Something I've been puzzling about quietly for a while has now been given voice by Publius at Obsidian Wings and by Paul Campos at Lawyers Guns and Money.
They ask, are Americans really terrified of and terrorized by terrorists?
From the behavior of the Senate last week one would think so. But is the public once again ahead of the politicians? I don't really think that most of us cower in our beds every day worrying whether Osama bin Laden and his buddies are going to attack our hometown malls. But ever since 9/11, many politicians, most but not all Republicans, have behaved as though we're at risk of being blown up tomorrow and must therefore militarily destroy all those places and people where terrorists might congregate and hide.
Bin Laden and his cohorts are not Nazi Germany's Wehrmacht or the Soviet Union's Red Army, for heaven's sake. Why do our public servants act as though they are?
Posted by Linkmeister at May 23, 2009 12:12 PM | TrackBackIf you find out, let me know; I've never understood this either.
I'm much more afraid of dying in an automobile accident than in a terrorist attack by Osama bin Laden. Osama bin Laden, last I heard, was on dialysis, for chrissakes; he can't even exist without his machines.
Posted by: hedera at May 23, 2009 06:19 PMditto.
Posted by: RONW at May 23, 2009 08:46 PMChiming it to agree with the chorus here. I have a list of things I'm afraid of, and terrorists aren't even on the top half of it.
Posted by: Juli Thompson at May 24, 2009 04:09 PMRight, we're not afraid of terrorists because the odds of one of us being in an attack are very low. But consider the situation of a US Senator or CongressThing, who spends a large fraction of his/her time in a large white building in DC whose location is well known to the entire world, and which is almost certainly a high priority target. Of course they're afraid, and it's not important to them whether we are or not. After all, it's their money - NOT.
Posted by: Bruce Cohen (SpeakerToManagers) at May 24, 2009 07:59 PM