Ted,
Yes, and that threat is the right and the NY Post who are always trying to scare us. The same argument was made about communists. It was the basis for McCarthy's witch hunt. The players change but the story remains the same.
They where right on both counts, except, back in the McCarthy era, I think Post was liberal, and I imagine, they were apologists for communists.
The reason McCarthy times were not witch hunt is that there are no witches, but there were plenty of communists, working within the institutions of this country, working for Stalin. While McCarthy's tactics might have gone overboard, the basis of his argument was solid.
On the enemy within, they are right on target, and profiling is the way to go. If the enemy were Slovak immigrants, it would be the right thing for FBI to target them, and I would be the first to sign up and provide information to the FBI.
The point of profiling is that if there is a serious crime, and you know the "profile" of the perpetrator, say a radical muslim, or Russian mafia, you instantly narrow down your search from 260 million to say 2 millions (of muslims or Russian) and the further qualifier (radical, mafia) may narrow it to few hundred or thousand. This means that when one of these groups does something, you are not wasting time interviewing British nannies, you go right to the source.
The only reason this is controversial (while it is supremely logical) is because the Liberal dogma created some untouchable classes. Any negative information about the untouchable classes is censored.
Joe |
