[This is not a call for war of any kind. Far from it. I have no doubts that we aren't going to fix what's wrong with ourselves or anyone else in the world by slugging it out. The observation which follows is only an attempt to help us realize that we are not doing what we say or think we are doing, and that any truly appropriate remedy isn't even being discussed by most of us.]
In spite of what we are being told by virtually every media source, the U.S. is really not interested in war. We are interested in wiping-out people and countries and evil-doers, but not if it involves any risk to ourselves. A magic ray gun or the equivalent high-tech toy is what we are interested in, not sending our boys to fight anything like a battle, a war.
[We've already shown the world that the most powerful nation on earth is even afraid of being its police force, let alone its military defense. There are 45,000 thousand peacekeepers stationed around the world at this moment. Only 700 of them are Americans. We don't want to risk injury or death. Of course we also know now that we don't want to risk being tried for genocide while on such police duty, although apparently the brave little countries risking the 44,300 remaining soldiers don't seem to have the same concern.]
Obliterating cities and countries from thirty thousand feet is not war. It's playing god.
I've written before about the cowardice of a nation which is so afraid of its shadow that, after a single horrendous act of free-lance terror, it closes-down its mind and its democratic culture in favor of investing a nincompoop and his handlers with divine powers and a divine aura. We are now willing to give up everything for what is only the illusion of safety. We have ceased to have a backbone; we have ceased to think for ourselves; we have ceased to be Americans.
The condition may still be reversible, but at this time we are demonstrably a nation of cowards.