The significance escaped me the first time when I read this:

Let me know where you see some middle ground, here.

I knew that misunderstanding was inevitable across the partisan gulf. You always mischaracterize "understanding" as sympathy. There was no sympathy in what I wrote. I was criticizing our unwillingness to examine our enemy objectively and analyze what makes him really tick. Instead, we rely on feelgood but meaningless pronouncements like "they jes' plain hate freedom!" That, to be blunt, is simply stupid. If America's foreign policy and anti-terrorism strategy is based on that shallow an understanding of the problem, then we're dead meat.

And speaking of stupid, since when is it appeasement to note that if America reduced its foolish dependence on Middle Eastern oil we would be better off intrinsically, from the environment to national security, regardless of the terrorist threat. That's something we could do without even the appearance of weakness, because it's simply the smart thing to do, and--news flash!--being smart makes us stronger. We've known the problem and its solution since long before bin Laden came on the scene, so it seems just plain stupid to me that we knowingly made ourselves hostage to those people. Is the way out to stubbornly remain hostage just to prove we're not weak? Does George W. Bush ever think with his brain instead of his balls????

Now I'm flamin'!