Chuck, short answer to your question is americans.
Frank
-----Original Message-----
From: blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
[mailto:blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Charles Krugman
Sent: Sunday, June 19, 2016 12:06 AM
To: blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [blind-democracy] Re: The FBI Was Right Not to Arrest Omar Mateen
Before the Shooting
this is very valid and who or what group would be the next targets if due
process was decreased and police powers were increased?
Chuck
-----Original Message-----
From: Miriam Vieni
Sent: Saturday, June 18, 2016 6:19 PM
To: blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [blind-democracy] The FBI Was Right Not to Arrest Omar Mateen Before
the Shooting
Greenwald writes: "The massacre at an Orlando LGBT club has predictably
provoked the same reaction as past terror attacks: recriminations that
authorities should have done more to stop it in advance, accompanied by demands
for new police powers to prevent future ones."
Glenn Greenwald. (photo: Reuters)
The FBI Was Right Not to Arrest Omar Mateen Before the Shooting By Glenn
Greenwald, The Washington Post
18 June 16
The massacre at an Orlando LGBT club has predictably provoked the same reaction
as past terror attacks: recriminations that authorities should have done more
to stop it in advance, accompanied by demands for new police powers to prevent
future ones. Blame-assigners immediately pointed to the FBI's investigation of
the Orlando shooter, Omar Mateen. "The FBI closed this file because the Obama
administration treats radical Islamic threats as common crimes," GOP Sen.
Lindsey O. Graham argued on Fox News. "If we kept the file open and we saw what
he was up to, I think we could have stopped it." Others cited core fundamental
rights, demanding they be eroded. "Due process is what's killing us right now,"
proclaimed Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin about the FBI's inability to act more
aggressively against Mateen.
Ever since the Sept. 11 attack almost 15 years ago, every act of perceived
terror, and even thwarted ones, have triggered identical responses. The Boston
Marathon attack, for instance, prompted this critique of the bureau, which had
looked into the older brother: "Many people thought the FBI should have
continued to investigate [Tamerlan] Tsarnaev until the Boston plot was
uncovered," David Gomez recalled this week in Foreign Policy. About Orlando, he
wrote: "As more terrorists become successful in hiding from the FBI in plain
sight using encryption and other means, perhaps it is time to revisit the
probable-cause standard to open investigations in potential terrorism cases."
Underlying this mind-set is an assumption that is both dubious and
dangerous: that absolute security is desirable and attainable. None say that
explicitly, but it's the necessary implication of the argument. Once this
framework is implicitly adopted, a successful attack becomes proof that
something went wrong, law enforcement failed to act properly and more
government authorities are needed. To wit: Hillary Clinton this week proposed
an "intelligence surge" to halt "plots before they can be carried out." And
Donald Trump called for more intelligence activity to give "law enforcement and
the military the tools they need to prevent terrorist attacks."
This is wrong, and based on what we know, the FBI acted properly. Agents have
the power they need, and they were right to close the case on Mateen.
Just because someone successfully carried out a violent mass attack does not
prove that police powers were inadequate or that existing powers were
misapplied. No minimally free society can prevent all violence. In the United
States, we do not hold suspects for crimes they have not committed.
It is possible, indeed probable, that violent attacks will occur even with
superb law enforcement. This is the tradeoff we make for liberty.
The complaint that the FBI, once it had Mateen under suspicion, should have
acted more aggressively to stop him illustrates a kind of pathology. By all
accounts, Mateen had committed no crime (though his ex-wife later said he had
battered her). At the time the FBI decided to close its file on him, he had not
joined any terrorist organization, nor attended a terror training camp, nor
communicated with terror operatives about any plots. Although he boasted to
office colleagues about ties to al Qaeda and Hezbollah, agents found those
claims dubious. There is not, as far as we know, even evidence that he had
expressed support for violence.
When the FBI has reason to suspect someone of extremist activity, they open an
investigative file and gather whatever information they can. But once they
conclude that there is no evidence of criminality, they close the file.
That's how it should be: none of us should want permanent inquiries into
citizens without evidence of lawbreaking, and we should certainly not want
punishments meted out based on unproven suspicions. The FBI followed these
principles in closing its file on Mateen, and it deserves praise for that, not
armchair criticism. "As I would hope the American people would want, we don't
keep people under investigation indefinitely," FBI Director James Comey said.
If agents "don't see predication for continuing it, then we close it."
What plausible theory exists for empowering the government to restrict the
actions, rights or liberty of a citizen who has broken no laws? For obvious
reasons, the temptation to vest more power in law enforcement agencies is
potent after witnessing carnage like what we've seen this week in Orlando.
Our compassion and instinct tells us: isn't it worth any cost to prevent such a
massacre in the future?
But history leaves no doubt about the serious costs, and dangers, from straying
too far on the liberty-security axis. Encouraging law enforcement agencies to
take action against citizens who are not even charged with, let alone convicted
of, breaking the law is inherently abusive, and certain to lead to its own
serious injuries.
Those dangers are vividly seen by examining the long list of American Muslims
who have arrived at an airport expecting to travel, only to be told that they
have been secretly deemed by unidentified officials as too suspicious to board
an airplane, and have no effective recourse to challenge or even learn the
basis for this restriction. That Democrats, who once found such
due-process-free no-fly lists appalling, now seek in the wake of San Bernardino
and Orlando to expand their use to ban gun purchases illustrates how easily
terror attacks induce an abandonment of reasoned analysis.
We collectively understand tradeoffs in many other contexts. Outside of disease
and suicide, the most common cause of death for Americans is fatal car
accidents. Roughly 36,000 people died from car-related deaths in 2015 (gun
deaths are a close second). There are numerous measures that could be taken to
reduce car accidents: lowering speed limits, bolstering safety regulations for
automakers, putting stop signs and lights on every corner.
But our reflexive response to reading about an auto fatality is not to demand
implementation of these measures.
That's because we rationally assess that this fatality level - tragic and
horrifying as it is - is the worthwhile cost paid in exchange for the benefits
of efficient auto travel and affordable cars. We understand that absolute
safety on the road is neither attainable nor desirable - and that we can
minimize, but cannot fully avoid, the risk of injury or death if we want to use
automobiles efficiently. We accept that some deaths are inevitable.
Yet Americans have eschewed that reasoning process in the face of terrorism and
mass attacks. Each attack has been cited as intrinsic proof of policy failures,
of the need for greater powers and more aggressive policing. We insist on
endlessly trading liberties for false security, eagerly doing so with each new
attack.
That mind-set does far more harm than good. In the wake of Sept. 11, it ushered
in the Patriot Act, mass surveillance, torture and two decade-long wars. It led
to the official dilution of Miranda rights for terrorism suspects after Omar
Abdulmutallab attempted to blow up a plane over Detroit in 2010 with a bomb in
his underwear. And it led Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump to advocate new and
aggressive responses to Orlando: from an escalation of the bombing campaign
against various ISIS locales to increased surveillance activities.
Terror attacks, by design, succeed in terrorizing. If you are a resident of any
western country, it is more likely that you will die from a lightning strike
than from a terrorist attack perpetrated by a Muslim. Writing in The New Yorker
in early this year, the physicist Lawrence Krauss noted that "even if you
include 9/11, the total death toll from terrorism amounts to less than one per
cent of the death toll from gun violence."
Hypothetically, there may one day be a threat severe enough to justify
rebalancing security and liberty. But terrorism, by every metric, comes nowhere
close. It is obviously unfortunate that nobody was able to stop Mateen, but
that does not mean the FBI could or should have.
Error! Hyperlink reference not valid. Error! Hyperlink reference not valid.
Glenn Greenwald. (photo: Reuters)
https://www.washingtonpost.com/posteverything/wp/2016/06/17/the-fbi-was-righ
t-not-to-arrest-omar-mateen-before-the-shooting/https://www.washingtonpost.c
om/posteverything/wp/2016/06/17/the-fbi-was-right-not-to-arrest-omar-mateen-
before-the-shooting/
The FBI Was Right Not to Arrest Omar Mateen Before the Shooting By Glenn
Greenwald, The Washington Post
18 June 16
he massacre at an Orlando LGBT club has predictably provoked the same reaction
as past terror attacks: recriminations that authorities should have done more
to stop it in advance, accompanied by demands for new police powers to prevent
future ones. Blame-assigners immediately pointed to the FBI's investigation of
the Orlando shooter, Omar Mateen. "The FBI closed this file because the Obama
administration treats radical Islamic threats as common crimes," GOP Sen.
Lindsey O. Graham argued on Fox News. "If we kept the file open and we saw what
he was up to, I think we could have stopped it." Others cited core fundamental
rights, demanding they be eroded. "Due process is what's killing us right now,"
proclaimed Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin about the FBI's inability to act more
aggressively against Mateen.
Ever since the Sept. 11 attack almost 15 years ago, every act of perceived
terror, and even thwarted ones, have triggered identical responses. The Boston
Marathon attack, for instance, prompted this critique of the bureau, which had
looked into the older brother: "Many people thought the FBI should have
continued to investigate [Tamerlan] Tsarnaev until the Boston plot was
uncovered," David Gomez recalled this week in Foreign Policy. About Orlando, he
wrote: "As more terrorists become successful in hiding from the FBI in plain
sight using encryption and other means, perhaps it is time to revisit the
probable-cause standard to open investigations in potential terrorism cases."
Underlying this mind-set is an assumption that is both dubious and
dangerous: that absolute security is desirable and attainable. None say that
explicitly, but it's the necessary implication of the argument. Once this
framework is implicitly adopted, a successful attack becomes proof that
something went wrong, law enforcement failed to act properly and more
government authorities are needed. To wit: Hillary Clinton this week proposed
an "intelligence surge" to halt "plots before they can be carried out." And
Donald Trump called for more intelligence activity to give "law enforcement and
the military the tools they need to prevent terrorist attacks."
This is wrong, and based on what we know, the FBI acted properly. Agents have
the power they need, and they were right to close the case on Mateen.
Just because someone successfully carried out a violent mass attack does not
prove that police powers were inadequate or that existing powers were
misapplied. No minimally free society can prevent all violence. In the United
States, we do not hold suspects for crimes they have not committed.
It is possible, indeed probable, that violent attacks will occur even with
superb law enforcement. This is the tradeoff we make for liberty.
The complaint that the FBI, once it had Mateen under suspicion, should have
acted more aggressively to stop him illustrates a kind of pathology. By all
accounts, Mateen had committed no crime (though his ex-wife later said he had
battered her). At the time the FBI decided to close its file on him, he had not
joined any terrorist organization, nor attended a terror training camp, nor
communicated with terror operatives about any plots. Although he boasted to
office colleagues about ties to al Qaeda and Hezbollah, agents found those
claims dubious. There is not, as far as we know, even evidence that he had
expressed support for violence.
When the FBI has reason to suspect someone of extremist activity, they open an
investigative file and gather whatever information they can. But once they
conclude that there is no evidence of criminality, they close the file.
That's how it should be: none of us should want permanent inquiries into
citizens without evidence of lawbreaking, and we should certainly not want
punishments meted out based on unproven suspicions. The FBI followed these
principles in closing its file on Mateen, and it deserves praise for that, not
armchair criticism. "As I would hope the American people would want, we don't
keep people under investigation indefinitely," FBI Director James Comey said.
If agents "don't see predication for continuing it, then we close it."
What plausible theory exists for empowering the government to restrict the
actions, rights or liberty of a citizen who has broken no laws? For obvious
reasons, the temptation to vest more power in law enforcement agencies is
potent after witnessing carnage like what we've seen this week in Orlando.
Our compassion and instinct tells us: isn't it worth any cost to prevent such a
massacre in the future?
But history leaves no doubt about the serious costs, and dangers, from straying
too far on the liberty-security axis. Encouraging law enforcement agencies to
take action against citizens who are not even charged with, let alone convicted
of, breaking the law is inherently abusive, and certain to lead to its own
serious injuries.
Those dangers are vividly seen by examining the long list of American Muslims
who have arrived at an airport expecting to travel, only to be told that they
have been secretly deemed by unidentified officials as too suspicious to board
an airplane, and have no effective recourse to challenge or even learn the
basis for this restriction. That Democrats, who once found such
due-process-free no-fly lists appalling, now seek in the wake of San Bernardino
and Orlando to expand their use to ban gun purchases illustrates how easily
terror attacks induce an abandonment of reasoned analysis.
We collectively understand tradeoffs in many other contexts. Outside of disease
and suicide, the most common cause of death for Americans is fatal car
accidents. Roughly 36,000 people died from car-related deaths in 2015 (gun
deaths are a close second). There are numerous measures that could be taken to
reduce car accidents: lowering speed limits, bolstering safety regulations for
automakers, putting stop signs and lights on every corner.
But our reflexive response to reading about an auto fatality is not to demand
implementation of these measures.
That's because we rationally assess that this fatality level - tragic and
horrifying as it is - is the worthwhile cost paid in exchange for the benefits
of efficient auto travel and affordable cars. We understand that absolute
safety on the road is neither attainable nor desirable - and that we can
minimize, but cannot fully avoid, the risk of injury or death if we want to use
automobiles efficiently. We accept that some deaths are inevitable.
Yet Americans have eschewed that reasoning process in the face of terrorism and
mass attacks. Each attack has been cited as intrinsic proof of policy failures,
of the need for greater powers and more aggressive policing. We insist on
endlessly trading liberties for false security, eagerly doing so with each new
attack.
That mind-set does far more harm than good. In the wake of Sept. 11, it ushered
in the Patriot Act, mass surveillance, torture and two decade-long wars. It led
to the official dilution of Miranda rights for terrorism suspects after Omar
Abdulmutallab attempted to blow up a plane over Detroit in 2010 with a bomb in
his underwear. And it led Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump to advocate new and
aggressive responses to Orlando: from an escalation of the bombing campaign
against various ISIS locales to increased surveillance activities.
Terror attacks, by design, succeed in terrorizing. If you are a resident of any
western country, it is more likely that you will die from a lightning strike
than from a terrorist attack perpetrated by a Muslim. Writing in The New Yorker
in early this year, the physicist Lawrence Krauss noted that "even if you
include 9/11, the total death toll from terrorism amounts to less than one per
cent of the death toll from gun violence."
Hypothetically, there may one day be a threat severe enough to justify
rebalancing security and liberty. But terrorism, by every metric, comes nowhere
close. It is obviously unfortunate that nobody was able to stop Mateen, but
that does not mean the FBI could or should have.
http://e-max.it/posizionamento-siti-web/socialize
http://e-max.it/posizionamento-siti-web/socialize
