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From: spp@ucbvax.ARPA (Stephen P Pope)
Newsgroups: net.flame
Subject: Re: State Terrorism
Message-ID: <10665@ucbvax.ARPA>
Date: Tue, 15-Oct-85 12:49:44 EDT
Article-I.D.: ucbvax.10665
Posted: Tue Oct 15 12:49:44 1985
Date-Received: Thu, 17-Oct-85 00:40:16 EDT
References: <903@abnji.UUCP> <1351@ihlpg.UUCP>
Organization: University of California at Berkeley
Lines: 35

> Unbelievable.  Just who is being terrorized here.  Terrorism is the
> deliberate use of terror as a political weapon.  Mr. Armstrong is
> either too stupid to understand the meaning of the word "terrorism",
>
> By debasing the usage of the word "terrorism", Mr. Armstrong
> and others are only lessening the onus on terrorists.
> -- 
> Bill Tanenbaum - AT&T Bell Labs - Naperville IL  ihnp4!ihlpg!tan

Come on, Bill.  If you don't see the connection between (1) Reagan's 
decision to grab the escaping terrorists (2) Reagan's attempt to
overturn the Miranda ruling (3) The Reagan Justice Department's
(hey, there's a self cancelling phrase!) successful attempt to
allow illegally gathered evidence in federal court (4) et. cetera
then maybe you are either ....

ANYWAY, it's clear Ronnie has an "ends justifies the means" approach
to "justice", and has little respect for due process.  The problem
with this is that persons end up in jail mainly as a result of a
presumption of guilt.  Sometimes, as is probably the case with
the hijackers, the presumption is correct.  But grabbing the
hijackers is no kind of reason to generate national pride.  The
lynch-mob mentality of the old west lives in the White House,
one might suspect.  Now, this DOES have its good points.
The question is, have world affairs reached such a state of 
emergency that such wide-sweeping police powers are necessary
and desirable?  Not clear to me.  

Grabbing the hijackers may have been a good thing, I
don't know.  I wouldn't call it "terrorist" as did Mr. Armstrong,
but I can see where he's coming from.  I'll be it looks a lot
less reasonable to those who regard Egypt and Palestine as 
sovereign entities.

steve pope