Arguments: Post-9-11 Cost Benefit Analysis

A friend of mine linked me up with Glenn Greenwald, a lawyer who wrote a recent opinion that the threat from terrorism is overblown. He writes, quoting a recent NY Times editorial by History Professor Joseph J Ellis:

All of this seems obvious at this point. The total number of Americans killed by Islamic terrorists in the last 5 years -- or 10 years -- or 20 years -- or ever -- is roughly 3,500, the same number of deaths by suicide which occur in this country every month. This is the overarching threat around which we are constructing our entire foreign policy, changing the basic principles of our government, and fundamentally altering both our behavior in the world and the way in which we are perceived.

And yet, one almost never hears anyone arguing that the terrorism threat, like any other threat, should be viewed in perspective and subjected to rational risk-benefit assessments. That's because opinions about terrorism are the new form of political correctness, and even hinting that this threat is not the all-consuming, existential danger to our Republic which the Bush followers, fear-mongerers and hysterics among us have relentlessly and shrilly insisted that it is, will subject one to all sorts of accusations concerning one's patriotism and even mental health.What do you think? Are we Americans overblowing the threat, changing our lives for no good reason? Should Americans accept a terrorist threat, that perhaps the loss of 3500 people per year to terrorism is an acceptable risk versus the benefit of no attacks? This same professor would have problems with the 2200 soldiers dead in Iraq "for no good reason", when his same risk-benefit analysis is applied to that foreign policy decision.

First, I think it is important to properly analysize the threats to American society when a bomb blasts two of the worlds highest skyscrapers in the worlds only remaining Superpower. What affect does something like this have? All the way in Texas, our business ground to a halt for a couple weeks. It was slow for a month or so more. In Texas.

Let's look at the economic problems wrought by the measily 3000 deaths (in comparison to the 3500 deaths that occur each month in the U.S. from suicide) that occurred on September 11, 2001. Here is a thumbnail analysis. The total immediate cost was approximately 27 Billion, the intermediate and long-term costs are simply staggering. Read the whole link for more understanding of the economic effects.

Mr. Dr. rightly noted that the lost wages alone where almost incomprehensible. If you consider that the average age of the dead was 40 (I'm guessing) and would work 25 more years making a wage of $50,000 (this was NYC and Pennsylvania, financial and government workers so the average wage is probably somewhat low) that's 3000x50,000x25=you do the math.

From a strictly cost-benefit analysis view, those who commit suicide are depressed, by definition. Depressed people tend to drag on society, right? They are sick more often, work less, commit more crime, and generally are a pain to be around. So their loss to society can't possibly be as great as highly motivated workers in the Financial District, right? (I don't believe this BS, by the way, but this is the kind of thinking that the pointy-head being quoted above suggest we do to assess the cost of making terrorism a war--contrasting costs also have to be valued, don't they?)

What about the emotional toll exacted when society endures an attack? What about the emotional toll when society stands still and waits for the next attack (that may or may not happen) without action? Sitting ducks, as it were. What about the emotional toll taken when aggressive responses are undertaken?

They all exact a price. There is no cheap war. Sun Tzu's first rule of war: It is always a loss. Always. I agree with this statement, believe it or not. But there are greater losses than the economic losses and emotional toll war takes--like being plunged into economic chaos by a fanatical enemy, for example. Like the perpetual victimhood of appeasement.

At the risk of further offending my liberal readers, would an appropriate response to an abusive boyfriend be to try to make him happy? Give in to him--he wants sex three times a day and anything less "makes him mad", give it to him, girl! That's appeasement. How satisfying is it to hear that some victim has shocked the heck out of the abuser and beat him to a bloody pulp in his sleep--not very civilized granted, but satisfying nonetheless. Now a more civilized approach is to prosecute the human dirt and put his lanky butt in jail. Society has a responsibility to its other citizens to corral and punish theives, murderers, terrorizers.

The number one role of the U.S. government is to PROTECT HER CITIZENS. When a crazed maniac blows up a building, a ship, orders a hit on an ex-president, etc., that human and those who feed, nurture and sheild him should be crushed. Obliterated. Exterminated. Expunged. Nullified. This, of course, is why so many conservatives are literally up in arms about the porous border allowing every sort of criminal through.

The nature of terrorism is that a criminal approach is not enough--one attack deprives Americans of a fundamental belief in freedom and security. This may sound circular. Civil libertarians cry out that that's exactly the problem--by turning this situation into a war, civil liberties are lost. I posit that those liberties are gone the minute the attack happened anyway. A seige mentality and democracy do not work together. A war, messy as it is, is less messy than a vague sense of unease that doing nothing propogates.

My rage at the terrorist attacks were multifold. In fact, I can't remember being more outraged except in an instance of finding out that innocent children had been molested (the Priest scandel ranks right up there with moral outrage). Why? Because these attacks did more to destroy people and a building. Suddenly, where the thought never occurred before, every person in a turban, every dark-skinned person who looked of Middle Eastern descent looked suspect to me. My airplane flights which I continue to take (the terrorists can kiss my ass), are now fraught with jitters that I never before experienced. New Years celebrations cause anxiety. Group activities like the Super Bowl cause concern. I don't change my behavior--the terrorists would win if I did. But my mind has changed. Forever.

Yes, the likelihood of dying in a car wreck is greater. Yes, more people drown, commit suicide, have accidents, every year than would be killed in a random attack. Yes, natural disasters displaced far more people, killed more people and was uncontrolled and devestating. But that's beside the point. Those things don't cause mass physical devastation at the hands of a few people, those losses don't cause me to distrust people, those losses don't violate the essential pact of trust that democracy is based on.

Say that the U.S. endures a random attack once a year--an airport lost here, a mall damaged there with approximately 3000 people lost each time. We can guess this would happen because certain security measures now undertaken are deemed Draconian and unncecessary and therefore discarded.

Wiretapping of people connected to known terrorists would be verboten or else, the press should be allowed to see for themselves who is on the list so that they might decide if the person is a threat or not--go interview them, say, and find out "the truth". Potential attacks that could be thwarted would go on in secrecy, but that's the price you pay for civil liberties.

No-fly lists would be a thing of the past. This actually might be a good decision. Average Americans are the best defense against these psychos. No person again will sit if someone tries to take over a plane with plastic forks or tweezers. That person is dead or beat to hell or the plane goes down. A plane will never be used as a weapon in the U.S. again, ever. (That is my prediction, we'll see...) More importantly, my baby won't be patted down going through security. Stupid!

Security around airports and other places of travel will be abandoned or goes back to the old days of general portly policing because it makes me add time to my already suck-bag travel. Trucks and cars filled with explosives can ride right up because the government will no longer monitor munitions, farm supplies used in bomb making, and other explosive equipment. But at least my husband can drive up to the airport unmolested and sit and wait for my plane to arrive. It is so annoying to have to wait for him to swing around the airport again because of the no-stopping policy. Oy!

Prisons holding terrorists would be opened up or the detained people should have their day in court. The U.S. government will spend billions (with a B) defending their actions to detain people who have not yet, but were associated with people who do or intended to, do the U.S. harm. These poor non-citizens must have their rights protected. It is the U.S.'s job to prove every person's plan--their past history, intercepted phone calls, and written plans revealing secret plots in mid-foil, mean nothing until a jury of his hated enemy gets to look it over for themselves. The time and human resources to carry out this litigation will fall to the tax payer, as all worthy things should. It's his fault that Islamofascists hate us anyway--stupid Jesus-loving Red State morons.

In all this kibitzing about cost-benefit analysis, the experts don't seem to acknowledge the results. If the U.S. endured random attacks, the chronic economic devestation would cause social disarray, important services would be discontinued, our society would lurch from crisis to crisis.

Left unchecked and unabated, the terrorist's achieved goal would plunge the world into medieval maddness. Elites chortle that this would never happen. Ha! That is immature fear talking, they say. Nobody in the aristocracy wants to acknowledge this world's bloody past, and present for that matter. The civilized world, in the form of the UN and other non-elected authorities, should be beyond revenge. Good heavens, war is so primal, so infantile, so unevolved! What the hell happened to turning the other cheek?

Wrapped up in these smug arguments is derision for simplistic religion and the simpletons who believe them. Devoted Muslims, barbarians, should be abandoned to their ways--as should devoted Christians. Let them toil in narrow-minded anonymity. They don't have the sophistication it takes to lead or have vision. This is, no doubt, why George Bush as President is so unmitigatingly galling.

The enlightened Glenn Greenwald calls him "Dear Leader" of course implying that Bush runs a totalitarian regime like Hitler or Stalin or Mao--he just hasn't reach Greenwald yet, to shut him down. (This fact seems to be lost on Mr. Greenwald--that he has the freedom to bellow like a bull-moose unmolested but would be eating dogs and in prison in China for spouting his views today. On the other hand, his political view would fit nicely with China's policy. He might be given a government position, but I digresss.)

These discourses certainly need to happen. I agree. My irritation increases, though, when opponents to the war and to aggessive military action and to pissing off "allies" who show shaky resolve because of their absurd conflicts of interest (France is just mad that their hand got shut in the Iraq cookie jar--isn't it nice to see the name of an "ally" on a bomb pointed at your head?) refuse to do a cost-benefit analysis on doing nothing. They act as though there are no costs by going about our business as though 9-11 never happened.

In the spirit of going back to "normal", I suggest that we rebuild New Orleans just the way it was. Leave the levees. Fixing them might offend the people who didn't maintain them to begin with. Let's re-inhabit the mold-filled dwellings. Let's build below sea-level at the cost of gazillions of dollars. We don't want anyone to feel bad about the fact that New Orleans is eroding and will cease to exist if expert environmentalists are to be believed. We want everyone to feel good. We need a chocolate city even if we don't have jobs, even if corruption is rife, even if building in portions of the city is suicide. The threat of another hurricane hitting is 1/20. Highly unlikely. Why change life around for a remote possibility? It just makes people live scared. We want people to feel good. The cost of losing Jazz and Creole culture and crawfish boils outweighs rebuilding.

Does this seem absurd to you?

Likewise, the U.S. is demeaned by engaging such a puny little enemy like Bin Laden--a nutjob funded by totalitarian regimes like Iran and other fanatic governments. Iran, Syria, used by Russia, China and while expedient, France, as a thorn in the pompous U.S's flesh should be praised. They just reveal what a tyrant the U.S. is--hypocritical, too.

While the U.S. jails citizens, takes civil liberties on one hand, they chastise other governments for doing the same thing. Greedy and smug, the U.S. exploits other nations for it's own interests--mainly guzzling fuel that is killing our environment. And, gas is over $2 a gallon! That is so unfair to poor people! And, no drilling should be done stateside 'cuz that would ruin our environment. And, no windmills should be used as alternative fuel, because I can see them through my binnoculars when I look out to sea, I pay for a prime view!

What would have been a better response to 9-11? What should the U.S. policy have been? Considering that France, Germany and Russia were utterly complicit with regimes at odds with their supposed ally (us--just in case you were wondering), how would the U.S. avoid offending them save taking no action whatsoever. How does the Middle East falling into fanaticism serve our country's interests? Should we just let Europe implode--she has already taken the poison into her system? Extracting it will be painful. Why are nations like Poland so in favor of the U.S.'s action in Iraq? Why does Britain and Australia stay the course--these are representative governments too, afterall--are their citizens simpletons?

Finally, what are the costs of no change? What are the costs of continuing to live in a pre-9/11 mentality? Much of the talk about risk-benefit analysis blithely ignores the moral questions of letting injustice going unpunished. Much of the talk of risk-benefit analysis ignores the probability of more attacks--bullys don't stop pushing when you don't push back, they push harder and more often. What then?