> like those canadian truckers,

I thought the protestors turned out to, by the numbers, prove to be not Canadian and not Truckers.

Meanwhile, I'm not sure why you would pick that example. There seem to be more relevant protests in the US you only have to go back a short while.

Meanwhile, it's difficult to assess if the US government has a great track record at dealing with terrorists. We're unsure of how many incidents are prevented.

> Meanwhile, I'm not sure why you would pick that example.

I think it's pretty clear why the parent poster choose that protest as an example of government tyrrany, and not the, uh, couple of months of gassing, rubber-coated bullets, and beatings that preceded it.

Any source on that?

Of course they're worried about criminals and terrorists, as well as protests; nobody wants to watch their children die in a home invasion or a burning skyscraper, not even politicians, and nobody wants habitual violent criminals to repeatedly victimize innocent people (unless they identify strongly with the criminals). Peaceful protests can be a powerful instrument for change, including taking away government power, but only when the protestors are willing to die for their cause.

Every day, police officers and prosecutors go to work and spend much of the day worrying about criminals, and a few of them are assigned to worry about terrorists too. When they go home, they have to keep worrying about criminals, too, because their job makes them tempting targets for revenge. I'm not saying people don't seek employment as police officers and prosecutors in order to have free reign for their sadistic urges --- they do --- but that's not the majority and it's never the whole story.

Terrorism can have extremely large effects, just not desirable ones. When the people think the government is doing a bad enough job of protecting them from criminals, terrorists, and protests, that government is at high risk of losing its power entirely, which is something almost nobody in the government wants.

Even anarchists often don't want it, because there's no guarantee that what replaces the government will be better. You may not like the FBI, but if the alternative is the Proud Boys, better the devil you know. Remember who won the elections after the overthrows of Mubarak, the Shah, and the Tsar.

> Remember who won the elections after the overthrows of Mubarak, the Shah, and the Tsar.

A mostly liberal-democratic provisional government that was violently overthrown eight months later by a Bolshevik coup because it refused to deal with the same problems (war and famine) that caused the Tsar to be overthrown?

Have we all forgotten the February revolution..?

That's a very interesting definition of "liberal"! They were about as liberal as the british parliament at the time, and that I cannot call liberal in any sense of the word.

And they did lose it in no time, yes

The individuals in the government are worried about all threats. Canadian truckers are certainly one of them, but not a very important one other than they gum up commerce and may eventually develop into a riot.

Criminals and terrorists don’t use public comms to communicate (at least the smart ones). They use dead drops, trusted couriers, and in-person talking.

Protestors by default must communicate in the open, and to each other. They are much more disorganized.

The smart criminals and terrorists are generally the ones working for the government.