Interview. What makes someone a terrorist? Is it their views? Is it their actions? Should they be allowed a day in court to qualify them as a terrorist?

My reasoning for this question is Bill O' Reilly's questioning of Helen Thomas' statement of "so called terrorists" in the Pakistan region.

Should she have said "so called terrorists"? Have they been proven to be terrorists? How can we be sure they are terrorists? Have they been convicted or is it just because someone says they are? Or is it from self proclamation of hatred like bin laden?

Just wondering.

I honestly don't know.

But I find it too easy to shoot people and then claim they are terrorists, too.

This question is tearing me apart.

I do not know the answer to that on the frontlines. In an ideal world, I would think it would be their actions that would set them apart. Just because someone holds certain ideals doesn't necessarily mean they will act on them. But, in the real world, that doesn't seem practical or realistic.

Good question

Well the journalist probably said so called to prevent herself or her paper from being sued by anyone who could make a case in court that they were slandered but since didn't see the OReilly Thomas interview I don't know.

Seems like that label gets bandied around alot. To me a terrorist is someone who does and overt act that results in not only terror but significant harm to a persons life or liberty or sense of saftey. Many degrees of that.

I suppose you could ask the family of the Polish engineer that was beheaded earlier this week.