Uncharted territory

Jonah Goldberg points out that

unlike the Nazis, the Communists, and countless other evil movements, the Islamic State doesn’t hide its barbarism and doesn’t deny its horror. It broadcasts them to the world as a recruiting tool. And it works!

Sure, terrifying your enemies with atrocities is a very, very old tactic. But it’s been rare in the civilized world for a while now. And, when combined with the digital revolution and social media, this is uncharted territory.

...even the oppressed and impoverished have a better deal in the West than they would with the Islamic State. And yet, the opportunity to slaughter innocent people, destroy priceless artifacts, rape little girls, set dudes on fire, crucify Christians, fight fellow Muslims and/or maybe die horribly in the effort speaks to something deep within them. The claim that these recruits are just criminals looking for an excuse is sand-poundingly stupid. If all they wanted was an excuse for criminality, they don’t need to fly to Syria for that. They can rob people outside their own homes. They want something more, something outside our extended order, something evil.

... I don’t think the Islamic State is an existential threat to the U.S. But I do know it wants to be. That alone is good enough reason to kill them all. Since when is posing an existential threat a minimum threshold for killing child-raping barbarian slavers?

Read more here.