Terror Porn..John Stossels words
John Stossel tackles a controversial subject in his new column....is the terrorist threat really all that big of a deal? He really stirs things up by saying your odds of getting attacked by an international terrorist are about the same as getting hit by an asteroid.
LINK http://www.townhall.com/columnists/JohnStossel/2007/03/07/terror_porn
LINK http://www.townhall.com/columnists/JohnStossel/2007/03/07/terror_porn
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This is where statistics vary from emotional reality.
A statistical approach does not help the guy under the asteroid, or his family.
D.0 -
Yeah like winning the lottery the chances aren't very good but the fact remains someone is going to win it.
Smitty0 -
I generally like Stossel. His libertarianism is a refreshing anti-dote to the big government statism advocated by the MSM.
However, statistical studies on matters, literally, of life and death, I usually discount. So what if you've only got X% chance of being killed by a terrorist? To do nothing based on that presumption will only encourage more attacks, thus raising your risk by some amount since there will be more and more violent attacks if they are not stopped. THAT'S why we fight now, to try and get a handle on the problem when it at least appears manageable (we should have been fighting them 20 years ago, but that's a topic for another time.) It's better to fight small wars than big ones, right?0 -
I think his main point is "QUIT BEING SO G-- DAMNED AFRAID, AMERICA!"
The fear-lovers have hijacked the American spirit and turned what used to be brave nation into one packed to the rafters with people jumping at their own freakin' shadows. "Terrorists this!" and "Terrorists that!"
We can be secure without being afraid. We can be free without being vulnerable. Is that really so hard to comprehend?0 -
At least he pointed out that swimming pools are more dangerous to kids than guns. It was an interesting special that showed how irrational most peoples fears are. 0 -
We aren't necessarily afraid of terrorists, we just want to kill them. And...... (wait for it)..... bomb the Dome of the Rock. 0 -
Yeah. When ever some shark lovers try to downplay shark attacks, they tell us statistics that are something like your chance of being killed or attacked by a shark are something like 1 million to one.
And of course this trys to make it sound like you couldn't get attacked by a shark even if you tried.. And that may be true if you were presently in the middle of the USA, say Kansas City, etc.
But if you were swimming in the ocean near a sea otter colony I am just guessing that your chances of being attacked by a shark are just a little bit higher than that of the guy presently living in KC.
But that is just me and I could be wrong.0 -
quote:Originally posted by tr fox
Yeah. When ever some shark lovers try to downplay shark attacks, they tell us statistics that are something like your chance of being killed or attacked by a shark are something like 1 million to one.
And of course this trys to make it sound like you couldn't get attacked by a shark even if you tried.. And that may be true if you were presently in the middle of the USA, say Kansas City, etc.
But if you were swimming in the ocean near a sea otter colony I am just guessing that your chances of being attacked by a shark are just a little bit higher than that of the guy presently living in KC.
But that is just me and I could be wrong.
You're on to something, as usual, Fox.
While I can certainly appreciate the sentiment of Monkey's points above, playing with statistics is foolish and misleading in a lot of instances and hides certain basic truths.
Like I said, the less vigorously we respond to the threat, the more vigorous the threat itself will become. If we take 9/11 as our baseline, let's look at some numbers. about 3,000 people were killed on 9/11. America has a population of 300,000,000 give or take. 9/11 killed 1/100,000th of the population or .001% of the population as a whole. you've probably got a better shot of being struck by lightning while having your genitals ripped off by a pack of wild hyenas than you do dying in a terror attack. Even if there's 10 9/11s a year, that's "only" 30,000 people and your risk of dying is still an infintesimal .01%, but who in their right mind would tolerate even 1 9/11 a year, let alone 10? Also, these numbers games assume almost as a starting point that all targets, locations, and victims are equal. They're not and everyone knows it. Like you said, if I lived in Kansas City, my risk of being involved in a terror attack would remain virtually unchanged (i.e. as close to 0 as possible) while if I resided in New York or LA for instance, it would be a virtual certainty that I would be somehow DIRECTLY affected by the all but inevitable terror attacks that we would be tacictly encouraging by not confronting and doing all we can to prevent.0
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