Message-ID: <302120AD38217A97D130BE41@paul-schmehls-powerbook59.local>
Date: Wed, 04 Apr 2007 22:55:56 -0500
From: Paul Schmehl <pauls@...allas.edu>
To: full-disclosure@...ts.grok.org.uk
Subject: Re: The Cyber war on Iran

--On April 4, 2007 11:06:24 PM -0400 Valdis.Kletnieks@...edu wrote:

> On Wed, 04 Apr 2007 21:38:40 CDT, Paul Schmehl said:
>> You seem to be living under the delusion that your actions can somehow
>> influence the extremists.  There's only two actions that will influence
>> the extremists in any way and that is to kill or imprison them.
>
> Radical idea number 1:  You can always ignore them, or merely accord
> them a level of concern related to their *actual* threat level.  Figure
> out the number of deaths and economic damage per year due to cancer,
> cardiovascular illness, tobacco, various communicable diseases, and
> terrorism. React accordingly.  Hint: How many Americans have gotten
> killed due to terrorist action, and how many have gotten killed since
> then due to our *choosing* to get involved in two wars?  Who's a bigger
> hazard to American lives - the terrorists or our own commander in chief?
>
I absolutely loathe this argument.  It goes something like this:
Hey, so a few people are dying - I don't know any of them, and I don't 
feel personally threatened, so screw them.  I'm worried about cancer not 
IEDs.  Besides, statistically, I have more chances of dying from cancer 
than I do from an IED.  (Sorry about those folks in New York, London, 
Madrid, Berlin, Paris, Beirut, Bali, Darfur, Singapore, the Phillippines, 
Somalio, the Congo, and all the other places where jihadis have bombed and 
beheaded innocent people, but hey, that ain't in my back yard.)

Nice to know you care.
>
> Radical idea number 2: This guy Ghandi managed to kick the British out
> of India without killing or imprisoning anybody - people just sat down.
> *LOTS* of people.  For those of you who aren't old enough to remember,
> this dude named Martin Luther King Jr used the same tactic - and keep in
> mind that some of the people opposing King would easily qualify as
> "extremists".  Yes, it can take a long time, and you may have a few
> martyrs of your own - but it's possible to win the conflict while
> retaining the moral high ground.
>
Funny thing about the Brits - they're actually civilized.  They don't go 
around cutting off children's heads and blowing up innocent women.  So 
Ghandi's sit-down actually worked, because the Brits have a conscience.

> When you've decided that killing them and imprisoning them are the *only*
> two options, you've allowed them to frame the question and win the
> debate, because you're guaranteeing them an endless supply of martyrs.
> At that point, your only choice for stopping the flow of martyrs is
> cutting off the supply via genocide.
>
Oh, bullshit.  This isn't a debate.  And there isn't an endless flow of 
martyrs.  If you seriously think the vast majority of Muslims are only 
interested in martyring themselves for jihad, then you're a racist in the 
extreme.  Most Muslims are just like you and me.  They want to live a 
peaceable life, earn a decent living and take care of their family.  But 
until the cost of being a jihadi is not worth the reward compared to 
living in peace, they will continue to slaughter people by the millions. 
And just because you don't give a shit about the people dying in Darfur or 
the Muslims being slaughtered every day in Iraq, doesn't mean everyone 
thinks that way.

Let's see if I can put this in terms you can understand.

A hoodlum is running around the neighborhood killing people.  You think 
it's a good idea to negotiate with him but he's just interested in killing 
people.  Since more people in the neighborhood have died in car crashes 
than the hoodlum has killed, you think he's not much of a threat. 
Unfortunately for Billy, tonight is his turn to be the hoodlum's next 
victim.  But that's OK with you because, hey, statistically, it's just a 
blip on the radar.  Eventually, if enough people die, he'll tire of his 
killing, and we'll be able to get him to reform his ways by convincing him 
there's a better way to live.  If a hundred have to die before we get 
there, it's OK, because 200 will die in car accidents anyway.

> Is that what you're advocating, Paul?  Now who's the extremist here?

Well, I'm not surprised you asked the question since you obviously have no 
clue.  And your philosophy stinks.

You're a great security mind, Valdis, but your politics suck.

Paul Schmehl (pauls@...allas.edu)
Senior Information Security Analyst
The University of Texas at Dallas
http://www.utdallas.edu/ir/security/

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