I’m quite sure I could beat LeBron James in a game of one on one basketball. The game merely needs to feature two special rules: It lasts until I score, and as soon as I score I win. Such a game might last several hours, or even a week or two, and James would probably score hundreds and possibly thousands of points before my ultimate victory, but eventually I’m going to find a way to put the ball in the basket.This to me is what we have been witnessing. The idea of perfect safety is a dangerous one, and the sliding scale used is even more corrosive for our political discussions. Because when people are afraid they make bad choices.
Our national government and almost all of the establishment media have decided to play a similar game, which could be called Terrorball. The first two rules of Terrorball are:
(1) The game lasts until there are no longer any terrorists, and;
(2) If terrorists manage to ever kill or injure or seriously frighten any Americans, they win.
-Cheers
4 comments:
Ooh, I'm glad you brought this up. I have some thoughts on risk tolerance and how it relates to the required level of security against terrorism that are right up this alley. If we ever get together, I can talk your ear off about it.
Ooh...well if you wanna come up to Champaign. I have about 12 hours free on Saturday.
Seriously this has really been grinding my gears. What it illustrates to me is that there really are very few people who actually understand terrorism, or aviation safety actually...
Obligatory Comic
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