Thanks for your service, Semper.
There is a huge difference in what happened in the Clinton administration and now with respect to military deployments, in my opinion.
We are at war. Most of us do not realize it, but we are. Because of the sacrifices of our troops, we get to go shopping, go to parties, live our lives as we always have. They have sheltered us from it, but we need to realize we will be engaged in this for a long time. Many more lives will be lost, both military and civilian before this is over.
It should be Terrorism=Tar baby. And like everyone who has ever been involved in crisis knows, you don't always get to pick your tar baby.
"We are at war. Most of us do not realize it, but we are. Because of the sacrifices of our troops, we get to go shopping, go to parties, live our lives as we always have."
You mean like, if we hadn't invaded Iraq, the Iraqis would now be attacking our shopping malls, breaking up our parties, perhaps hijacking our planes, etc.?
You seem not to understand the concept of "Tar-baby". It is based upon the story from the Uncle Remus Tales where Brer Fox sets a trap to capture Brer Rabbit. The fox's Tar-baby does not react to Brer Rabbit as expected and when Brer Rabbit finally gets frustrated enough to initiate physical force, he gets caught in the sticky substance of the Tar-Baby and is then at the mercy of the fox.
You always have a choice about engaging with a tar-baby. The trick is realizing what it is and not engaging. It is looking as though we might have chosen a better way to deal with this particular challenge. No matter how worthy the goal, if you don't have sufficient resources, resolve and support you should find another way to reach that goal.