War on Terror

Its not an expression you often hear these days is it? There's a good reason for that. The War on Terror is not something that can ever be definitively won. Who exactly is at war? And who exactly are 'we' (?) fighting this 'war' against? How can victory be measured or defined? It cannot really. can it?
What can be measured is how we change the way we live. The freedoms we relinquish, our liberties, the ways of life that are made more demanding in the name of the 'war on terror'. Things like extra long queues at airports, entire city centres closed down for hours at a time whenever a funny shaped bag is left lying around. They inform us that the alert levels have been raised they tell people to be 'vigilant' (what exactly does that mean?!). Our authorities don't want to take any chances now. They have seen the consequences of 9/11 and, although no one will publicly admit it, they are covering their backs in case something really bad does happen so they don't get sued. Everything has to be carried out in the name of 'sec-ur-ity'.
By the way do you remember the 'Dead or Alive!' ultimatum George Bush handed out to Osama Bin Laden? Well, where is he now? Why is still making videos? Is that 'mission accomplished'?
Defeating terrorists cannot be achieved through aircraft bombing and indiscriminate shooting. Quite the opposite. It relies on clever, reliable, up-to-date intelligence and understanding.
But most of all, it relies on something very simple - us, continuing to get on with our lives in the same way we always have done, not allowing our way to be dictated to by a few murderous nutters. Our countries and histories are much bigger than that so why do we give them the satisfaction of changing the way we live? I say dont give any terrorists the satisfaction or mass hysteria publicity by building them up into a level of exaggerated threat beyond what they are really capable of. Just deal with them as cold-blooded mass-murderers, plain and simple.