How Much Publicity on Terror is Enough?

Some conservatives are outraged that the MSM isn’t devoting enough attention to the
London terror bombings of 7/7.Tony Blankley notes
the outrage of Michael Savage that by the weekend after 7/7 the MSM had switched their
attention from terror bombing to important matters like baby pandas, hurricanes, and the
breathtaking story of Karl Rove and the leak.

And of course there was also the scandal of the BBC emptying its coverage of the
emotional word “terrorist” half way through 7/7.

But is this a bad thing? The terror strategy requires high impact and relies
on western democracies cringing from media-fueled
sentiment and overreaction. It requires hitting the sweet spot between actions that
are ignored by the media and actions that spur the west to “do something,” the mid-point at which the west is
neither inattentive or angry, but just becoming more and more discouraged.

The purpose
of terror attacks in Iraq, for instance, is to create a Vietnam quagmire
effect and encourage the US political and media elite to withdraw “from a faraway country about which we know little” before the elected Iraqi government can
develop effective security services. President Bush seems to be trying to avoid
high expectations about Iraq. No doubt he wants to avoid media and Democrat-fueled discouragement frenzy.
Maybe the best way to achieve this is to get terror attacks off the front page
as soon as possible.

Bottom line on all this is always the reaction of the stock markets. And hyper-optimist
Larry Kudlow is
crowing that the markets are already up after 7/7, telegraphing that the markets
think that 7/7 was not going to impact global growth.

As I write here, the Islamic terrorists can probably best be
compared to other movements of desperate young men like the Ghost Shirt movement
of the Plains Indians and the Chinese Spirit Boxing movement of late nineteeth century.
They were no match for the global capitalist juggernaut.