They don't "Hate Us Because of Our Freedom"

Those are Bush's words. He claims the root of the hatred people like Osama Bin Laden have is 'our freedom'. This has always sounded like some oblivious Junior High girl convinced her enemies hate her because she 'looks so good' (or 'don't hate me because i'm beautiful' commercials). Here a CIA Intelligence Officer (who is the anonymous author of the book discussed a few days ago on this site) gives the more realistic outline:

"The reason we've made these mistakes, he argues, is that we fail to understand that bin Laden doesn't hate us because of our freedom. Or, rather, while he does hate the licentiousness and modernity that the U.S. represents, it's not what compels him to declare war on us. Nor does an anti-modernist bent explain bin Laden's appeal across the Muslim world. Instead, it's what Anonymous identifies as six points bin Laden repeatedly cites in his communiques: '(1) U.S. support for Israel that keeps the Palestinians in the Israelis' thrall; (2) U.S. and other Western troops on the Arabian peninsula; (3) U.S. occupation of Iraq and Afghanistan; (4) U.S. support for Russia, India and China against their Muslim militants; (5) U.S. pressure on Arab energy producers to keep oil prices low; (6) U.S. support for apostate, corrupt and tyrannical Muslim governments.' "

While I don't always disagree with this nation's policies in all these places, these issues listed are the real meat of the matter. The bush approach (viewing Bin Laden and his ilk as 'hating freedom') shows a level of disregard for the seriousness of the issue or, at the very least, an intellectual laziness that is far from helpful. this does not create good foreign policy. if it is PR, then it is the sort of PR that keeps the public ill-informed and vulnerable.