Informed Opinions on Today’s Topics : Ways to Halt Terrorism on Minds of Many

The Oklahoma City bombing alerted America to the danger of terrorism within its own borders. If it can happen in the nation’s heartland, it can happen anywhere.

Now the question is: What is the government doing to prevent it from happening again?

This week, President Clinton proposed a new package that would include hiring an additional 1,000 FBI agents, prosecutors and other federal law enforcement officials, and creating a centralized counter-terrorism bureau under the direction of the FBI.

Some members of Congress, however, are concerned about the constitutionality of granting the government too much authority in wiretapping and other forms of electronic surveillance.

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What should we do about the terrorist threat in this country?

Los Angeles City Councilman Joel Wachs

“We need to have an effective intelligence operation, and I think we could do that without stepping on people’s civil liberties. I don’t want to strip our law enforcement of the tools it needs to deal with terrorism. I don’t want to see their hands tied. We should rely on law enforcement; they are the experts. We have to rely on them in times like this. That’s why we have them. I don’t want everyone taking the law into their own hands.”

Phil Blazer, publisher, Jewish News, Studio City

“Seems to me that the terrorism that exists here in the United States is different than the Middle East. We have too much freedom to obtain guns and weapons, and when we see what’s going on with the growth of state militia groups, the use of machine guns and rockets, and the potential for capturing tanks, it means that we need to curtail the availability of such weapons, which is not unconstitutional.

It’s the good Americans being concerned about self-defense. The way we can defend ourselves is to make sure the fanatics and extremists don’t have these types of weapons.”

Elizabeth Kaufman, president, San Fernando Valley Bar Assn.

“New legislation should be drafted and passed so that our law enforcement agencies may be empowered to rapidly and effectively deal with this serious problem. However, in the hysteria of the moment, the urge to do something of a drastic nature, hopefully, will not result in the creation of law that infringes on our fundamental civil liberties.

New laws must be drafted carefully. However, they should not be used to harass, intimidate or entrap law abiding citizens who hold politically incorrect or unpopular views. The delicate balance between our desire for protection against terrorism and our enjoyment of civil liberties must be preserved.

Personally, I believe that we should not negotiate or give in to terrorist demands since this only encourages further acts of terrorism. Israel’s policy of quick response, by the use of specially trained units to retaliate against international acts of terrorism, appears to be effective.

Lessie Caballero, assistant principal, Fulton Middle School, Van Nuys

“I don’t know what we can do about the actual event, but one of the things we can do is to start educating our children about one another. I think we operate out of fear and ignorance because we don’t know anything about one another. I think it is time to respect the differences that we have, but to also recognize the areas that we have in common.

Another thing we need to do is to teach alternative ways to solve problems. Very often, our young people are given models of violence. When we solve a problem, we go to war, we attack, we bring out the big guns. We need to teach them that when there are problems, there are ways to solve them peacefully. You can compromise.”