I've seen several stories today about a subject that seems to always come up after tragic, seemingly terrorist related incidents whether successful or foiled - the subject being "what price are we as a people willing to pay for feeling safer?", in other words the idea that after every one of these incidents many individuals, both politicians and everyday citizens, start suggesting things that seem to strip away civil liberties all in the name of protecting us in this 'war on terror" we now seem to find ourselves in as a permanent condition.
It's one of those odd ball subjects where people seem to voice opinions and feelings on the subject that may be completely counter to other opinions they hold. An example would be the schism that seems to happen with extreme conservatives who generally rile against government involvement in their lives being the first to call for enemy combatant status for a US citizen arrested within our boarders, or immediately questioning why the FBI did not keep a the older brother in this case under constant watch after he was brought to their attention back in 2011 - at that time they did a preliminary investigation and interviews and found him to not be a threat. This last one always seems like one of those hindsight is 20/20 and it's easy to criticize after the fact.
I was skimming through channels this morning and watched an interview with Rep. Peter King (NY) on The Daily Rundown with Chuck Todd in which he said that radical beliefs (he specifically mentions radical Islam) should be enough to cause heightened monitoring, a point that the host follows up with what I see as a reasonable question - that being, are we talking about having radical beliefs or views (ANY radical beliefs or views) being enough to treat a US citizen as a threat and the subsequent result being possible constant monitoring and treatment as an "enemy combatant"? Mind you, this is my interpretation of what I thought the host was getting at.
You can see the video here:
http://tv.msnbc.com/2013/04/22/gop-...-should-not-be-given-the-option-to-cooperate/
I suspect if that were indeed the case, we would have far to many people to keep constant eyes on as we have people with radical beliefs of all sorts all over this country - both on the extreme right and the extreme left, we have Christians that could be considered to have radical views, we have people with radical views on animal testing, on Wall Street reform, you name almost any subject and we have people with radical views. does that mean they are going to act on those radical views and commit an act of violence? I suspect in the vast majority of cases the answer is no. This is the point I call the schism of the "keep government out of my life" types suddenly endorsing the "police state" they supposedly fear (not all mind you, but a good number from my observations).
So back to the original question "what price are we as a people willing to pay for feeling safer?"
I'm interested in seeing how others feel about both the overall question as well as the more specific question Chuck Todd had for representative King (as I understand what he was getting at). What are you willing to live with to feel safer? Do your opinions on our response to the "war on terror" seem counter to other beliefs you hold? Do you find yourself conflicted in cases like this?
Just wondering.
