It was not very long ago that we all knew precisely what constitutes terrorism. It was always some derivation of the killing of civilians, for the express purpose of making a political statement, to achieve a political aim, that was directed by an organized group and not part of achieving a legitimate military objective. We never talked about its precise definition, but EVERYONE knew what it meant. Obvious examples were the PLO bombings in Israel and the IRA bombings in Ireland. These were attacks planned and directed by an organized group trying to make a political statement. You could even throw in bombings by the Weather Underground and maybe abortion clinic bombings into the mix, because these were organized activities supported and encouraged by centralized groups. Nobody EVER questioned the meaning of terrorist attack. When the first post office shootings occurred in the mid 80s and the term "going postal" was coined, NOBODY confused this with terrorism. It was suicidal lunatics deciding to go out in a blaze of glory, without a political aim, and lacking in having support and encouragement from a centralized group. When Timothy McVeigh bombed the OKC Federal building, the line began to get blurred. Yes he created violence to make a political statement, and had tangential ties to militia groups, but those militia groups did not explicitly condone or encourage precisely what he did. At any rate, while the line was slightly blurred, I think we could all legitimately acknowledge that what he did could also be called a terrorist attack. We all could also acknowledge that the Cole bombing and 9/11 were textbook examples of terrorism. Somewhere after 9/11, after the left and right took divergent positions relative to Islam, the definition of terrorism was disingenuously expanded to something along the lines of "Terrorism is the unlawful use of force and violence against persons or property to intimidate or coerce a government, the civilian population, or any segment thereof, in furtherance of political or social objectives." All of a sudden, according to this definition, some lunatic going postal now can be counted as a terrorist, as can any mass shooting by a mentally deranged individual. Spiking trees counts as terrorism, and so does bank robbery. Now all of a sudden we have hundreds of "terrorist attacks" that have happened on our soil since 1980. What do we have to gain by blurring this line?.....absolutely nothing. This was done expressly for the purpose of providing political cover for the left for their inexplicable defense of radical Islam. Now they can make misleading statements like "94% of terrorism in this country comes from non Muslims". When faced with an undeniably growing world problem with Radical Islamic Terrorism, it makes absolutely ZERO sense to broaden the definition so that Islamic based terrorism is hidden in the shadows. This would be akin to there being an increase in Rape, and instead of highlighting the growing problem with Rape, we decided to lump all violent acts into one category that includes assault and battery, murder etc. By lumping them all into one group, the increase in rape would be hidden, and by doing so, we would be hindering our ability to point out and address that specific growing problem. Nobody would do that when faced with a marked increase in Rape. For political reasons however, that is PRECISELY what the left is doing in regards to the marked increase in Radical Islamic Terrorism. In order to hide/deny the problem relative to Radical Islamic Terrorism, they are purposefully blurring the lines. While I know that some of you may be tempted to argue that the nightclub shooting was a lone suicidal gunman wanting to go out in a blaze of glory, it is undeniable that Radical Islam is actively seeking Lone Wolf attacks, and that fact alone makes it part of an organized plot and clearly a legitimate terrorist act by any definition.
Surely someone from the left side of the aisle must be willing to defend the reasoning behind the much expanded definition ?
