CRITIQUING THE WASHINGTON POST'S "SOPHISTICATED" DEBUNKING OF TERRORISM

If we conservatives sign something that says "we admit that liberals are better-er and smarter-er than conservatives", will they promise to stop trying to insipidly prove to everyone that their understanding of the world is more sophisticated than everyone else's?

Because of the two kinds of fundamental errors - covering over genuine distinctions vs. pointing to differences that don't make any kind of real difference - the second one is definitely more annoying.

There is nothing easier than pointing out an irrelevant difference - it's the basis of an entire cottage industry in the academy, and the way that toddlers first tell the difference between red and green and hard and soft.

But the reference to the irrelevant becomes particularly annoying when it forms the basis of our international diplomacy.

Or when it's done smugly in the cause of denying the overwhelming threat of terrorism:

Six years after 9/11, all too many Americans still have only a vague idea of what does -- and doesn't -- motivate terrorists. It doesn't help that many politicians exploit the anxiety that terrorism evokes to promote their own agendas. Here are five key urban legends:

(1) Terrorism is a random act carried out by irrational people who hate our way of life.
(2) Terrorists are no different than ordinary criminals.
(3) Terrorists are likely to cross into the United States from Mexico.
(4) Terrorism is mainly perpetrated by Muslims.
(5) Terrorism never succeeds.

In the interests of space, we'll with just the first one. To deny that jihadists don't hate the Western tradition or way of life strains credibility. We'll gladly agree that terrorists time their attacks - the Palestinians have taken to launching rockets while Sderot schoolchildren are walking to school, to make sure that the 5 and 6 year olds don't have time to reach bomb shelters. So their terrorism isn't random, but it is certainly opportunistic.

They openly state their desire to establish a global caliphate subject to sharia law. They pathologically and viscerally loath the rights that the West gives to religious minorities, women, and gays. Virtually nothing of the twenty-five thousand year Western tradition would be left over if these genocidal lunatics managed to implement half of what they openly declare they want to implement. And yet this glib little list does its work. Any leftists looking for something sophisticated to bring up their next cocktail party will still be able to walk away from the article with the assurance that terrorists do not hate our way of life and can, presumably, be reasoned with.

[Read an extended version of this post at Mere Rhetoric]