You're insulting yourself. It doesn't take Washington to tell us anything and until Bush came along...Washington looked the other way. There is a plethora of books written by scholars, University Professors, and experts that are not from "Washington." Military experts on the region that have written books are not of "Washington." You will find this material going back to the mid 80's. Oliver North even talked of this civilization being a future problem for us and mentioned the name "Osama Bin Ladden" to a laughing panel of politicians during the Iran/Contra Hearings. Even back then, intelligent men who have studied and faced the region knew of this civilizations symptoms and the threat it poses. Every President has known and seen the reports and intel briefings of the future and ignored them, because how do you fix an entire civilization? Only one listened, but it took 9/11 for him to realize the validity and our inevitable involvement. Whether you can see it, refuse to see it, or pretend not to see it, the problem would have gotten worse if the Middle East continued the status quo. Wishing that all would just go away by closing your ears and covering your eyes will not make it so. Islamic Extremists are determined to wage war upon us and they do not change. There are milions of Islamic extremists in the Middle East that act as cheerleaders to their "martyrs" or are future "martyrs" themselves. The only fix is a changed Middle East that lifts them from their oppressions, offers the free flow of information, no longer subjected to a dominating religion (Arab blasphemous version of Islam), and stop seeing us as their imagined enemy. So whether you like it or not...you are being protected.
Of course, like you implied...I'm just a robot and I have been brain washed to think that any of this exists. Like wise for my experiences. Civilians who don't study any of this, never seen a terrorists, and far less have no idea of what this civilization is would know far better than all those lying experts.:roll: