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Politics : Sharks in the Septic Tank -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Constant Reader who wrote (27782)	9/16/2001 8:52:14 PM
From: Dayuhan	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 82486

it is impossible to use that method for two reasons: a long-standing executive order prohibiting assassination, and an Act of Congress prohibiting the United States doing business with any unsavory characters who are now or ever were terrorists, violators of human rights, or purveyors of illicit drugs. These restraints haven't bothered us in the past, why should they bother us now? What makes you think the assassins would have anything to do with the US government? Of course they would not. They would be ordinary hired killers, hired by private individuals, quite unknown ones who would be unidentifiable and far away by the time the killing took place. No official involvement at all. I assume that you know what "deniability" is. It is a hard concept to invoke when high-profile leaders are involved, but if you are tracking individuals working under deep cover, living apparently ordinary lives, it can work very well. Our officials will not take this course, though, because they don't want to do something deniable. They want to do something dramatic and obvious, something that will be splashed across front pages all over the world, something that calls for noble speeches peppered with words like "courage", "resolve", "triumph". They care less about whether it works than about whether it looks good. That is natural. They are politicians; that is how their mids work. This is not a partisan observation; it applies to Democrats and Republicans equally. A strategy that has no more visible result than a brief bump in the number of inexplicable homicides around the world would be most unsatisfactory to politicians, even if it was followed by a miraculous reduction in terrorist incidents. They would not be able to claim credit, and that would be unacceptable.