"Movie-plot threats"

[David Farber <dave () farber net>]

Begin forwarded message:

From: Art Botterell <acb () incident com>
Date: September 11, 2005 1:38:34 PM EDT
To: David Farber <dave () farber net>
Subject: "Movie-plot threats"



Security expert Bruce Schneier offers a useful perspective in today's  
Minneapolis Star-Tribune:

<http://www.startribune.com/stories/562/5606306.html>


> The problem is that we all got caught up in "movie-plot threats,"  
> specific attack scenarios that capture the imagination and then the  
> dollars. Whether it's terrorists with box cutters or bombs in their  
> shoes, we fear what we can imagine. We're searching backpacks in  
> the subways of New York, because this year's movie plot is based on  
> a terrorist bombing in the London subways.
>
> Funding security based on movie plots looks good on television, and  
> gets people reelected. But there are millions of possible  
> scenarios, and we're going to guess wrong...

I think that's right, and that it also says something about the New  
Sentimentalism that's dominated American public discourse for awhile,  
and especially since 9/11.

Pious and patriotic sentiments are good, but they're not sufficient.   
A degree of dry-eyed objectivity is required as well.  Certainly we  
need to guard against letting "loyalty," "supporting the troops" and  
so forth become codewords for groupthink, unquestioning conformity  
and, ultimately, self-deception.

- Art



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