Al Qaeda Opinion Polling

What’s the worst thing in the world? It used to be nuclear holocaust. We built fall out shelters and, just before my time, practiced the quaint, though pointless "duck and cover" routine. I don't know about you, but I could watch those videos all day long and not get tired of them. We did a lot of idiotic things in order to feel more secure against something that only rational thought and diplomacy could avoid.

Today it's a terrorist attack. For this we have a "War on Terror". This term has confused me since it was first introduced as one typically fights a group or ideology. I used to watch a lot of the "The World at War" WWII series with my dad when I was a kid and I don't have any recollection of the stern announcer dubbed over the footage of scruffy, cigarette smoking GIs walking alongside Sherman tanks in the French countryside saying, "The "War on Formed Divisions" marched on toward victory". The Nazis were Fascists and the Allied Forces were determined to eliminate them so we could get on with the pointless nuclear winter musings.

But instead of a group or ideology we are waging a war on a method? Some have been more specific and referred to Jihadists or Islamic Fascists, but that wouldn't explain the initial push to eliminate the Baathist regime, referred to by Osama bin Laden as Communists, in Baghdad. And what about the Basques in Spain or those wacky ecoterrorist groups in the northwest? As you can see, it is all a bit confusing.

Whatever we call it, we can only hope this "War on Something" is slightly more successful than the "War on Drugs". Since the Nixon Administration, complete with a Tsar, a term loaded with meaning that would appear contrary to American values, we have been fighting that one and the result is more drugs in higher potencies at lower prices. Yippee! If this war goes like that one we'll all soon be dead and in our place decent Muslims will be persecuted by a small minority of radical non-thinkers. Interestingly Republicans say Democrats would do less to protect us from Islamic extremists. Think about it; Al Qaeda is against alternate lifestyles, reproductive choice, minority rights and just about everything else that distinguishes the Democratic platform from the Republican. From the extreme right of American politics you get a feeling that some of them would be comfortable under an Al Qaeda government. Sorry, that was a typical hyperbolic blog statement. Should anyone have been offended by that statement I apologize (Sweet! overreaching blog statement countered with recently pervasive non-apology apology! Yes!).

Like the "duck and cover" exercises of the past, we have our current practices akin to a child's security blanket. The most obvious is the Terror Alert System. I believe we are in Orange and have been for the past 20 months or so. Take a moment and think of how your life has changed in this bright hue of alertness? Was a moment too long? Perhaps you stocked up on your plastic sheeting and duct tape when we were still in magenta? If so, make sure the expiration date on both is still good. Comedian Ron White suggested a two stage system- 1. Get a (expletive) helmet. 2. Put the (expletive) helmet on. As logical as the current system and much more action oriented.

We’ve also had droves of smokers bumming lights outside airports since their lighters were confiscated when they boarded. Some 80% of all the items TSA confiscated were lighters, in some cases taking four or five lighters off a single passenger who, in his or her nicotine driven paranoia, stashed multiple incendiary devices in their carry-on hoping to sneak one through. As an attachment to the Intelligence Bill signed in December 2004, the Congress banned lighters in reaction to the Shoe Bomber incident in 2001. The law came into effect the following spring, almost four years after a bruised Richard Reid was taken into custody. In between the President signing the law and the application of the ban several months later, TSA officials informed passengers that they would soon not be able to take on the lighter they now had in their possession. I tried to make that sentence more coherent, but the substance made it impossible. How the "terrorists" missed that window I do not know. In mid-2007 the TSA Chief Kip Hawley admitted taking lighters was "security theater" and all but torch type lighters were supposedly allowed, though you still see all sort of lighters being confiscated to this day. Maybe not everyone got the memo.

Matches were never banned as it was not deemed cost effective. How that gelled with the Cheney 1% premise (if there is even a 1% chance of a terrorist event taking place that could have a significant impact we must address it as if it was sure to happen) is unclear. That the 1% premise turns risk management on its head and ensures more likely scenarios will not be properly addressed due to limited resources is actually a comforting thought since no advanced civilization could really be that stupid so there must be sound logic at its foundation and risk management is just made up business speak to keep consultants employed. Right?

We are assured all these measures have been successful, along with a few dents in our civil liberties, since there hasn't been another major terrorist attack since 9/11. Improved security coordination internally and externally along with us calling Al Qaeda out to the parking lot of Iraq and our half completed efforts in Afghanistan probably has done much more. It's difficult to know what Al Qaeda and their affiliated groups are thinking or planning since pollsters tend to shy away from beheadings. However, that hasn't stopped dozens of politicians from asserting with great certainty what has or hasn't emboldened or assisted the enemy.

The latest of these pronouncements came from Iowa Republican Steve King concerning the "optics" of an Obama victory and Al Qaeda's jubilant reaction. My first inclination is to take King into custody and waterboard him as he seems to have far too much knowledge of what Al Qaeda is thinking. Similar pronouncements were made about John Kerry once the fact he was a combat war hero was obscured. A video by bin Laden four days before the 2004 election helped ratchet up the fear and Bush's poll numbers. I wish we could have polled Al Qaeda then. I bet you they were pretty steamed that their video helped secure Bush's second term when they really wanted Kerry, who like Obama, would have made life easy for them. In the absence of being able to ask Al Qaeda directly, let's wait for King to confess and then we can make an informed decision about who to vote for.