Re: The Cyber war on Iran

[Valdis.Kletnieks () vt edu]

On Wed, 04 Apr 2007 21:38:40 CDT, Paul Schmehl said:
> You seem to be living under the delusion that your actions can somehow
> influence the extremists.  There's only two actions that will influence
> the extremists in any way and that is to kill or imprison them.

Radical idea number 1:  You can always ignore them, or merely accord them a
level of concern related to their *actual* threat level.  Figure out the number
of deaths and economic damage per year due to cancer, cardiovascular illness,
tobacco, various communicable diseases, and terrorism. React accordingly.  Hint:
How many Americans have gotten killed due to terrorist action, and how many
have gotten killed since then due to our *choosing* to get involved in two
wars?  Who's a bigger hazard to American lives - the terrorists or our own
commander in chief?

"To the extent that we overreact, we proffer the terrorists the greatest tribute."
                -- High Court Judge Michael Kirby

Radical idea number 2: This guy Ghandi managed to kick the British out of India
without killing or imprisoning anybody - people just sat down. *LOTS* of
people.  For those of you who aren't old enough to remember, this dude named
Martin Luther King Jr used the same tactic - and keep in mind that some of
the people opposing King would easily qualify as "extremists".  Yes, it can
take a long time, and you may have a few martyrs of your own - but it's possible
to win the conflict while retaining the moral high ground.

When you've decided that killing them and imprisoning them are the *only*
two options, you've allowed them to frame the question and win the debate,
because you're guaranteeing them an endless supply of martyrs.  At that point,
your only choice for stopping the flow of martyrs is cutting off the
supply via genocide.

Is that what you're advocating, Paul?  Now who's the extremist here?

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