Will you prefer to forgo some rights and have good security or have all your rights and live in fear, for example, fear of terorism An armed American is a free American. This cannot be the best answer, because the question is not about America. America is not the only nation facing terrorist treats. Report It
Freedom, because security is never 100% effective anyway... freedom False duality. There is no security without freedom. The state's first loyalty is to its own power and prerogative. Rights abandoned are not easily restored. It took World War II and Stalinist totalitarianism, and the liberal 1960s [and never mind that hated word "liberal"] to assure civil and human rights in the West and Japan. The erosion of such rights under guise of fighting a "war on terrorism" may be irreversible in our time.
A "war"? Like the "war on crime", the "war on drugs". Or a "war on sin". It's really against their own citizens. Terrorists are criminals, not representatives of a State. Usually.
(Hezbollah and Hamas are special cases: Hezbollah is part of the Lebanese government; Hamas part of the Palestinian one, and Palestine while not a recognized State is a political entity.)
The fact is that no act of terror can do more than INSULT the United States, and (likely) cause it psychological harm through intimidation and fear. But the USA is so huge, so populous, its military and political control so redundant -- compare MAD (mutually assured destruction) during the Cold War: no terrorist force could come near) -- that the abolition of Constitutional rights is absurd.
Star chamber-type trials, waterboarding and other tortures, can esily spread from being used only on people with beards and beanies and robes to being used on people in suits and ties.
Already on Y! Answers you see "Democrat" being equated to "traitor". "We want a one-party state!" "We want George W. Bush as our President For Life!"
Such "spontaneous" demands to abolish parts of the Constitution are not so far fetched as one might hope. Already there are few checks and balances with the Republican Right controlling all three branches of government, and the Republican Right controlled by those who would favor a theocracy. A theocracy obsessed with the End Times and The Rapture.
I couild say, "What do I care, I live in Europe". But there's more: that theocracy is really false: it's a power and money grab by a clique of insiders who scorn their own supporters. The depletion of the Treasury -- of the Clinton surplus -- the indebtedness of future generations to the Chinese (the new federal debt) to support a war that was supposed to be paid for by Iraqi oil (so that the Bush and Cheney oil interests could profit) is beyond belief. The dollar -- a world reserve currency -- must depreciate. US assets will be sold off cheaply to foreigners -- e.g., the Chinese; and the Arabs.
The implications are sobering.
And you will not be free. And you will not be secure. And, your attention diverted from What Really Matters, tin-pot dictators and religious zealots worldwide will be free to terrorize their own people. Think Sudan. And their neighbors. Think North Korea, Iran. If you are a follower of Christ, this is isnt even an issue. I'll take the fear thank you. freedom.
security is redundant.
If life turns to hell it will turn you or it will be redundant.
Why Fear if you know god. the very question is predicated on the notion that you have a leader who can actually fulfill either. are we any safer?...are we less free? freedom from fear, and hey, it is one of my rights i dont want to forgo :) With increasing population and technology, people have been losing rights for a couple hundred years, but also gaining new freedoms.
If you are talking about governmental wire-tapping, I have nothing to hide and am in favor of it. If you are talking about random searches without probable cause, I am not against that, either.
We will all eventually have to forego some of our rights in order to keep our freedom.
In some countries, the Nazi party and Communist parties have been made illegal. Not a bad idea either, in my book. In America, we have both. The choice to live here provides them. I will take the ham on rye there is nothing to choose. yours free mind means all security you need. jusOne
P.s.
Be without fear! Security.
If you cannot enjoy freedom due to lack of security..living in fear and despair, then freedom seems incoincedental compared to a "secure " state of mind. look at the situation in iraq. people are fleeing their "free" country for iran and other neighboring countries which have theocratic facist govenments. but at least in these countries theres a shred of security. Freedom all the way!
Freedom comes with responsibility...and that goes for: not sticking a piping hot cup of coffee between your legs, taking time to discipline and actually pay attention to your children, and it means not blaming everyone else for your own goddamned problems!
Freedom means that everyone is watchful, and if they can't beat down a suspected bomber on their own, they should call someone who can.
Freedom means that people are at liberty to worship as they choose and express their beliefs, so long as they don't infringe on someone else's Life, Liberty, and Pursuit of Happiness.
Freedom means being able to speak your mind, and not worry about being "Politically Correct."
I don't believe we should be afraid of terrorism. We should be watchful, but not living in fear. If we keep running to the federal government everytime we are afraid or have a problem, they're just going to legislate all of our rights away. Be mindful of that. depends what freedom meens to you. If you choose 'freedom' you are not free from terror, death, and violence. If the government wants to listen to phone conversations, to make sure another 9/11 doesn't happen, or a Columbine, I see nothing wrong with it....does it infringe apon my freedom...in a way it does, but like the other person said, I don't have anything to hide, so let em' listen to how my grandaughter learned how to go potty, and move on to more important things... Give me Liberty or give me Death!
BTW
Do you know why the conflict in IRAQ is called OIF or Operation Iraqi Freedom?
Because if they called it Operation Iraqi Liberation they would have to admit it was only about OIL.
Like the old man said
Just call me by my initials! Oh Freedom- hands down. Security is a myth. In fact, the only REAL security- is believing in ourselves. If you have to wall yourself IN to feel "secure" then you might as well be living in jail. Freedom is taking charge of your choices- & not letting any thing, or any ONE, stare you down. There's no way we'll ever be completely free of the stupidity of terrorism- any more than we'll ever be free of stupid people. But what we CAN do- is stand up for what we believe in- and give the terrorists alittle something to think about while they're planning their next "move" . -Maybe they'll think better of it... -for awhile... The key words here are "some rights". Guess has always been true, even before the new wave of terrorism?
You never have "all your rights" your rights are what have already been decided in the past, and will change into the future. The real trick is to know what rights you can't live without. Freedom.
Only freedom will allow you to even make that choice. Freedom in a civilized country comes with some restrictions, disciplines, and maybe covert operations like eavesdropping on some occasions. This is exactly the freedom that you are enjoying: it is not an absolute freedom. Freedom in jungle is all out but it is a world of Kill or Be Killed. Come to think of it, is civilized world coming close to the laws of the jungle? Pre-emptive strikes, counter-intelligence, espionage, etc..... The trade-off between freedom and security, so often proposed so seductively, very often leads to the loss of both. -- Christopher Hitchens
Nations grown corrupt love bondage more than liberty; Bondage with ease than strenuous liberty.
~John Milton
The people never give up their liberties but under some delusion. ~Edmund Burke
I believe there are more instances of the abridgment of the freedom of the people by gradual and silent encroachments of those in power than by violent and sudden usurpations. ~James Madison, speech, Virginia Convention, 1788
The contest for ages has been to rescue liberty from the grasp of executive power. ~Daniel Webster
What county can preserve its liberties, if its rulers are not warned from time to time that its people preserve the spirit of resistance. Thomas Jefferson
If your most basic right is the right to life, then it seems obvious to me that you have the right to defend your life. Guns are, in this century, the most effective means of doing so - so effective that every genocide has only been carried out against victims who were disarmed by their governments." -- William G. Hartwell
I think it was H. L. Mencken who once said that in America they go after the S.O.B.'s first. And nobody cares about them. They establish bad precedents on them, and then they go after the rest of us." -- Allan Dershowitz
They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety. ~Benjamin Franklin, Historical Review of Pennsylvania, 1759
Liberty has never come from the government. Liberty has always come from the subjects of it. The history of liberty is a history of resistance. ~Woodrow Wilson
I freed a thousand slaves. I could have freed a thousand more if only they knew they were slaves. -- Harriet Tubman
Free government is founded in jealousy, not confidence. It is jealousy and not confidence which prescribes limited constitutions, to bind those we are obliged to trust with power.... In questions of power, then, let no more be heard of confidence in men, but bind him down from mischief by the chains of the Constitution. -- Thomas Jefferson, 1799
It is proper to take alarm at the first experiment on our liberties. We hold this prudent jealousy to be the first duty of citizens and one of the noblest characteristics of the late Revolution. The freemen of America did not wait till usurped power had strengthened itself by exercise and entangled the question in precedents. They saw all the consequences in the principle, and they avoided the consequences by denying the principle. We revere this lesson too much to forget it.
James Madison
If ye love wealth greater than liberty, the tranquility of servitude greater than the animating contest for freedom, go home from us in peace. We seek not your counsel, nor your arms. Crouch down and lick the hand that feeds you; and may posterity forget that ye were our countrymen." -- Samuel Adams
The most effectual engines for [pacifying a nation] are the public papers... [A despotic] government always [keeps] a kind of standing army of newswriters who, without any regard to truth or to what should be like truth, [invent] and put into the papers whatever might serve the ministers. Thomas Jefferson Freedom. I would gladly give up my voting privledges to stop the war on terror, the war on meth and beat the crooked system....but thats just me.... I choose not to live in fear. It's a lame way to live. And of course I would choose to be protected. But who is going to protect us from the Bush administration? I am more afraid of the damage that they are doing to the people of the world including Americans, than I am afraid of terrorist attacks... Freedom. Security without freedom would be short-lived.
Tyrants are the biggest threat to my security and freedom, they are the true terrorists.
Sincerely, Zach Doty
www.FightingForLiberty.org freedom as I have my own security The Constitutional Matters Project wrote a great article titled 鈥淔reedom vs. Security鈥?(http://constitutionalmatters.com/thevoic... that clearly articulates this dilemma. Read it and tell me you don鈥檛 agree鈥?
Thanks! | 