The Patriot Act.

[copacetic]

One look at the graph above, from New York magazine's very thorough 9/11 encyclopedia, shows that those who decried the Patriot Act's civil liberties violations may have been right. The graph depicts the numbers of "sneak-and-peek warrants," those that allow authorities to search private property without immediately notifying the target of the investigation, issued under the Patriot Act from 2006 to 2009: 15 for terrorism, compared to more than 1,600 for everyday drug busts in America's tremendously misguided "war on drugs."

http://www.good.is/post/the-most-imp...0RSS%20Feed%29

[Helghast]

Whoa!?
Well you can't be surprised, it was never just for terrorism, it was more on other stuff... as shown there, drugs.

[Garyvdh]

I'll say it again.. .as I have said it many times before.

The US response to 911 was all wrong.
They took away more civil liberties from their own citizens in the quest for safety than was necessary.
They have curtailed all the freedoms that made America great.
Their response should have been to make ideological warfare on those who threatened the US.
You can't fight terrorists who dress in civilian clothing and can fade into the public crowd at any time with open warfare.
It just does not work. Innocents will be killed or harmed or restricted.
You have to go undercover as well and change the mindset behind the threat.
For the Trillions of Dollars they have spent, this could have been very easily achieved.
Hell, for that kind of money, they could have bribed every single person living in the Middle East to the tune of $5,000.00.

[Nanfeishen]

Found this article with the following amusing quote , brilliant

If the Patriot Act had been in effect when the Free South Africa Movement was in full swing in the 1980s, hundreds of thousands of Americans would have been liable for imprisonment on charges of rendering “assistance” to “terrorists.”

http://www.blackagendareport.com/?q=...er-patriot-act

Some interesting articles regarding McCarthyism and the Patriot Act:
http://www.commondreams.org/views05/0110-21.htm

http://www.drstevebest.org/Essays/NeoMcCarthyism.htm

The New McCarthyism?
http://washingtonindependent.com/353...ew-mccarthyism

[Elimentals]

I'll say it again.. .as I have said it many times before.

The US response to 911 was all wrong.
They took away more civil liberties from their own citizens in the quest for safety than was necessary.
They have curtailed all the freedoms that made America great.
Their response should have been to make ideological warfare on those who threatened the US.
You can't fight terrorists who dress in civilian clothing and can fade into the public crowd at any time with open warfare.
It just does not work. Innocents will be killed or harmed or restricted.
You have to go undercover as well and change the mindset behind the threat.
For the Trillions of Dollars they have spent, this could have been very easily achieved.
Hell, for that kind of money, they could have bribed every single person living in the Middle East to the tune of $5,000.00.

In short, the terrorists won.

[ponder]

In short, the terrorists won.

Nice summation

[Garyvdh]

In short, the terrorists won.

Or at the very least... the US has made zero progress in the war on terror.

[copacetic]

What war on terror?

Isn't there a far greater chance of dying in the bathtub, than being killed by a terrorist?

Who are they fighting?

[biometrics]

Queue the argument that without all these measures there would have been more attacks.

After the end of the Soviet Union, the USA had to find a new bogeyman. Terrorism is it.

[Korn1]

I wonder what America would be like if the 911 attack never happened.

[Garyvdh]

Queue the argument that without all these measures there would have been more attacks.

After the end of the Soviet Union, the USA had to find a new bogeyman. Terrorism is it.

It's a worthy bogeyman... the number of terror attacks has risen exponentially since 1970 and before.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of...rist_incidents
http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0001454.html

[ponder]

I wonder what America would be like if the 911 attack never happened.

There would have been something else in the middle east to go war for.

[copacetic]

[Garyvdh]

Shocking to see how the actions of a few Radical Muslim terrorists have resulted in so much blood on their hands.

[copacetic]

Shocking to see how the actions of a few Radical Muslim terrorists have resulted in so much blood on their hands.

I guess that's one way seeing it.

Why did America invade Iraq?

What did that war have to do with 911?