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Toni
Happy Holi-daze all!
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Mjr40, your points on exaggerated fears is a good call. I don't know how much is simply irrational fears and knee jerk reactions, and how much is fanning of public fears to increase power. I think that would make the difference between being cult-like or simply reactionary and going into a panicky fight or flight mode.
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Mjr40
- Unreasonable fear about the outside world, such as impending catastrophe, evil conspiracies and persecutions: ie: al Qaeda. This group is used to keep people in a constant state of fear, to remind people why the Administration needs more power and has a need to launch foreign wars.
I think a lot of the fear is because we've grown up on things like James Bond where super-sophisticated, highly financed, technological rogue enemies lurk. The fact of the matter is these guys hijacked planes with box cutters. These guys were flagged not to be allowed on plans, yet incompetence allowed them on. (No need for Patriot Acts, and stripping of civil liberties -- people just need to be fired and ones put in that can do their jobs.)
Bin Laden is not a James Bond villain as we're lead to believe. Yes he has/had some decent cash, and pretty much the best he could do with it was to give some guys flying lessons. The plan seemed impressive simply due to airport employee incompetence, and irresponsibility on the part of airplane staff handing over an airplane because they were threatened with a box cutter! I mean, c'mon. Yes, you may get some nasty cuts which will need stitches after you wrestle the guy down. But it's complete cowardice and incompetence to hand over the controls of your plane to someone threatening you with a pair of needle-nose pliers.