HC: I am glad that you read Mr. Gore's speech. You are stronger than I because I can't bear to even listen to Mr. Bush's. Nevertheless, even the strong can be WRONG.
But all kidding aside, are you paid by Richard Mellon Scaife to troll around the sites and push the GOP agenda. I wish the Democrats had that much money. :lol:
jadams
"Can it be believed that the democracy that has overthrown the feudal system and vanquished kings will retreat before tradesmen and capitalists?" Alexis de Tocqueville, Democracy in America
Remember (if you are old enough) that people were predicting a close election in 1980. Americans wanted a change form Jimmy Carter's malaise, and after hearing Reagan speak in the debates, they felt comfortable enough about him to vote for him.Originally Posted by Tristan
Brian you are right on that point,
Either Bush will win big or be defeated big time, I am predicting the former than the latter for various reasons.
Again, if people want more of the same, Bush wins. If they want a change, Kerry wins. Either way, I disagree with HC -- I don't think it will be a squeaker. I tthink the bases are large enough on both sides that it won't be a landslide like 1984, but it could easily be a ten point margin, enough to be decisive.
I want people to know that peace is possible even in this stupid day and age. Prem Rawat, June 8, 2008
You didn't read it, so you don't have any idea whether it was worth bothering with or not.No. You're not reading carefully. I opined about the fact that you chose to respond at such intemperate length, and in such purple prose, to a speech by someone who isn't even running for office, on a subject that shouldn't evoke such controversy. I did not opine on the content of what Gore said or what you said in response. I actually consider that not worthy of bothering with.
As for Gore, he's not personally running office, but it if you imagine he's not speaking for the Kerry campaign, or more accurately putting out the red meat for the base, then you don't understand electoral politics. The Gore speech is precisely equivalent in function to the TV ads you commented on that seemed aimed at Bush's base.
Because it's being spun as 'patriotic', when in fact it's damaging to America and our efforts, and because it's a basic part of the Kerry campaign theme.
Why bother analyzing it at all? That's what I'm asking. Why do you feel it needs rebuttal?The reason I did such an elaborate response is that the speech itself, by its structure, couldn't be analyzed any other way.
Precisely. It got people needlessly killed then, too.Oh, pshaw. It happened for years during Vietnam. What are you talking about?And no, this isn't standard politics. It's almost unprecedented for the opposition to do what they're doing right now with troops on the ground.
Not necessarily, no. But it probably will be as long as neither side does anything to alter the balance, which so far they haven't. Kerry simply hasn't done anything to even seriously try to appeal to the 'red' voters, Bush ditto with the 'blues'.I would say rather that it was because Clinton was popular and people saw no reason to change. But whatever the cause, the point remains thatNo, but it was because Dole failed to bring out his base.
this "divide" you see in American culture isn't necessarily going to be reflected in presidential elections.
In 1996, Dole ran one of the most inept campaigns in modern history. The discontent among his base was palpable, I know because I heard them and saw them and spoke to them. They respected him, but they didn't see him trying very hard, and he kept reaching out to win over members of the opposition base, which is rarely sound strategy.
Certainly, the good economy in '96 made it harder to rev his base up, but note that even with it, Clinton pulled only 50%. He basically held the Democrats, while Dole could not do the same for the GOP voters.
That isn't the only reason, though it's part of it. But you're not going to like the consensus that's forming about those pictures, when it's finished.Then why have Bush's poll numbers gone down so much since the revelations about the prison? Look, I'm not prepared to believe that all Bush supporters are moral cripples. Torture and sadism are things that nobody with a conscience approves of, regardless of politics.What is your point? Of COURSE they're connected to what's happening in Iraq! What you misunderstand is the nature of their discontent. The Democrats are upset, more or less, that we're in Iraq at all. The GOP discontent is closer to a sense that we're trying to fight by half measures, and playing a 'pc war'.It's possible that Bush will do the same, though unlikely under the circumstances. But that's the only way Kerry is likely to get a 'landslide'.
You do. His name his George Soros, and as a matter of fact he funds Moveon.org, and thus Al's elaborate campaign commercial.
Bottom line, nobody is neutral.
This has never been about al Queda only.
Because 'marginal' in that part of the world has a different meaning than it does here. Remember, the Arab world is not democratic at all. The public has essentially no input into any decision-making, except by the ultimate necessity of maintaining at least their apathy.
2) But if we are discussing terrorism in general, I must ask you how they are marginal within their own societies, yet we have states that are identified as supporters of terrorism, and many others that perhaps are not on that list but do (Pakistan, Saudi Arabia)?
If they are so marginal, why were we compelled to disable the entire ruling apparatii of two countries?
In a real sense, every movement is marginal there, except for the rulers, who hold a monopoly on power that is simultaneously far more extensive, and far more fragile, then most Westerners readily comprehend.
They aren't really the same movements, in detail. In the larger sense, they prospered because they were mostly ignored. Israel was a partial exception.
3)Terrorism did not start in 2001, nor in 1993. As a child we saw a marine barracks blown to smithereens, planes hijacked, etc. In 1972 there was Munich. In 1968 Sirhan Sirhan gunned down Bobby Kennedy in California.
How far back do you wish to go? If these movements are so marginal, how have they managed to prosper for so long?
What makes you think they do? So far, they've remained remarkably quiet, for all the apocalyptic predictions. They hate America, to a point, but I suspect it's more a hatred of a symbol than the reality. Based on recent experiences, the truly dominant emotional state in the 'Arab Street' appears to be a bitter apathy.The question is, why is it the Arab Street that feels it necessary to bring down America?
The stop the current brewing threat to Western (and especially American and Israeli) lives, we have to kill them (meaning the terrorists and their supporters) first. That sounds rather simplistic, but it's the truth.
Once we can answer that question with a more thoughtful, less knee jerk response like "let's invade and sort it out later" then we can perhaps start to understand how we can truly stop terrorism as we know it.
In the larger term, nobody knows the answer to the question fully. The effort to rebuild Iraq is in fact one partial attempt at such an answer. We could, of course, simply have removed Hussein and left matters to fall as they would. Part of the reason we're still there is an attempt, clumsy and mismanaged as it has been, to provide a partial answer to the larger question.
Hold that thought.
The other question is, "WHY is the Arab world perpetually controlled by autocrats? It goes with the question of why our problems are rising from that part of the world.
I like the question "why?" I feel it is a very important one.
Nobody truly knows all the answer. I suspect it's partly rooted in a basic religious incompatibility. The problem is not that Islam can not cope with science, several of the basic elements of Western science were actually laid down in Islamic societies, over 1000 years ago. But Islam, by its basic tenets, has a hard time with the very concept of a 'secular society'.
And you should come up with a better answer than "they hate us because we're so rich and cool" or "they hate us because we have it so good being fat and uninsured." Many areas of the world can stake a claim in that kind of reprension towards the US. Why is it the Middle East that has spawned those who are willing to act on it?
Part of the reason for that is that what the West calls 'secular society' looks to Islamic eyes like a corrupt version of Christian society, rather than a truly a-religious society. Their perception is deeply flawed, but it contains just enough truth to make it dangerous. Many of the values that the West now considers 'secular' are actually just Judeo-Christian ideals repackaged a bit. Thus, many of the ideals we like to consider basic morality, feel to them like an imposition of foreign rule.
The hatred in the Middle East is partly based on a resentment of their relative position in the world, compared to the West. But I think it's also based on the fact that every single high hope Arabs ever held out since the collapse of the Western European colonial empires has been disappointed, for a variety of reasons.
Partly, that's just from sheer bad luck (if such a thing can be said to exist). The leaders of the Arab states after the fall of the European empires took all the wrong examples from the developed world. They stove for centralized command economies, they tried to concentrate all the power in the hands of the ruler (sometimes even with good intentions), and they found themselves caught in the crossfile of the Cold War. For various reasons, not all of them the fault of the Arabs, they ended up tending to align themselves with the Soviets. (Sub-saharan Africa made several of the exact same errors, and as a result the misery there is even worse than it is in the Middle East, since the Middle East is an ancient civilization, while Sub-S Africa is not.)
Today, they've seen their patron in the Cold War collapse, they've seen the rest of the world zoom past them economically, including many of the other 'less-developed' regions, and they find themselves simply unable to uproot Israel. Yet their religious beliefs require them to see themselves as the natural leaders of the world. The contradiction is agony to some.
This last is made far worse by the fact that the Arab governments use the Palestinian-Israeli mess as a source of provisional legitimacy. The problem could have been solved decades ago, except for the fact that many Arab governments find having a large Palestinian population, trapped in ghastly misery against Israel's borders, so very useful.
The truth is that nobody, and I mean nobody, knows how to fix this mess. George Bush doesn't know, John Kerry doesn't know, Kofi Annan doesn't know, nobody knows. Bush has made a stab at answering it, in part, in Iraq, but it'll be many years before we know how well it works out.
IIANM that is just the Gallup poll. But I said it wasn't worth anything right now. None of the polls mean much with the election half a year away. Eighteen months ago right-wingers were gloating over 90% approval ratings, today left-wingers are doing the same over 40% ones, neither ever had anything to do with anything.Is that a weighed average of different opinion polls or just one opinion poll?
If the results of the last few months remain the same to November the election would be a very close one.
But there are other parts of the world ruled by autocrats. There are other parts of the world still upset by colonialism, locked in deadly civil wars where the US plays a significant role, from Colombia, to Haiti, to Liberia and elsewhere.
Terrorism is obviously not only a Islamic phenomenon. There are Basque terrorists, and Irish terrorists, and even American terrorists, like Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nicholls.
I am still wondering what has caused the Middle East, of all places, to invest so much in killing Americans and stopping American interests.
One could imagine Colombian rebels having similar aspirations...
:lol: :lol: :lol:
3) No man is a complete waste; he can always be used as a cautionary example!
Vince,
Maybe I have counted him out too rashly!!! :wink:
Americans have had enough of glitz and roar . . Foreboding has deepened, and spiritual currents have darkened . . .
THE FOURTH TURNING IS AT HAND.
See T4T, p. 253.
In your opinion. The pro-war camp links Saddam and 911 sort of like this.
1] 911 was done by al Qaeda, which is a terrorist organization
2] 911 began The War on Terrorism
3] The War on Terrorism means fightng terrorists and their supporters.
4] Saddam supported Hamas, which is a terrorist organization.
5] Thus, Saddam is a supporter of terrorism and hence a legitimate target of the War on Terrorism
There is a consensus agreement on 1, 2, and 4. There is not on what point three means, meaning there is no consensus on point 5. Simply asserting otherwise does not create a consensus. If Bush wins in a landslide as Marc predicts, this will likely create a consensus for his policy (at least temporarily). If Bush loses or wins in a squeaker, then this consensus will not not been achieved. Since WW II, permanent consensus on the wisdom of war policies has generally been formed in hindsight.
If Iraq becomes a democracy or even a Western-leaning authoritarian regime the consensus will be that the war was a good idea. If Iraq becomes a failed state and Iraqis join the Saudi, Eqyptian and Yemeni terrorists in al Qaeda, then consensus opinion will be that the war was unwise. The same will likely happen if Iraq ends up as an anti-American theocracy and no WMDs are ever found.
HC actually caught one of those posts (and responded to it) before I deleted it. :wink:This must have been good too!
Actually its not that hard to come up with a good answer. One has to ask the right questions.
The first question is, did 911 change the way you think about terrorism? If it did (and I expect this is true for many Americans) the next question is why? What is it about 911 that is different from Oklahoma city ot the 1983 marine barracks bombing? Is it just the number of dead, or is it something else?
One you get these answers you have a good start.
I tend to agree Mike. Except that even if Iraq does become a Western-leaning authoritarian regime, I have a feeling some controversy is likely to remain embedded in our collective analysis for a long, long time to come.In your opinion. The pro-war camp links Saddam and 911 sort of like this.
1] 911 was done by al Qaeda, which is a terrorist organization
2] 911 began The War on Terrorism
3] The War on Terrorism means fightng terrorists and their supporters.
4] Saddam supported Hamas, which is a terrorist organization.
5] Thus, Saddam is a supporter of terrorism and hence a legitimate target of the War on Terrorism
There is a consensus agreement on 1, 2, and 4. There is not on what point three means, meaning there is no consensus on point 5. Simply asserting otherwise does not create a consensus. If Bush wins in a landslide as Marc predicts, this will likely create a consensus for his policy (at least temporarily). If Bush loses or wins in a squeaker, then this consensus will not not been achieved. Since WW II, permanent consensus on the wisdom of war policies has generally been formed in hindsight.
If Iraq becomes a democracy or even a Western-leaning authoritarian regime the consensus will be that the war was a good idea. If Iraq becomes a failed state and Iraqis join the Saudi, Eqyptian and Yemeni terrorists in al Qaeda, then consensus opinion will be that the war was unwise. The same will likely happen if Iraq ends up as an anti-American theocracy and no WMDs are ever found.
And let me add that Iran and Pakistan (and possibly Saudi Arabia in a more indirect way) were even more legitmate targets in respect to criterion #3. Furthermore, #4 and #5 did not constitute an "imminent" or "immediate" threat to the USA and therefore did not warrant a unilateral (or at least non-UN, non-NATO sanctioned) pre-emptive invasion.
Americans have had enough of glitz and roar . . Foreboding has deepened, and spiritual currents have darkened . . .
THE FOURTH TURNING IS AT HAND.
See T4T, p. 253.
Your initial reaction to Gore's speech was to go along with Sam Johnson and call it "borderline traitorous." Then you took it back, sort of, when you saw TK's reaction to that.No, you haven't, Kiff, not if you agree with what Brian said.
I strongly disagree that political dissent, even during wartime, amounts to anything approaching treason. And I am sick and tired of that tactic being used by Bush supporters -- and the argument that any criticism of him and his policies is "unpatriotic."
I believe that what has been done by this invasion and occupation of a nation that did not attack us goes so much against what America represents that it must be opposed -- and I don't particularly care who stands up and says so.
HC, I think you and I have reached an impasse on this issue, and I don't really see that we have anything more to discuss at this point.
It's these calls of "treason" or faulting individuals as "unpatriotic" or "enabling the enemy" that leads many of us to worry about the rightist, proto-fascist tendencies of some of our fellow citizens.Your initial reaction to Gore's speech was to go along with Sam Johnson and call it "borderline traitorous." Then you took it back, sort of, when you saw TK's reaction to that.No, you haven't, Kiff, not if you agree with what Brian said.
I strongly disagree that political dissent, even during wartime, amounts to anything approaching treason. And I am sick and tired of that tactic being used by Bush supporters -- and the argument that any criticism of him and his policies is "unpatriotic."
I believe that what has been done by this invasion and occupation of a nation that did not attack us goes so much against what America represents that it must be opposed -- and I don't particularly care who stands up and says so.
HC, I think you and I have reached an impasse on this issue, and I don't really see that we have anything more to discuss at this point.
If they were to put their money where their mouths were, and were in a position to do so, we would no doubt rapidly unravel to that point.
... So, no matter how many folks have to die as a result, I 'm gonna yell "Fire!" in this movie thea, er, country all I want, even if there's just slim chance I'm right about that.
Well, we certainly knew he was, to the tune of $25,000 for each human bomb.
So what? It's business as usual. Hamas keeps bombing, and Jenny Genser keeps voting for Congressman Jim Moran who supports Hamas. What else is new?
Why do you worry about Woodrow Wilsonian tactics? Were the good Wilsonians that murdered a Nordic man in Duluth, Minnesota for pacific views on "The War to End All Wars" not agents of Progress and democracy?
Were not the cleansers of sauerkraut and Brahms and non-intervention doing their civic duty? It's the Unravelling at play.
4T cleansers of thought/ brainwasher
Today on Radio Dubya the host, Rush Limbaugh, declared Lincoln and FDR to be heroes of his because "they knew it," unlike so many other American politcians, such as Thomas Jefferson. "It" was the notion that Americans do not have the right of free speech when that speech is in conflict with "the national interest." Limbaugh was making the Lincolnian case for having the state censor all antiwar voices in order to prop up the neocon Bush regime.
Of course, the big question is: Who is to define "the national interest?" Historically, this question has been answered by Stalin, Mao, Hitler, Mussolini, Lincoln, and others with the word "me." Rush clearly wants to bring back the Sedition Act, which made it a crime punishable by prison to criticize the central government.
Limbaugh's Heroes: Lincoln and FDR
Posted by Mr. Thomas DiLorenzo at 01:27 PM on 1 June 2004
It is that simple, yet not in that way. Concerned citizens who are passionate about their country are allowed to question their government, and according to White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan, encouraged to do so. If they think their government is doing a shitty job of protecting their national interests, or is wasting their money on personal vendettas, or that their president is a tad bizarre in his homoerotic relationship with Saddam Hussein and find the fact that he keeps Saddam's pistol as a souvenir a little freaky, they have the right to do so and loudly.... So, no matter how many folks have to die as a result, I 'm gonna yell "Fire!" in this movie thea, er, country all I want, even if there's just slim chance I'm right about that.
I am terrified of living in a nation where such freedoms would be stifled, and would flee any attempt by a fascist insurgency, howver benevolent they claim to be, to impose restrictions on our fundamental American rights.
On the other hand, if you are plotting to blow up apartment buildings, then you should be apprehended. If this is indeed a "war" then you should be treated according to the protocol laid out in the Geneva Conventions. If you are an American citizen, then you should face the same domestic laws that other American terrorists, like Timothy McVeigh, were subject to.
Case closed. It really is that simple, and it CAN be done.
Only in that it caused me to upgrade it a bit on the priority list. While I had no idea that an attack was coming on that particular day, or in that particular way, I've always taken it for granted that sooner or later the bubble would be broken, and I've always been fairly sure that the troubles in the Middle East would boil over in some way that would burn us. I thoght this long before I ever heard of either Strauss & Howe or Osama bin Laden.Actually its not that hard to come up with a good answer. One has to ask the right questions.
The first question is, did 911 change the way you think about terrorism?
For that matter, I always took it for granted, ever since the end of the first Gulf War, that sooner or later something would have to be done to finish off the Hussein problem.
I was a bit surprised at how successful such a complex plan (meaning 911), with so many moving parts, turned out to be.
Are you serious?!
What is it about 911 that is different from Oklahoma city ot the 1983 marine barracks bombing? Is it just the number of dead, or is it something else?
Oklahoma City was the work of a small group, who were captured and dealt with. There isn't and never was an ongoing threat from the ilk of McVeigh and Co.
There was and is an ongoing threat from Al Queda and their allies and parallels. They aren't (at leaast in the foreseeable future) a threat to the survival of the United States, but it's eminently possible that they could kill thousands, tens of thousands, or more people, by any of several means.
How many corpses does it take to constitute an ongoing threat?:-?
But none of those places combines all the various factors that bedevil the Middle East, from the disappointed expectations of the 50s and 60s to the religious incompatibilities, from the legacy of a troublesome colonial period to the basic frustration with their choices. Further, the matter is aggravated by the presence of the enormous oil reserves under the Middle East, which causes those former colonial powers to take a never-ending interest in the politics and economics of the region.But there are other parts of the world ruled by autocrats. There are other parts of the world still upset by colonialism, locked in deadly civil wars where the US plays a significant role, from Colombia, to Haiti, to Liberia and elsewhere.
'Terrorism' is a word so broad as to mean little. The mostly lone-small group actions of McVeigh and Co. have little or nothing in common with what al Queda, Hamas, etc, are doing. What McVeigh did was, in essence, closer to what happened at Columbine or West Paducah, on a larger scale.
Terrorism is obviously not only a Islamic phenomenon. There are Basque terrorists, and Irish terrorists, and even American terrorists, like Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nicholls.
The Basque terrorists are a little closer to al Queda, but again, they have a closer kinship with the IRA. They are an on-going threat, but on a smaller scale than al Queda, and their goals don't call for mass slaughter so much as for making so much political trouble that the ruling government decides it isn't worth the trouble not to give them what they want, be it a unified Ireland or a separate Basque sovereignty. They certainly kill people, maim people, etc, but their goals are firmly in this world, and if their methods are vile, their goals are comprehensible.
While I manifestly do not consider bin Laden to be a madman, his goals are not satisfiable, in the same sense the IRA or the Basque's theoretically could be. bin Laden's goals, to reach fulfilment in reality, would pretty much require either the destruction of the West, or such a collapse of will there as to render the West powerless. The minimum he and his ilk can settle for is more than the most the West can give.
The same situation obtains in Israel/Palestine. The absolute, bare minimum acceptable setttlement to Hamas and Fatah and the rest is more than Israel can even consider giving, as was demonstrated at Camp David a few years ago.
al Queda, for their part, has been fairly up-front about what they want. It's just that it's so extreme, by our standards, that Westerners have a hard time accepting that they really mean it.
Not quite. I agree with Johnson, but if he is 100% I am at about 70%. My first reaction to Gore's recklessness was such that I started out closer to 85%, and cooled off a little with time.Your initial reaction to Gore's speech was to go along with Sam Johnson and call it "borderline traitorous." Then you took it back, sort of, when you saw TK's reaction to that.No, you haven't, Kiff, not if you agree with what Brian said.
It's not a tactic, Kiff, it's a fact of life that ill-handled dissent during wartime increases casualties and makes victory hard. This isn't going away, ever.
I strongly disagree that political dissent, even during wartime, amounts to anything approaching treason. And I am sick and tired of that tactic being used by Bush supporters -- and the argument that any criticism of him and his policies is "unpatriotic."
It is hard to dissent during wartime, there's a fine moral line which binds the opposition. Gore and the rest have an obligation to weigh their words very carefully, distinguishing between questioning the wisdom of the policy and giving encouragement to the enemy. Gore has knowingly and recklessly crossed that line.
Do you care how many people die for it, who need not have died? If you don't care, then we really have reached impasse.
I believe that what has been done by this invasion and occupation of a nation that did not attack us goes so much against what America represents that it must be opposed -- and I don't particularly care who stands up and says so.
Look, there's no way you can avoid this dichotomy. What is said on the home front does affect what happens in the field, and the views of the home public are part of the battle. Anybody who thinks otherwise is simply wrong, and wrong in a way that can get people maimed and killed.It's these calls of "treason" or faulting individuals as "unpatriotic" or "enabling the enemy" that leads many of us to worry about the rightist, proto-fascist tendencies of some of our fellow citizens.Your initial reaction to Gore's speech was to go along with Sam Johnson and call it "borderline traitorous." Then you took it back, sort of, when you saw TK's reaction to that.No, you haven't, Kiff, not if you agree with what Brian said.
I strongly disagree that political dissent, even during wartime, amounts to anything approaching treason. And I am sick and tired of that tactic being used by Bush supporters -- and the argument that any criticism of him and his policies is "unpatriotic."
I believe that what has been done by this invasion and occupation of a nation that did not attack us goes so much against what America represents that it must be opposed -- and I don't particularly care who stands up and says so.
HC, I think you and I have reached an impasse on this issue, and I don't really see that we have anything more to discuss at this point.
Dissent is acceptable in wartime, but those expressing have to do so in a more constrained way than they do in peacetime, if they want to behave responsibly. That's not facism, TX. That's just the way things are.
What Bin Laden and his ilk really want is for America and the rest of the West "to submit", i.e. give up Judeo-Christianity and convert en masse to Islam. I've actually heard Al Queda sympathizers, being interviewed on CNN, actually expressing that precise sentiment. Idiots. Don't they realize that the West will blow up the world before that will be allowed to happen?But none of those places combines all the various factors that bedevil the Middle East, from the disappointed expectations of the 50s and 60s to the religious incompatibilities, from the legacy of a troublesome colonial period to the basic frustration with their choices. Further, the matter is aggravated by the presence of the enormous oil reserves under the Middle East, which causes those former colonial powers to take a never-ending interest in the politics and economics of the region.But there are other parts of the world ruled by autocrats. There are other parts of the world still upset by colonialism, locked in deadly civil wars where the US plays a significant role, from Colombia, to Haiti, to Liberia and elsewhere.
'Terrorism' is a word so broad as to mean little. The mostly lone-small group actions of McVeigh and Co. have little or nothing in common with what al Queda, Hamas, etc, are doing. What McVeigh did was, in essence, closer to what happened at Columbine or West Paducah, on a larger scale.
Terrorism is obviously not only a Islamic phenomenon. There are Basque terrorists, and Irish terrorists, and even American terrorists, like Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nicholls.
The Basque terrorists are a little closer to al Queda, but again, they have a closer kinship with the IRA. They are an on-going threat, but on a smaller scale than al Queda, and their goals don't call for mass slaughter so much as for making so much political trouble that the ruling government decides it isn't worth the trouble not to give them what they want, be it a unified Ireland or a separate Basque sovereignty. They certainly kill people, maim people, etc, but their goals are firmly in this world, and if their methods are vile, their goals are comprehensible.
While I manifestly do not consider bin Laden to be a madman, his goals are not satisfiable, in the same sense the IRA or the Basque's theoretically could be. bin Laden's goals, to reach fulfilment in reality, would pretty much require either the destruction of the West, or such a collapse of will there as to render the West powerless. The minimum he and his ilk can settle for is more than the most the West can give.
The same situation obtains in Israel/Palestine. The absolute, bare minimum acceptable setttlement to Hamas and Fatah and the rest is more than Israel can even consider giving, as was demonstrated at Camp David a few years ago.
al Queda, for their part, has been fairly up-front about what they want. It's just that it's so extreme, by our standards, that Westerners have a hard time accepting that they really mean it.
