I don't care about ISIS

This is probably heresy. But I gotta say it. I don't care about ISIS. I don't really care about terrorism in general.

Why? Because it's just not an important issue. I'm reading that a recent Gallup poll found that Americans think terrorism is the most important issue.They are wrong.

It's understandable, in a way. It's loud and explosive, and it pushes the adrenaline buttons. But the actual effect is miniscule. Depending on how you define the term, terror incidents have killed maybe 30 Americans over the past decade. You are literally more likely to be killed by lightning.

99% of the effect of terror comes from how we react to it. Every terror incident provokes a 24 hour news cycle, which focuses the attention of the entire nation on a single slice of a greater reality.

Is terrorism a problem? Yes, it's just not the crisis everyone makes it out to be.

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The "problem" of ISIS is a really non-problem. They have zero capacity to project power against the United States. The only power they have is recruiting and training Muslims already here. By controlling the number of Muslims in our society, we do two things: 1) reduce the pool of people from which they can draw, and 2) reduce their ability to blend in with local populatins. This, combined with aggressive intelligence, is really all we need.

My recommendation is to ignore the nocons hyperventilating about ISIS. Blow up their oilfields and pipelines, and starve them of cash. Let them fight it out against each other. If we're really annoyed we can arm the Kurds, and give them air support. This is all we need to do.

Flailing about in panic, and blindly stumbling into the next war is just shooting ourselves in the foot. Chill out. Dance a tango.

 

You're right..

But, ISIS doesn't have an oilfields or pipelines..

We should be vigilant, kill terrorists whenever possible and scrutinize Muslims applying for US visas.

 

The big issue is not ISIS, they are but a symptom of the spreading sickness. Islam is the big deal being discussed in the back of non-Islamic minds. There is now a religion that has decided to take the holy book literally and even has a word for what it is doing...JIHAD.

Just as when a nation declares war upon another, defense becomes the priority until Offense becomes necessity. This however is not as cut and dry because there is not a nation or nationality to defend against and defending against a religion is a relatively new concept. Distrust is a natural and expected reaction at this point and will probably be followed by something significantly more obvious and aggressive. If the "Moderate Muslim" wishes to avoid the inevitable reaction they really need to do more than march on YouTube. ISIS is slowly being eliminated and will go by the wayside, others will take it's place and they will also be Muslim. therein lies the actual problem.

 

Good post and you've got your perspective in the right place. The Middle East has been screwed up for a long time, we just hear about it all the time now.

I'm always interested in the gap between what a country needs and what politicians promise to deliver. I think if you were to ask the average American like yourself, who's not hysterical with fear, what is needed you'd probably get very different answers than what politicians are promising. Trump's promises include more war, bigger armed forces, deportations and so on. Those are all fear-based solutions to problems that simply don't impact the average American. Americans aren't being killed by terrorists, aren't being displaced by Mexican workers, are at no risk whatsoever of an armed invasion. The things that do impact Americans every day are things like quality and safety of infrastructure and taxes. Things that impact Americans over time are things like income security, access to education and jobs and quality of life issues like health care and access to leisure such as parks.

Not only will Trump's promises not get Americans what they need on a day-to-day basis or over time, his polices will actually prevent these things by diverting funds. A war means a lot of bridges and schools falling apart, no money for parks, and higher taxes which reduce what people can save for retirement.

 

Of course America's constant invasions, bombings and covert regime changes (Iran) are a large part of the problem. They aren't the "West" over there and every attempt to make them into something they aren't drives them further into darkness. Isis bombs us in Europe and kills a couple of people--but America sends B-52s and high tech drones to kill them. and they strike more terror in our hearts they we do in theirs. We kill their #2 guy (we always kill their #2 guy--on slow days we only kill their #3 guy) and they get another #2 guy in 15 minutes.

The funny thing is that the Middle East wasn't a problem at all until the Soviet Union fell and there was no more Empire of Evil for America to focus it's B-52s on. Sooooo, bada bing the Islamic world shows up all ready to get bombed by B-52s. (Heaven only knows what those billion dollar B-2s are for. But I digress.) The Middle East is a problem of our own making.

 

Being at war is almost the new normal isn't it. But it's an expensive normal, for no gain that benefits the US taxpayer. Using CBO estimates the cost of the Iraq and Afghanistan war works out to about 20,000 per taxpayer in the US. That estimate is considered low and the cost per taxpayer may be double that.

If you were to ask Americans if they'd be willing to pay that cost as a line item cost the answer would undoubtedly be no.

 

You don't care because you live in a progressive bubble of comfort. See how many of these ring true - gated, predominantly white, middle-to-upper-middle class suburb, very few Muslims around. What's funny is that your ideology would bring more Muslims here for "diversity" purposes. Maybe then you'd worry a bit more.

 

Jihad is first a spiritual struggle.. It doesn't kill women and children or non combatants. ISIS is just a bunch of criminal thugs who have hijacked Islam and teach lies for political gain.

 

As Muslim populations increased in Canada from 30,000 in the 70's to a million today the murder rate and total reported crime in Canada has decreased. The city with the largest number of Muslims, Toronto, is one of the safest large cities in the world.

So your claim that Muslims make a country more dangerous is bunk.

 

You have a lot of stuff correct or said in another way i agree with a lot of it. ISSIS is a symptom of arrogance, imperialism, colonialism, stupidity, compounded by geo-political correctness. "We" the world let the British and the French create several artificial countries out of the rubble of the Ottoman Empire. Since ISIS has a base in the "country" called Iraq for now we will hit that first. Unless we undo the stupidity of the Brits and French in their "creating" Iraq we will never have a chance to control the emergence violent groups like ISIS. The world ends to play an new arrogant game and restore as best possible the "countries" of Turkey, Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, Israel, "Palestine", Saudi Arabia, and some other created "countries".

Turkey needs to get over it's self importance and cede the Kurd lands back to the Kurds as does Syria, and Paper.stan sis Iraq. Iran who has Kurds within it's borders should also be part of this realignment but i realize that that would never happen.

Kurdistan needs to exists within as much as possible the ethnic boundaries of the Kurd people. Split the remainder of "iraq" between the Shia and that other Muslim gang. That group I think that are called the Arsis that the ISIS monsters were slathering needs to have a homeland attached to Kurdistan so Kurdistan can offer some protection to them from the Arabs.


Syria due to the fact that the many different groups are in poorly defined geographical areas needs to become a loose confederation.


Some minor realignment needs to occur with both Lebanon and Jordan.

Israel is going to have to accept the fact that a Palestinian state needs to exist and the Palestinians need to understand that they will not be allowed to have their own state until and unless they accept the existence of Israel. Egypt for the sake of area peace need to accept the fact that a part of the Sinai needs to be ceded in order to establish a Palestinian state. i know that this part smacks of country creation but there is no practical way to make the Palestinians and the Israelis live together.

If God really cared that humans lived in peace he would get him butt down here and straighten out the rest of the mess in the world. After he does the parts that I just set up for him he can kick the stinging Turks out of Constantinople. Then in the afternoon of that day kick the Russian monsters out of Ukraine.

before any of this good work cana be done a coalition of European, Muslims states and the US needs to use special operations and precision bombing followed by a sweeping of ARAB/Muslim troops to clean up the leftovers from what was IDIS controlled territory.

 

Everything you've said is on point right up till you got my personal tax dollars involved. The Middle East has to solve their on problems without the USA getting involved--if the British or French or whomever want to get involved--that's their business, but America should not get involved. Personally I think unless the Arabs solve their own problems they will never be safe or happy. But either way America should get out of the business of Caliphate building.

 

Do you actually believe non-Muslim people care?

What they (and me) care about is bombs blowing up, terrorists shooting innocents out of the blue, People dying because of who they are, and the fundamental beliefs becoming invasive enough to remove freedoms. I am aware of the political nature of this Jihad and couldn't care less as to the WHY....I am forced to focus on the risks it represents and as there in no way to differentiate a nice Muslim from a suicidal one they are all risky unless they somehow manage to show otherwise.

 

i am not a big proponent of US involvement in the ME. We are already since it's manly us who has hurt ISIS from the air and last time was a day or so ago. As much as I also do not like to lose American lives or fortune we will have to be the catalyst but i absolutely agree that this needs to be a Muslim nations and European heavy lifting show.

Of you will have to fight with the wacky wing of the GOP and the NEOCON Nippleheads because they keep thing that Obama is not "leading", we need to "lead" we need to be great again.

 

I always heard that Toronto was a very safe city but that was before the Muslim invasion. I am a bit surprised that even now it still is. Does Canada keep records by religion for those arrested for violent crime ?

 

Actually Mr Zorroaster maintains a very rational opinion based on fact rather than emotion. Important decisions should never be made on emotion.

All the hype and hysteria are exactly what terrorist want and it means that they are winning when we react that way.

It isnt about being smug. Its about being fortunate enough to not be personally touched to be able to evaluate and decide on a rational level as opposed to emotional.

Fighting terrorism is right action. Over reacting leads to making poor choices.

 

You may be right about the real effect being minuscule, but the attitude you are promoting is one of complete ignorance and indifference. The USA and other nations should, by all means, be taking an active role in fighting terrorism. Just because it is unlikely that somebody will die in a terror attack, we cannot allow evil organisations like ISIS to fester as a disease beneath everyone's indifference.

'By controlling the number of Muslims in our society, we do two things: 1) reduce the pool of people from which they can draw, and 2) reduce their ability to blend in with local populatins. This, combined with aggressive intelligence, is really all we need.'

This is where your proposal becomes especially dangerous. Deciding to regulate the numbers of Muslims in a society would mean that you most likely believe any Muslim, at any time, could become a vile terrorist. Such a view is ignorant, and I should not need to explain why. You are also actively encouraging segregation to force Muslims apart from the local population, which is a measure that I would associate with an oppressive regime. 'Aggressive intelligence' often implies thought policing. Ideologies cannot be killed, they can only be suppressed and made minuscule, and no one should be sentenced for what they might be thinking - only for their actions.

 

Toronto is still safe. No they don't keep records on the religion of murderers. Suffice to say that the influx of Muslims hasn't increased the murder or crime rate.

 

Perhaps you can answer the question why you say ISIS has hijacked Islam when they are doing nothing that Mohamed didn't do first include waging war, beheading captives, enslaving women, burning people alive and torturing captives.

And it is not just ISIS, but Al Qaeda, Al Nusra, Boko Haram, Al Shabaab, and many smaller groups all over the world. What is it in the world that, at this moment in time, bunches of criminal thugs all over the world are hijacking Islam? To me it really appears as a sort of religious revival to an original and more pure form of Islam transcending any one personality or group.

 

There is a huge gap between being hysterical and being present.
Obama is not present. He would be, if it were something he cared about, as we've already seen!

 

This is the same thought process that allowed Hitler to gain power. ISIS wants a worldwide caliphate. If everybody sits back and lets them do their thing they will metastasize.

 

It's not about panicking. It's about reality. Most American's weren't immediately threatened by Hitler either. But if we hadn't stopped him who knows what would have happened. When an ideology, with millions of adherents, openly professes their desire to destroy your way of life, you should probably pay attention and do something about it.

 

Excellent analysis and that is something not seen that often on this board.

 

We were making rather good progress until Obama got in....he has consistently under-estimated the threat of Islamic Jihadism. All this diplomatic, play nice, and talk politically correct garbage is only giving them time....and time is on their side....once they acquire wmd potential then all hell will break loose.

 

Excellent point....aka there is no way to differentiate between a good muslim and a bad one....and one additional point......aka.....a good one today might become a radicalized(bad)one tomorrow.

Thus all the b.s. about vetting them is horse manure.....impossible to solve the inherent problem that way.....the inherent problem actually is letting so many of them come over here....we do not even know how many are here...much less where they are or what they might be doing.....this policy of letting them come in here by the droves and to go back and forth is insane....absolutely insane.

And then..................when anyone comes up with some idea on how to combat these religious fanatics...obama say....dat not us. Pathetic

 

obama may not be a 'rogue president' but he is damn near close.