During the great depression, the best selling product was Bibles. Think about what your life is worth. Now think about what your life is worth in terms of dollars. If a global corporation figures out that it cost less to pay off your life insurance than to protect your life, you will die. Al Qaeda doesn't hate are freedom (the GWB lie), they hate our Materialism.

Think about it in reference to Maslow's hierarchy of needs. Terrorism threatens our base needs. That is why the fear is so affective. Now think about what motivates the terrorists and why they are able to recruit so well. The terrorist are fighting Materialism. That spiritual need of fighting materialism is at the top of the pyramid. Self Actualization. That is why the terrorist have the upper hand. They don't care if they die, and they have a religion that is more powerful in motivating people because it's not tied to materialism as much as ours. The poorer we make Muslims, the more likely they will run to that extreme version of Islam al Qaeda.

In the sense that Materialism is our biggest threat and their biggest enemy as well, al Qaeda has already won their war. We can't win our war on terrorism with votes or weapons alone. We can't kill every muslim on the planet. We have to get Americans to change the way they think about Materialism and its effects.

You can't put a price on everything, but our currency system attempts to. In the process, it devalues human life. We are seeing it here at home. Machines replace people, jobs go to sweatshops over seas, weapons manufacturers supply all sides of the war for profit, humane CEOs get fired because they don't turn profit. Where does it end? The currency system has taken on a life of its own. The system has gotten so powerful that even the richest billionaires can't stop the downslide of humanity versus profiteering. Humanity is getting crushed under the weight of dollars. Wealth doesn't care which countries fall because it can live in any country. Dollars don't care if humanity falls because dollars aren't even human.

I'm not suggesting a "Project Mayhem" like in the movie "Fight Club" to bring down the money system. Our currency system is too decentralized to take out an any one point any way. I'm also not suggesting that we resort to any violent revolution and stoop to the level of al Qaeda. I'm saying that we recognize that Spiritual Force (religion) has declared war on a material world (global capitalism). Whether its a negative material force like dropping bombs, or a positive material force like trying to bribe someone with wealth, it doesn't work against spiritualism. They don't want material things and they don't care if they die. The only way to stop that Spiritual force is with another spiritual force, humanitarianism.

Humanitarian = The Art and Science of supporting the Individual [B]Person

Interesting that this is closely related to target='_blank'>


http://www.commongroundcommonsense.org/for...topic=10429&hl= #3.

In many ways I agree with you, but in others not so much...

I'd have to add to the discussion that al Qaeda (via interviews, taped statements, Web sites, prisoner interrogations and its self-published papers/pamphlets) has made more than a few rumblings about wanting an Islamic planet. At the very least, reconquering the 'apostate nation' of Spain is on their wish-list.

Their European ambitions are obviously more likely to be facilitated by demographic means than military (the days of the green-flagged massive army sweeping across the world in a jihadist crusade are long past).

I submit that the hard core of al Qaeda cannot and should not be appeased. Frankly, death is the only thing that's going to stop them.

But for the pre-recruits, that vast mass of discontented youth throughout the Islamic world, the solution is social and political. Reform in the Islamic (particularly the Arab) world is key, as is peace between Israel and her neighbors. Reduce the temperature of that flashpoint and you'll do a great deal to dry up the recruitment pool.

That spiritual need of fighting materialism is at the top of the pyramid. Self Actualization.



Uh, I don't get this point. You don't "fight" materialism in a spiritual mode...you leave it behind. It's the realization of the LACK of need of material items that's the actualization.

Actualization = Alturisum is being motivated in a strong, spritual way to make human existance better for everyone. Being spritual does not mean religion but feeling something is more important than Self.

I agree, but not everyone sees it that way. Al Qaeda has waged a material war to fight materialism. However, they are motivated by spiritualism. If you just kill them without defeating their spiritual motivation, others will be motivated by it even more. Once they are dead, they become martyrs. They need a spiritual defeat in the material world.

Farmers were the first moral philosophers, they don't expect to reap if they have not sown, and they know very well that, if they sow cabbages they will not harvest carrots. How can someone who sows nothing but hatred and strife hope to reap a harvest of love and peace? If you want a marble palace you are not going to start building with clay bricks. If you want a healthy body you are not going to give it poisonous food.

How can anyone expect to develeop a healthy, sturdy psyche, a lucid mind and a generous heart if he is seething with anarchic thoughts and feelings poisoned by his own greed and resentment? Exactly as we sift and select suitable food or building materials, we have to sift and select the thoughts and feelings that present themselves to us. The laws that govern the psychic life are the same as those which have already been seen to govern other aspects of nature or technology. It was neither man nor society as a whole that invented morality: it is intrinsic to nature, to every aspect and dimension of nature. Morality is simply the extension on the human, psychic level, of the laws of nature.

Omraam Mikhael Aivanhov

Social and Political could be the same thing as Spiritual.

Nobody is suggesting that al Qaeda gets appeased. But a military solution will not solve the spiritual problem. Reform in the Islamic world cannot and should not be done forcefully. We can encourage it, but decisions have to be made from within. The only forceful acts should be direct and surgical attacks on known terrorists.

One of the generals said before the Iraq invasion "The Military is a Hammer, but not every problem is a Nail".

I'm not trying to be disrepectful or anything...but have you all ever read the litany of bin laden's endless transcripts....in full? The media does not tell the whole story. Give OBL a listen, and realize how many support him, and then tell me what you do with a group of people that want this to flourish, or how do you reason with this group of people?

http://www.memri.org/bin/articles.cgi?Page...ihad&ID=SP53903

You can't reason with bin Laden. You can reason with those who are potential al Qaeda before they become al Qaeda. But we should at least understand bin Laden before we make him a martyr.

I believe that one of our main strategies should be to always try to keep ourselves positioned so that we can ignore the Ben Ladens of the world. They really don't have much of a game unless we cooperate with them. A hand full of them can terriorize millions of us only if we allow them. We need to stop doing all the wrong thinks that are making the situation wrose like waging war in Iraq.