The 9/11 attacks were terrifying for their coordination, complexity and sophistication. People wondered "How could a group of men all over the world coordinate something like this, right under our noses?"

The 9/11 attack's complexity was its most terrifying element, but it was also the attack's greatest vulnerability. Such an elaborate scheme was open to many forms of counter-terrorism measures; from wiretapping to enhanced airport security, the Feds tried to make sure something like 9/11 didn't happen again.

Smaller plots, from shoe bombs to underwear bombs to cargo plane bombs followed, and these plots failed for their complexity. Whether it was during the planning stage or during the execution itself, the plans all unraveled. Extreme pressure on terrorist groups meant that complex schemes were a thing of the past.

But the motives remained, so plots necessarily became simpler.

In 2009, Major Nidal Hasan shot 45 of his coworkers at Ford Hood, a US military base, killing 13 of them. The plan was simple, but guns aren't necessarily a possibility for every would-be terrorist.

Finally, we have the London attack: May 22, 2013, two men literally cut a military cadet's head off in broad daylight in the middle of a busy street with a knife and a meat cleaver.

They were unquestionably terrorists of the same stripe as the Al Qaeda bunch, but far less sophisticated. So unsophisticated, in fact, that their attack was all but impossible to prevent. Anyone with 20 bucks and some spare time could pull this one off, and that's actually what makes it significant. The body count is higher than the shoe bomber, the underwear bomber and the cargo plane plot combined, and the means to do a similar attack are available anywhere.

Preventing the planning and execution of terrorist attacks is treating the symptom, and dramatic, elaborate plans only serve to distract from the cause of these attacks and increase the focus of the symptom. Certainly, keeping explosives out of the hands of would be mass-murderers is a worthwhile exercise in damage control, but it does nothing to treat the cause.

The simplicity of London's attack reveals the truth about terrorism: only the motive needs to exist, the means of attack are irrelevant. So long as terrorists have grievances, real or imagined, against the Western world, the attacks will continue.

In the frantic search for anyone who might do anything bad, our Federal Government has created a 21st century witch-hunt, creating lists of potentially dangerous people containing hundreds of thousands of names.

The following is in the same vein, and is just magnificently terrible.

The Conspiracy

According to a study by the West Point Combating Terrorism Center, certain types of anti-federalist groups believe

the American political system and its proxies were hijacked by external forces interested in promoting a “New World Order,” (NWO) in which the United States will be embedded in the UN or another version of global government.

Furthermore

the New World Order will be advanced, they believe, via steady transition of powers from local to federal law-enforcement agencies, i.e., the transformation of local police and law-enforcement agencies into a federally controlled “National Police” agency that will in turn merge with a “Multi-National Peace Keeping Force.”

These beliefs, marginalized by scare quotes, are cited as grounds for being identified as a far-right terrorist. This is what George Orwell called a "thoughtcrime" in his book 1984. In 1984, a thoughtcrime is not an act, but a belief that is counter to government interests and therefore illegal. Sadly, thoughtcrimes are a big part of the ugly reality of the Perpetual War on Scary, and the very concept has become relatively mainstream.

But let's imagine, in a perfect world of white-hatted heroes, that these beliefs are only held by far-right terrorists. It would be a simple matter of figuring out who believes that a federal police force is imminent, rounding them up and putting them in jail, right?

Would it be of any concern if these beliefs were actually true? Would knowing about the federal police become illegal? Would the safeguard from government scrutiny and persecution be to believe a lie?

Conspiracy Becomes Fact

Welcome then, to the real world. Last week, the US Military announced that it granted itself authority to interfere in domestic matters, creating a national police force. This is in violation of existing Federal law, but who cares, right? Say hello to the "National Police".

I admit, the West Point study was published before the US Military granted itself the right to declare martial law without anyone's consent. However, the fact remains that people who believe what is self-evidently true are targeted by the West Point study as domestic terrorists. Are those far-right conspiracy theorists still wacky, now that they are spot on?

This is the problem with thoughtcrimes, as George Orwell foresaw;

"In times of universal deceit, telling the truth will be a revolutionary act."

In the fight for liberty and limiting the authority of one group of people (the government) over another, all kinds of arguments have been used. Generally they fall into these categories; in what I believe are descending order of usefulness.

1. Historical arguments: "Hitler, Mao and Stalin all misused this power. Our government shouldn't have this power either."
2. Moral arguments: "Stealing is wrong. Therefore the income tax is wrong."
3. Constitutional arguments: "The Fourth Amendment protects us from unreasonable search and seizure."

The US Constitution is a great document, full of pithy truths, and it has demonstrated through the centuries a prescient wisdom that is quite remarkable. But as far as an argument in favor or against government behaviors, it is by far the weakest of the three. The principles behind the Constitution are so strong, and the historical evidence of unlimited government gone awry so plentiful that there is no reason to make weak appeals to the authority of a piece of paper so few recognize as valid.

To people without special reverence for the Constitution, it is a set of laws that can be changed at any time. To hardcore Constitutionalists and believers in inalienable rights, this is heresy, but it does nothing to strengthen their case in the eyes of those that feel the Constitution is flexible. As far as most people are concerned, the Constitution has been changed many times, the Bill of Rights violated intentionally many times, and no plague of locusts descended on our nation's capital.

Far more important than if something is in the Constitution is why.

Why was free speech and a free press important?

Why did the right to bear arms come next in the minds of the Founding Fathers?

Why did a trial have to be speedy and public?

Why was torture specifically mentioned and outlawed?

There is tremendous historical precedent for all ten amendments, there was when the Constitution was drafted, and the evidence in favor of an empowered population and limited government have only piled higher since.

So, instead of invoking a piece of paper, invoke the real reasons that the Constitution says what it does:

• Q: How many people died at the hands of governments in the 20th century?
• A: Over 200 million.

• Q: What is the necessary first step in committing widespread genocide?
• A: Disarming the population.

And so on. Argue this way.

Adherence to Constitutional principles can be better justified by historical precedent and strong moral argument than any appeal to the document's imagined authority. The Constitution is a great document, not because it is endowed with its own power, but because of what it says and why. If the people that needed convincing already had total faith in the value of the Constitution, there would be no argument to have. But the truth is, the Constitution in itself carries little weight with those that would see it changed. It is only the underlying principles, the central ideas, that have any power to change hearts and minds. Appeal to authority, when that authority is not recognized, is an exercise in futility.

According to Time Magazine, I am a lazy, entitled narcissist that lives with my parents. I disagree.

Anyhow, here's the cover:

I've seen this theme, actually, many times. A syndicated author in his forties takes a jab at the millennial generation, how they are lazy, narcissistic, don't have jobs and won't do anything but take selfies.

As much as you can generalize characteristics of an entire group of people, let's assume everything these fellows say is totally accurate. Let's imagine all these teenagers and people in their early twenties DO have terrible personal habits, can't come up with a coherent thought, are totally self-absorbed and cannot function in real life. Let's say they have all been coddled since birth, and think they are very nearly God Almighty. Let's say they all live in their parent's basement well into their twenties.

Okay, whose fault?

If a seven year-old is terrible, you blame their parents.

If an 11 year-old is terrible, you blame their parents.

If a teenager is getting arrested, you look to their parents to see what went wrong.

Finally, in their late teens and early twenties, you start to blame the person themselves, as these articles generally do. But truly, a newly minted adult is never moreso the product of their upbringing. They are hot off the presses.

So, if a cake comes out well, do you complement the cake, or do you complement the chef?

Instead of patting themselves on the back and scorning their children, the Baby Boom and Generation X needs to thank their parents and figure out exactly what they did to make their child a lazy, arrogant sack of turds. Can you really indict the character of a person that just learned how to drive without also taking a long, hard look at the parents? Can you look at a freshman in college, and say that his habits are totally his own and none of his behavior is related to his upbringing?

As so many authors would have it, the Millennials just hatched out of eggs, sporting smartphones and ironic hats or facial hair, only to infest the basements of hardworking Baby Boomers and Gen X'ers. But, we all know the truth: the Millennials were coddled endlessly, told they were special no matter what, given trophies for losing and never allowed to fail. They never had to get a job, and they graduated college into an economy that had been driven into the ground. All this by whom? By their parents.

In the Middle Ages, the Pope was believed to be endowed with what was called "Papal Infallibility", which essentially meant the man could do no wrong. Today, there is a general sense that anyone opposing Israel is universally wrong, generally evil and has no legitimate right to dissent. The idea that any one group can be universally right under all circumstances is intellectually bankrupt, and Israeli Infallibility is no different.

Before any reasonable discussion about Israel can begin, one must understand the history of the Zionist movement. Zionism, simply, is the idea that the Jews should own and occupy the area that was once Palestine, and is now Israel. The reason being that Jewish scripture describes this area as the "Promised Land" given to the Jews by God Himself.

If one takes the "Promised Land" as the absolute truth, and many devout Jews do, Zionism is the natural offshoot. The movement gained steam in the late 19th century, and the Jews of Europe started to move to Palestine. By the 1920's tens of thousands of Jews whose families had left Palestine hundreds or thousands of years prior had returned to Palestine, which had been controlled by Muslims since roughly 700 AD.

It was during these early days that it became fashionable for Zionist Jews to changed their European names to Hebrew names. For instance, current Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's father's name was originally Mileikowsky, and Israel's first Prime Minister, David Ben-Gurion, was born David Grün. Many people do not realize this, and from their names assume that the Jews have continuously controlled the region and that it is the Palestinians that have no hereditary claim.

As tens of thousands of Jews came from all corners of the world to Israel, the locals began to resent the newcomers. In 1917, Great Britain endorsed the creation of a Jewish state ontop of the existing Palestinian nation, which was, at that time, mostly occupied by Arabs. By 1936, the Arabs revolted against the British colonizers and the hundreds of thousands of Jews that had wisely fled Europe in the years preceding the Holocaust. The Arabs were soundly defeated by the British and the Jews.

After World War II, the Jews fought the Arabs over a clumsily partitioned Palestine, won, and established the state of Israel in 1949. In the following 64 years, the fight has continued between the displaced Palestinians and the relatively recent European Jewish immigrants.

As fate would have it, the sympathies of the world have firmly chosen Israel. From this situation, has grown this albatross of Israeli Infallibility, and the logical fallacies that must follow.

• Any nation that resents Israel is pilloried in the press as wrongheaded, evil, and a seat of terrorism.
• Military action against Israeli dissenters is universally regarded as acceptable.
• Military action against Israel is universally regarded as wrong.
• The enemies of Israel and their sympathizers are typically branded irreconcilable terrorists.
• To not support Israel is often regarded as un-American.
• Anti-Zionism is nearly always equated to antisemitism, and often Nazism.
• The "creation" of a Palestinian state is almost never even considered, even though it existed long before Israel.
• The legitimacy of Israel is never questioned, even though the nation is younger than television.
• The existence of Israel is never considered as the cause of violence in Israel. It is always the other guy's fault.
• Palestinian resistance is always regarded as unreasonable, religious extremism, rather than legitimate dissent.
• Religious motives of Israel are never questioned, or even mentioned.

Israeli Infallibility is an unreasonable position to maintain, and is stated by terrorist groups worldwide as their chief motivation for violence against the West.

I've heard many people state that Muslims are irreconcilable terrorists and violent by the nature of their religion, but people need to remember the IRA. It was only 30 years ago that Irishmen were toting AK-47's, wearing black masks, staging hunger strikes in prison and indiscriminately bombing the "occupying forces" in London. It sounds perfectly absurd to say that Anglicanism and Catholicism are "radicalizing and dangerous" religions that create inherently violent people. The first suicide bombing in the Middle East happened in 1983; the phenomenon is not as ancient as Islam. Its only slightly older than Nintendo.

History repeats, and it's time we looked inward for the reasons for terrorism, and the motivations of those who would do us harm. We are fooling ourselves if we feel anti-American sentiments only live in the minds of lunatics and religious extremists. While violent actions are carried out by the most-crazed and fanatical, the resentment is all but mainstream.