Another "coincidence":
the latest Pew poll – the favorite of the Washington elites – lists "terrorism" as Americans’ top concern "for the first time in five years," just as the new Congress goes into session – and the presidential election pre-season begins.
[...]
This isn’t about free speech, at least not anymore: it’s about how to respond to an enemy that we created. No, we can’t go back in time and un-create ISIS, we can’t repeal the Iraq war or erase its tragic memory – and we can’t get rid of our own warmongers by simply deporting them to a desert isle where they could only bring harm to themselves. Although it’s not a bad idea, come to think of it.
We are going to have to live with the consequences of our government’s actions for many years to come, as the tides of religious and ethnic hatred batter the walls of our republic and transform it into something the Founders would neither recognize nor dream of. The great American ship of state cannot be turned around in a day, or even within the four-year term given to a President. The demons unleashed in the days and years after 9/11 – who were conjured well before then – will not be easily banished.
Yet it can be done.
Those are war clouds on the horizon, but I also see rays of hope. Many are beginning to question our long march to permanent war, and many more will enter the ranks of the Peace Party in the years to come, if only we can learn to fight effectively. Yes, the polls tell us terrorism is on the minds of the American people, but they don’t say how we ought to meet this threat – and the idea that we should keep repeating the same failed policies fits the clinical definition of insanity to a tee.
