While I agree that our culture has gotten too sensitive to "offending" people, I don't think targeting a specific group will solve the problem. Terrorists can come in all shapes and sizes, and as soon as what we have come to know as the "average" terrorist figures out that we're focusing on them more than anyone else, why wouldn't they start recruiting bombers, etc., who don't fit that profile?
I don't remember the specifics, but on a recent episode of The Today Show, someone from Homeland Security (?) was saying that they recently found a weapon in the teddy bear of a 3-year-old child. I agree with BigRed here, at least about the not targeting specific groups. Of course I find it preposterous to think that in our country we would bow to the terrorists so much that we would profile our own peaceful, law-abiding Muslim citizens just because they physically look a little like the people who are targeting us. I agree that, beyond this moral objection, it will be completely ineffective after a short time as terrorists just start planting weapons on other individuals, leading to even greater security risks. Not a good plan...
I disagree. It's time to start profiling a specific group (Middle Easterners) that have the reputation and the likelyhood of being a terrorist. While it may offend them, all I can say is "sorry, but in a post 9/11 world Americans can't really afford to take a chance with Abdullah Akmed Barak-Ibim and Tom Johnson as to who is the more likely suspect."
I would not call it 'bow[ing] to the terrorists' when the terrorists themselves begin intentionally targetting Jews and Americans on daily basis in Iraq.....
Furthermore, if we refrain from 'profiling' these terrorists, the terrorists will not engage in other activities such as 'just planting the weapon on others', these are animals that blow up children. Come on, let's all be somewhat realistic.
If I were a Muslim, and I truly denounced the barbaric methods employed by my fellow Muslims, I would gladly step forward to be searched. I know I am not a hypocrite, because liberals on a daily basis do not call me a christian, they call me a 'fundamentalist of the christian right.' I do not support bombing abortion clinics, but the burden is on my religion to state what we are diametrically opposed to.
Fact is, if Muslims in the US and Great Britain were not so indignant since 9/11, many of these 'profiles' would not be so prominent.
I agree with the logic of profiling terrorists; as nm262 said, it's not hard to guess which will be more likely to attack us when you have those two choices to pick from. But it's dangerous if we start thinking only people who fit that profile will ever attack us. If we put too many resources toward profiling only that group, we may drop the ball and overlook what the terrorists try to do to get around it. Let's not put all our eggs in one basket.
Publis...I believe your statement is the most correct statement I have ever heard.
I have nothing further to add.
Great job.
The essential point here is to act on the knowledge that we now hold. That knowledge is that every major terrorist activity in the last four years has originated from the same general group. I am not suggesting that we re-live WWII and categorically encamp all Muslims like we did the Japanese-Americans (Although, it is true that Japanese spies were held in that facility). Such a deprivation of the rights guaranteed by the Constitution would certainly not be allowed today. But, make no mistake, this is still a war on terror, and it has already been brought to our front door, although many have already forgotten.
We must focus on the nearest and most immediate threat at hand, which is the Islamofacists of the Middle East. To profile at this point is not only prudent, but necessary.
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