For David Brooks, who may be realizing that the liberal faith that all points of view have a point, and that talking can solve anything, doesn't apply to some people.

Some of us understood this when Islamists drove jumbo jets full of terrified men, women and children into skyscrapers filled with office workers.

Some of us got this point a lot further back than that. The Olympics in Munich, for example.

And maybe even the French are figuring it out:

"As the days pass by, doubt is creeping in," the daily Le Telegramme in the Atlantic port of Brest wrote in an editorial that questioned France's strategy of relying on its opposition to the Iraq war to win favor with the hostage takers.

"Demonstrations of friendship carry little weight in a region where the only audible language is that of the guns. Playing buddy-buddy is not enough," it said.