Uh-Oh. Attorney General Evasive about Causes of Terrorism

Eric Holder seems to be part of the Reality-Based Community. His level of uncertainty about the causes of terrorism and the best ways to combat terrorism may be higher than Janet Napolitano's.

But there is one exception to this type of uncertainty among the elite in our country: Dennis Prager:

The Left's inability to identify the religious beliefs of Islamic terrorists and instead ascribe their murders of Americans to the terrorists' psychological tensions and economic problems — while at the same time utterly certain that conservative white Americans have only the most vile motives — is an expression of the Left's failure to recognize and confront real evil.

Just remember this: If Shahzad had not been identified as the would-be bomber, the mainstream (i.e., liberal) news media and leading Democrats would have told us repeatedly that a white male — surely a conservative white male — was the Times Square terrorist, and that we should therefore be looking suspiciously at our fellow Americans on the Right, especially those attending tea parties. For while liberals claim not to know the motives of Muslim terrorists, they are always certain of conservatives' motives: racism, sexism, homophobia and xenophobia.

When, one day, the Left exits from history's stage, its epitaph will read: "Those who do not understand evil will not understand good."

UPDATE: Tim Blair links Mark Steyn:

Listening to Attorney General Holder, one is tempted to modify Trotsky:
You may not be interested in Islam but Islam is interested in you. Islam smells weakness at the heart of the West. The post-World War II order is dying: The European Union's decision to toss a trillion dollars to prop up a Greek economic model that guarantees terminal insolvency is merely the latest manifestation of the chronic combination of fiscal profligacy and demographic decline in the West at twilight. Islam is already the biggest supplier of new Europeans and new Canadians, and the fastest-growing demographic in the Western world.
Therefore, it thinks it not unreasonable to shape the character of those societies – not by blowing up buildings and airplanes, but by determining the nature of their relationship to Islam.
For example, the very same day that Eric Holder was doing his "Islam? What Islam?" routine at the Capitol, the Organization of the Islamic Conference was tightening its hold on the U.N. Human Rights Council – actually, make that the U.N. "Human Rights" Council. The OIC is the biggest voting bloc at the U.N., and it succeeded in getting its slate of candidates elected to the so-called "human rights" body – among them the Maldives, Qatar, Malaysia, Mauritania and Libya. The last, elected to the HRC by 80 percent of the U.N. membership, is, of course, a famous paragon of human rights, but the other, "moderate" Muslim nations share the view that Islam, in both its theological and political components, should be beyond discussion. And they will support the U.N.'s rapid progress toward, in effect, the imposition of a global apostasy law that removes Islam from public discourse.
Attorney General Holder seems to be operating an advance pilot program of his own, but he's not alone. Also last week, the head of Canada's intelligence service testified to the House of Commons about hundreds of "second- or third-generation Canadians" who are "relatively well integrated" "economically and socially" but who have become so "very very disenchanted" with "the way we want to structure our society" that they have developed "strong links to homelands" that are "in distress."
Homelands such as Afghanistan, Pakistan, Yemen and Somalia.
Hmm. If you're wondering what those countries might have in common, keep wondering. No words beginning with "I-" and ending with "-slam" passed the director's lips. If the head of the Crown's intelligence service has narrowed his concerns about "disenchanted" "second- and third-generations Canadians" to any demographic group in particular, evidently it's classified information and can't be disclosed in public.
The U.N. elections are a big victory for the Organization of the Islamic Conference. By the way, to my liberal friends who say, "Hey, what's the big deal about the Organization of the Islamic Conference? Lighten up, man," try rolling around your tongue the words "Organization of the Christian Conference." Would you be quite so cool with that? Fifty-seven Prime Ministers and Presidents who get together and vote as a bloc in international affairs? Or would that be a theocratic affront to secular sensibilities? The casual acceptance of the phrase "the Muslim world" – ("Mr. Obama's now-famous speech to the Muslim world" – The New York Times) – implicitly defers to the political ambitions of Islam. And, if there is a "Muslim world," what are its boundaries? Forty years ago, the OIC began with mainly Middle Eastern members plus Indonesia and a couple more. By the Nineties, former Soviet Central Asia had signed on, plus Albania, Mozambique, Guyana and various others. In 2005, Russia was admitted to "observer" membership.