Huffington Post 07/07/2013 - The odds of dying in a terrorist attack on North American soil are roughly 1 in 20 million. Canadians have a better chance of being killed by a stray bullet in a random Toronto shooting -- 1 in 222,000, or suffering a fatal car accident -- 1 in 11,000. Evidently -- if past experiences and expert analyses serve as any indication, that is -- terrorism is not one of the most serious threats to Canadian safety and security. Unfortunately, the sensational language employed by the Harper administration and law enforcement agencies when referring to terrorist threats tends to be substantially more dramatic than the realities uncovered by those expert non-partisan analyses, past historical experiences, and irrefutable statistical evidence. But why in the world would our governments and law enforcement agencies want to inflate the terrorist threat you ask? The answer is simple: to engage the strongest political validation of them all -- fear. With fear come easy justifications for augmented military spending, increased political leverage, and, above all, a terrified citizenry which longs for security, safety, and refuge -- the kinds of things we were told could only be guaranteed if we were willing to give up some of our Charter-imparted rights and freedoms in return.