Thursday December 01st 2005, 9:52 pm
Jonathan
Allen, a public relations mouthpiece for the British government, was
unable to restrain his sarcasm when talking about civil liberties. "The
liberals who are holding things up need to ask themselves if they want
the right to civil liberties or the right not to be blown up on the way
to work," said Allen in response to concerns over the government
including provisions in proposed "antiterror legislation … requiring
telecommunications companies to retain data like e-mails and telephone
records… The right for the state to police Web sites, which are being
used as recruitment tools for potential terrorists, also remains a
divisive issue," reports the International Herald Tribune.
In short, according to Allen and the Brit government, the British
people have but two choices—either they surrender their civil liberties
or fall victim to evil terrorists. It’s so simple—and very Manichean.
Never mind that the alleged "mastermind" behind the London bombings,
Haroon Rashid Aswat, is a British intelligence asset.
It
appears the police state disease afflicting Britain has spread to the
rest of Europe as well. "At the beginning of a two-day meeting in
Brussels, [European] ministers adopted a package of new steps to combat
terror, including strengthening border security and improving the
monitoring of recruitment grounds like radical mosques," the Tribune
continues. "But deep divisions remained over whether to adopt America’s
zero-tolerance approach to terror or to apply a European strategy in
which privacy rights trump the right to security…. EU countries agree
that terrorists must be deprived of the opportunity to use the Internet
as an instrument to promote terror, but they have nevertheless rejected
French demands that EU countries be granted the judicial tools to close
down a suspected terrorist Web site." Notice how civil liberties are
considered a trade-off. It was a famous colonial who once quipped:
"They who would give up an essential liberty for temporary security,
deserve neither liberty or security."
But never mind. Evil
terrorists are working overtime to make damn sure our civil liberties
are decimated. "The EU moves came as Belgian investigators charged five
people with involvement in a terrorist cell that sent volunteers to
Iraq, including Muriel Degauque, 38, who blew herself up in a failed
attack on U.S. troops near Baghdad last month." Degauque’s face is
plastered all over the web, as she is the new frightening visage of
terror—pretty white girls seduced by al-Qaeda "bad guys" bent on
destroying infidels. It wasn’t so long ago we were told about a new
phenomenon—formerly passive Middle Eastern Muslim women acting as
suicide bombers—now we have to worry about the girl next door blowing
herself and the entire block up.
Of course, the only solution is to surrender your civil liberties—and pronto.
Degauque
may also be considered a poster girl for "an EU-style Central
Intelligence Agency," roundly rejected by effete soft-on-Osama wimps in
Germany and France. "Many Europeans are wary of the U.S. approach to
fighting terrorism, which they argue flouts human rights and condones
torture." A few more pretty girl-next-door suicide bombers will change
their minds, or maybe a couple more bombings like those in Madrid and
London, never mind the police were involved in the former and there are
more inconsistencies in the latter than you can shake a stick at. Don’t
bother yourself with the fact "Al Qaeda exists as an organized body
only where the intelligence services have created, funded and employed
it," as former Justice Department prosecutor and terror expert, John Loftus, remarked after Haroon Rashid Aswat was pegged as an MI6 asset.
Instead, concentrate on the Belgian woman Muriel Degauque and recoil in horror at the prospect.
Next up: school kids with Semtex in their backpacks.
