Nobody in any of the articles said the process was bad, but nobody said it was particularly good. The articles mainly discussed the deficiencies. It’s open to interpretation whether this should be construed as an admission of inadequacy.
You can find very similar statements regarding, say, minority access to polls. There are very specific deficiencies, and depending on your perspective this could be construed as an admission of inadequacy or as a system that is generally good.
Did you find anything in any of those articles that says that “Our current vetting system for immigrants and refugees is universally recognized as being inadequate by the intelligence community”? And not just a few officials, but universally they say it’s poor?
I didn’t find that, and it’s not me reading bias news right because Royal himself finally picked a few links for us to use as his source for this statement. What I did find is they pointed out some risks, and like you said, whether those risks or good or bad or acceptable isn’t fully decided upon by the intelligence community at large… but they seem to indicate the process is improving but risks remain.
But back to my original point in all this, this talk of civility. Dropping statements like this and then walking away when challenged is not a sign of civility. I understand things can get heated around here, name calling can ensue, and maybe sometimes it is best to walk away but in this case, it’s not about personality. Challenging someone to support their position is not about taking away someone’s individuality, or saying they can’t have an opinion that differs from yours. it’s saying hey, you’re making your opinion sound like a fact but you’re not backing it with anything.
I even quoted the part. Here it is again.
People make statements on this forum all the time without support. And there is nothing wrong with asking someone to support their statement. If they decline, well then like I said take whatever they said with a grain of salt (and maybe remind them that you’ll need to see more evidence when the matter comes up again).
I disagree with the idea that someone can’t “walk away” from their statement. Maybe they can’t find a citation, maybe they decided that it’s not worth their time (particularly if they have a minority view and are beset by multiple requests). At that point, I think it’s perfectly civil for them to concede the point by walking away. If it helps, consider that any observer will probably conclude you’ve “won” that exchange, so be gracious in victory.
You seem to be implying that they have an obligation to either respond or formally renounce their position, but that’s not a civil conversation. That’s an academic debate, or a cross examination. It’s the sort of dialogue where the goal is to diminish the reputation of your adversary, in public view. There are secondary objectives at stake.
But this is just a forum conversation. There is nothing else at stake. When someone doesn’t want to participate any more, for whatever reason, that conversation is over and it’s time to move on.
I did read that part. It’s hardly a ringing endorsement and it can easily be interpreted as an optimist’s admission of failure. Again, your interpretation depends on your perspective.
I agree with Schneier. But risk tolerance is a personal thing. Conservatives seem much more risk averse when it comes to terrorism. So if one of them claims that risk of terrorism is excessive to them, it’s hard to dispute that. There is no “correct” amount of risk tolerance.
Just a note that even this thread title is doing the Devil’s work.
Spicer is obviously the worst. No question.
But nobody gives a shit about Sean Spicer, outside of how he’s the Mouth of Sauron.
The Mouth is not the fucking problem here, y’all.
But it’s funny because the mouth of Sauron in this case is so hilariously incompetent.
This is true.
I mean when death comes to take us all, at least we can greet him with a laugh, cause that’s all we got left.
I desperately want Spicer to talk out of his ass, like Jim Carrey did in “Ace Ventura: Pet Detective”.
Admitting that there is a small and manageable risk is an admission of failure? That is… an unusual perspective.
Yes, it is, but it apparently it’s one held by a segment of Trump supporters.
Hasn’t that been shown to me and time again though? Conservatives are much more motivated by fear then liberals?
I’ve often wondered about that. I’ve never quite understood the Republican party post 9/11. I mean, I remember 9/11 and all its horror very clearly, but I never understood selling out what makes us the way we are for a false sense of security. No, I’m not going to voluntarily surrender my constitutional rights just so that you can keep me “safe”.
It’s the same thing that I’ve been bitching about with this whole “Sweden is a Muslim zombie wasteland” thing for the past year or so. All this talk among some older members of my extended family about how we need to slam the gates shut before we’re overrun by the Other. Or how we need to stop accepting refugees and immigrants because there’s always a chance that there may be some bad hombres among them. I fundamentally don’t get it.
Granted, I don’t exactly live in a prime target for terrorist attacks, but I don’t live my life worried that a Muslim is going to blow me up. Bad things are going to happen. Terrorist attacks are going to happen (regardless if we accept refugees or not). Relatively speaking, I stand a very good chance of being killed or maimed on my commute into work each day, but that doesn’t prevent me from leaving the house.
People really really don’t like to live in a world where bad things randomly happen to “good” people. This is why we overreact to terrorist incidents and why some people invent fictions like Sandy Hook never happened.
But then they get in their cars anyway.
That’s because terrorism (unlike car accidents and heart attacks) is seen by some as an injustice, where actuarial arguments miss the point.
It’s similar to the controversy over unarmed black people being killed by police. Some will regard the risk as insignificant or compare it to other types of shootings and/or causes of death. But this argument doesn’t work with those who regard even one unjustified police shooting as intolerable.
I mean, are you going to tell black people in Ferguson that the risk of being shot by the police is quite small and manageable?
That’s not remotely the same. Police are given an extraordinary amount of trust and power to do their jobs and when that trust is broken on a fairly infrequent but not rare basis, it’s a violation. Terrorists are criminals.