Nothing there about "appeasement", Tom. Four uses of the word "enemy". Hardheaded observations of the practical value of being able to get into your enemy's head.

The real "blind spot" here is your insistence that there must be some piece of critical "understanding" of jihadism that people are missing.

The resulting implication being, of course, that somehow there is a non-violent, yet non-submissive, way of dealing with such a belief system.

Or to simplify it, what the hell do you think I could get out of bin Laden's head--to use him as the most famous example of a more widespread phenomenon--that would change my view that it's either us or him? Specifics, please. Tell me what John F. Kerry would say new about bin Laden that Bush and others have not said.

I highly recommend you go back and review the writings of bin Laden and others like him so you can refresh yourself on what actually IS going on inside their heads, and what they would demand of our society in order not to be targeted for destruction by them.

We KNOW what's inside their heads. It's no secret. It hasn't been for years prior to 9/11. There's no deeper understanding required here, no magic formula for peaceful coexistence that only the mighty minds of Democrats can discern.

Of course, from your point of view, all you have to do is submit that there IS such a higher level of understanding, and that us poor benighted types who take a simpler view of being targeted for cultural and actual extinction will just never operate at the elevated conceptual planes of people like Nancy Pelosi.

You can dance faster around a simple concept than anyone else here--with possibly one exception. And then people get annoyed when I have to keep pounding at a point.