• Civ7 is already available! Happy playing :).

Tennesee Terrorism

It wasn't a complaint about using the label as much as pointing out how hypocritical the definitions and processes are.

For instance, any attack on a federal facility is considered to be a "federal crime of terrorism" as long as it can be considered to be an attempt to kill someone with a "dangerous weapon" and it was "to retaliate against government conduct":

8 U.S.C. § 2331 defines "international terrorism" and "domestic terrorism" for purposes of Chapter 113B of the Code, entitled "Terrorism”:

"International terrorism" means activities with the following three characteristics:

Involve violent acts or acts dangerous to human life that violate federal or state law;

Appear to be intended (i) to intimidate or coerce a civilian population; (ii) to influence the policy of a government by intimidation or coercion; or (iii) to affect the conduct of a government by mass destruction, assassination, or kidnapping; and

Occur primarily outside the territorial jurisdiction of the U.S., or transcend national boundaries in terms of the means by which they are accomplished, the persons they appear intended to intimidate or coerce, or the locale in which their perpetrators operate or seek asylum.*

"Domestic terrorism" means activities with the following three characteristics:

Involve acts dangerous to human life that violate federal or state law;

Appear intended (i) to intimidate or coerce a civilian population; (ii) to influence the policy of a government by intimidation or coercion; or (iii) to affect the conduct of a government by mass destruction, assassination. or kidnapping; and

Occur primarily within the territorial jurisdiction of the U.S.

18 U.S.C. § 2332b defines the term "federal crime of terrorism" as an offense that:

Is calculated to influence or affect the conduct of government by intimidation or coercion, or to retaliate against government conduct; and

Is a violation of one of several listed statutes, including § 930(c) (relating to killing or attempted killing during an attack on a federal facility with a dangerous weapon); and

§ 1114 (relating to killing or attempted killing of officers and employees of the U.S.).

* FISA defines "international terrorism" in a nearly identical way, replacing "primarily" outside the U.S. with "totally" outside the U.S. 50 U.S.C. § 1801(c).

That makes it sounds like it is terrorism just to drive through the gate of a military base without permission when an MP is standing nearby if you are opposed to war or other policies of the US government.

It also sounds like the statutes were specifically written to make just about any attack on a military base to be terrorism. Yet we certainly don't use that definition when the US or the Israelis attack a foreign federal facility. Then it is an "Operation Just Cause" or similar nonsense.

Furthermore, the article I posted in the OP has this paragraph:

U.S. Attorney Bill Killian told the news conference that "as far as we know at this juncture, there are no safety concerns for the general public." Earlier in the day Killian had called the killings an “act of domestic terrorism.”
 
The distinctions seem to be just political though. In general we need better ways of identifying unstable people regardless of their political agendas and whether we label them terrorists or not.
 
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