I wouldn't want you to get the idea that I'm obsessive or anything - not that you possibly could get such an idea - but here is another FKATWOT update. If the three reports I'll be linking to in this post are to be believed, serious thought is being given by President Obama's national security team to the question of how to rename the war on terror (please forgive the crudity). In case you might be hoping to find out from them why it needs to be renamed, don't. It's the same bunch of irrelevancies as before. Like:
After all, "terror" or terrorism is a tactic, not a country or some other identifiable foe to be targeted, confronted or defeated.
And:
Critics have long decried the use of the phrase "war on terror" on the grounds that terrorism is a tactic, not an identifiable enemy.
I have news for these guys: perceptive as they are in this matter, crime, drugs and poverty are also not countries or identifiable foes or enemies in the sense they intend, and yet metaphorical wars have been fought against all three. The president himself seems at a loss for a good reason for ditching the phrase. He is quoted as saying:
I think it is very important for us to recognize that we have a battle or a war against some terrorist organizations... But that those organizations aren't representative of a broader Arab community, Muslim community.
So for him it is a battle or a war, and against identifiable enemies at that, the 'interpreters' who preceded him here notwithstanding. But the terrorist organizations against whom this battle or war is being fought aren't to be thought of as representative of all Arabs or all Muslims. Indeed not. 'War on terror', however, doesn't say anything to the contrary, since what it says is, not 'Arabs', not 'Muslims', but 'terror'. I think I'll contact Obama's security team to suggest 'the struggle formerly known as "the war on terror"'. Meanwhile, in these words just quoted from the president we have the wherewithal for FKATWOT 9.