knee-jerk "How dare you" responses.

Re: Patriot Act author warns EU against dragnet response to terror

#65

Post by cm2187 »

mkaziz wrote: post #9

In my mind, the erosion of privacy and freedom - some of the most vaunted principles of the West - is the ultimate triumph of terrorist organizations like ISIS and Al-Qaeda. They can't beat us by strength of arms, so instead they're stunting our culture.

And they are achieving what the USSR failed to achieve with far less means.

Re: Patriot Act author warns EU against dragnet response to terror

#66

Post by maxerickson »

jacquesm wrote: post #54
acqq wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Which points to a wider issue, sure he was suspicious, but then what? That's exactly the question to which Europe also searches for the answer now. One of the reasons everybody bends over backwards to avoid saying anything against the religions in different countries is: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blasphemy_law "In some European countries is the crime of "religious insult", which is a subset of the crime of blas…

I'm quite ashamed to see NL on that list. Really, we should know better than this. But then again, we're also still a monarchy so we have a bit of a history of believing fairy tales.

The date of the most recent prosecution would be a little bit more telling about the cultural atmosphere than just having the law on the books.

For example, only recently did my state repeal some stupid laws, removing them from the state code:

http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2015/08/20/it-s-almost...

Still, it was big news 15 years ago when someone was prosecuted under the swearing law, and the courts eventually tossed the law:

http://lubbockonline.com/stories/040102/upd_075-8555.shtml

I label that unsurprising inertia more than I label it embarrassing.

Re: Patriot Act author warns EU against dragnet response to terror

#67

Post by RobertoG »

sandworm101 wrote: post #55
mkaziz wrote: post #9

In my mind, the erosion of privacy and freedom - some of the most vaunted principles of the West - is the ultimate triumph of terrorist organizations like ISIS and Al-Qaeda. They can't beat us by strength of arms, so instead they're stunting our culture.

ISIS and AlQaeda aren't the ones taking freedom from the west. Similar organizations have existed for hundreds of years without such impact. If it wasn't ISIS it would be something else. The source of erosion is internal. So too is the blame.

"Similar organizations have existed for hundreds of years"

So have done the internal source of erosion, is just they now have the technological capacities. In absence of a strong social movement against, this doesn't look well for the future.

Re: Patriot Act author warns EU against dragnet response to terror

#68

Post by dceddia »

From the article: "In France, the current state of emergency, which lawmakers quickly agreed to extend for three months, allows authorities to raid homes without warrants. The country’s interior minister said Wednesday that since November 13, French authorities have conducted 2,235 searches and arrested 263 people."

Re: Patriot Act author warns EU against dragnet response to terror

#69

Post by sandworm101 »

fragsworth wrote: post #64
sandworm101 wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

ISIS and AlQaeda aren't the ones taking freedom from the west. Similar organizations have existed for hundreds of years without such impact. If it wasn't ISIS it would be something else. The source of erosion is internal. So too is the blame.

Good luck trying to fix the source of the problem when information spreads as quickly as it does today. Any attempt to put terrorist attacks in perspective, or to calm people's reactions, is met with knee-jerk "How dare you" responses.

That's why we have so many mechanisms to slow official reactions. We know that, as humans, we are prone to rash decisions in the face of crisis. Even the patriot act contains a sunset provision, an internal recognition that it was likely a knee-jerk reaction to fear. But the renewal of that provision is not a rash decision, nor is it taken by ISIS. The decision to keep the Patriot Act alive year after year is a cold political calculation divorced from any immediate crisis.

Re: Patriot Act author warns EU against dragnet response to terror

#70

Post by beccasanchez »

ianopolous wrote: post #50
kvncombo wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Erosion of privacy and freedom is inevitable. Mass human breeding on earth puts so much pressure on all aspects of our existence. I believe this will necessarily lead to reduced freedom as mere survival becomes more important. Small groups of people or even individuals have so much power and can inflict terrifying damage. How else do you solve such a problem? At the end of the day, people will demand the problem is s…

Raising the lowest education level and the lowest happiness level would go a long way. i.e. a society that genuinely looks after and educates everyone. Easier said than done though.

But so many of the terrorists were well educated. They don't suffer lack of money or education, they suffer from a lack of meaning in their lives.
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