Today President Obama is addressing the security lapses that occurred regarding the attempted terrorist bombing  on Christmas Day in order to ensure the American public that his Administration is taking the proper steps to review and remedy the procedures that led to inaction on the information that was provided to security agencies, as well as silence his critics.  Johnathan Alter of Newsweek even went so far as to suggest that the President needs to negotiate with Dick Cheney in order to get him to stop criticizing the Administration on it’s War on Terror. 

That is utter nonsense.  Dick Cheney is a hypocrite, as Alter himself acknowledges, and thereby irrelevant in his lame attempts to critique this Administration.

More to the point is Howard Fineman’s intelligent and inciteful essay in Newsweek noting that President Obama has several options to battle terrorism, suggesting one that I have long been philosophically opposed to on the principle of protecting the constitutional rights of individuals:  profiling terrorists.  Why, you might ask would I oppose this tactic?  Before you prejudge my reasoning – “oh, this is just more Liberal gobbly-gook” - try reading clear to the end of this post.  You just might  be surprised by my conclusions.

The reason for my opposition to any type of profiling is the overwhelming evidence that there is a significant and unwarranted risk that it will ultimately result in few arrests and too many innocent people being wrongfully detained or otherwise unfairly targeted by security and law enforcement, and which has been scientifically proven to be both ineffective, as well as a waste of precious time and resources.  That does not even speak to the “human cost” of targeting innocent people. 

Moreover, law enforcement officials are widely known to rely on a multitude of nonsensical reasons under the guise of “reasonable suspicion” – which is not ironically the legal standard for a lawful search and seizure – as a legal basis for stopping someone because the officer thinks they may be involved in a crime.  Many people would say, “well, so what . . . we have to sacrifice the emotional security of a few for the personal security of the many.” 

This argument has been forwarded for over a century subsequent to a long line of U.S. Supreme Court decisions upholding individuals 4th Amendment right to be free from unlawful search and seizure.  Very few Americans have any real indepth knowledge as to the historical basis for this fundamental right recognized by our founding fathers, as well as a comprehensive understanding of the evolution of case law protecting us from unwarranted and excessive intrusions upon our privacy by agents of the government. 

But I digress from the central point of the issue of terrorist profiling.

Although I will always remain highly skeptical of law enforcement offficer’s motivations and justifications as a result of my professional experience (I have caught too many of them lying in court, while under oath), there just might be a reasoned and measured manner for accomplishing our national security objectives with a modicum of protection for the innocent.  On the other hand, no one should pretend that profiling will easily identify and stop those who intend to kill innocent people and terrorize us.  There are no simplistic solutions to this difficult and contentious issue.

The deeds of evil men are rarely so apparent until after they are completed.