It's quite obvious that many haven't the foggiest idea of what's really going on in the world today. They are still operating under some mistaken notion that all these regional conflicts currently underway have little relation to each other; that the factors contributing to these fights are local, and can be solved independently in each case though some sort of diplomacy or other kind of capitulation. Oh, you're upset about land in Gaza? We'll pull back. You can't find jobs in France? We'll expand the nanny state. You can't preach your intolerance in Britain? We'll go ahead and let you do it anyway. This approach is fundamentally flawed, as each and every situation has shown. Almost every conflict the Western world is engaged in right now has one thing in common, the clash between Islamic expansionism and the ideals of Western Liberalism. Local conditions and complaints are coopted by the Jihadists for convenience, they are not the cause of this global strife.

Some seem to think that, whatever happens, it's guaranteed the world will be basically the same tomorrow as it is today. That's wrong. They think we have somehow been anointed the worlds one true society, that Western values and tolerance and all that wonderful jazz will perpetuate itself forever, without any effort from us. In short, they think we can't lose. They're wrong; we can. And we are.

We aren't losing because Rumsfeld screwed up and disbanded the Iraqi army, multiplying the pool of potential insurgents by tens, if not hundreds, of degrees. We aren't losing because he okayed an American administration over Iraq instead of immediately turning it over to Iraqi's, even if it were just exiles who hadn't been there in years. These mistakes were costly. But they are setbacks, albeit major ones; just not the kind of mistakes that bring civilizations down.

No, we are losing for a much simpler, and yet much more devastating reason. We are losing because our ideology has turned on itself and is paralyzed into inaction. Europe as it exists today, or as we conceive it to exist as a bastion of Western Liberalism founded on the basis of Judeo-Christian beliefs, is done. It is unsustainable. Too many in the West don't even believe in the righteousness of their own side. How can a people survive that way? They can't. They say, "why not something else? What right have we to assert our beliefs?" And so they tolerate intolerance, their multiculturalism compels them to unquestionably accept uniculturalists. Europeans no longer have a solid conceptualization of their own existence. They don't know who they are, nor how they got there. This is a recipe for disaster. Now they are being taken over by the beliefs of others, swept aside into the historical trash bin.

The transformation is already underway. Many European locations are already seeing near as much emigration as they are immigration. Those that see the writing on the wall are leaving. The world of government dependence was unsustainable from the get go. The promise of American military protection bred a European society unconcerned about first order problems. Protection? Leave that to America. Health care? Leave that to the government, just so long as I can party in Amsterdam. Mass immigration was sold as the solution to the overgrown welfare state, but it turns out no one ever told them they had to accept a radical transformation of their society as a consequence. And now many are starting to realize that is exactly the price they are paying.

Nonmuslim women in many British neighborhoods will only go out wearing veils because it's unsafe not to. 2,500 French police have been injured in the last year fighting roving bands of "youths". Frenchmen are as frightened of using their own public transportation system as if they were in Baghdad. As the demographic gap closes, it will only get worse. Those that don't outright convert to the new dominant belief system, one whose follows actually are convinced of their own superiority and carry a desire for self perpetuation, will flee. Western Liberalism is crumbling, and soon it will only be found in America, if even here.

Iraq was an opportunity at a back door solution. A chance to temper the new and reformed Islam. Many promote "moderate" Muslims and the chance at "reforming" Islam as a viable solution. But they missed the boat, Islam has already reformed. The Jihadists are it. These aren't first generation immigrants signing up en masse to join the Jihadists, these are second or even third generation Frenchmen, English, Canadian, Dutch and American citizens. But they hold little loyalty to their native countries. That comes second, a very distant second, to the new pan-Islamic Jihadism sweeping the globe. Iraq, or someplace like it, was our hope; a chance to draw potential Jihadists away from expansionism and encourage more desirable and tolerant governments, ones that could live together with the West, even with their differences. It was, and still is, worth the price to try, even if it doesn't work. But we can't keep worrying about the little stuff, all the while ignoring the tidal wave of history that's moving sweep us aside like yesterdays dirty dishes.

It's time to make decisions. The "blame America first" crowd that thinks America is the principle agent behind all the world's ills and the European worshippers of multiculturalism who refuse to condemn even those views that threaten to destroy their own need to decide whether they want to fight or not. Is Western Liberalism worth fighting for, or is it not? Decide. Because if they don't want to defend their own ideological core - the principles that have allowed Western civilization to soar to unprecedented heights - they might as well go get fitted for their burqas.

Cross-posted at Conservative Compendium.