The 'Two Americas'

We're not referring to presidential nominee John Edwards' 'two Americas,' which was his ill-fated attempt to divide the electorate in the last election.  For an explication, we turn to Michael Barone, who segregates the electorate according to whether people believe radical Islamism or global warming is the greater threat, with Republicans and Democrats comprising the two camps respectively.

Mr. Barone ably characterizes each group, with Republicans asserting that America is a force for good and blameless with respect to the 9/11 attacks and the recently foiled attacks, and the Democrats' habitual introspection, looking in all the wrong places to explain "why they hate us." 

On the global warming front we find Republicans shaking their heads in amazement that Democrats are blindly willing to hobble our economy based on unsettled science, and argue that they're exploiting it to reach otherwise unachievable goals.

It's a Looking Glass scenario when viewed by the opposing party, but it strikes us as a staggering admission of political cynicism that there can't be some agreement on both issues.  Simply stated, the left should concede that there the issue of global warming does not enjoy the universal unanimity among atmospheric scientists it profess, and that moving forward without the Goliaths of China and India on board is a non-starter.

In contrast, Republicans could advance their cause by exercising some rhetorical restraint when describing the Islamic foes we all generally agree are much in evidence. 

The most meaningful crux of the broader debate is illustrated by Rep. John Murtha et al's assertion that we're merely antagonizing the radical Islamists and effectively creating the post-9/11 threat they've posed.  The most equitable way to resolve this is to look at what the radicals themselves have said and continue to say, and not just since 9/11.

There are numerous documents, assertions, and threats made by al-Qaeda leaders and other extremists, some dating to the 1980s.  In November 2001, Osama bin Laden himself said that if America wondered about the cause of 9/11 they should think about what happened 80 years ago.  That, of course, takes us to the end of the Ottoman Empire, and, in particular, to the abolition of the Caliphate, an event that most Americans know little or nothing about.

We don't pretend to know the underlying causes of the festering hatreds radical Islamists harbor for Westerners, particular Americans, but we know it's as real as the flames that shot up from the World Trade Center and the people who were incinerated that day.

Scholars such as Bernard Lewis and Samuel P. Huntington, who have spent their entire lives studying the Middle East, have argued modern Muslims are avenging centuries of alleged buse and oppression.  Others have posited that the failure of Middle Eastern nations to lift themselves from their stone-age, theocratic roots has perpetuated their stagnant economies, which, combined with their deep-seated hatred for Western culture, has convinced them that the West is to blame for their ills.

Bringing this full circle, it takes a rare blend of naivete and political hubris to discount the radical Islamists' threats to destroy the West, and therefore the Democrats who do so are taking political risk of monumental proportions.  Those among them who do take it seriously--Senator Joseph Lieberman comes to mind--are typically ostracized and lampooned.

It is curious that this dichotomy--between a threat based on the possibility of a dangerous change in global temperatures and one whose lethality has already been demonstrated--is not laughed off the stage.  Perhaps in the aftermath of the next attack the Democrats will finally realign their priorities.

Perhaps.