Baby Steps, cont.

Robert Spencer, the éminence grise of the Counter-Jihad Mainstream (CJM), actually used the term "political Islam" with a straight face.  That's how you know he's part of the CJM.  And he will remain so, comfortably and arrogantly, until enough of his civilian supporters call him on it (I wouldn't hold my breath on this).

Thus, in a story reported at Jihad Watch in late January on Trump reaching out to Al-Sisi of Egypt, Spencer wrote [bold emphasis added]:

Sisi’s regime isn’t perfect. Muslims are still brutalizing Christians in Egypt, and the government has done little to protect this despised and defenseless minority. At the same time, Sisi is a bulwark against political Islam in the Middle East. With Turkey rapidly re-Islamizing and the Islamic State still in the picture, that is important. So after the Obama administration’s unwavering support of the Muslim Brotherhood, this is most welcome.

Meanwhile, the story itself from Reuters indicates more baby steps from Trump:

“Trump, Sisi discuss fighting terrorism in phone call,” Reuters, January 23, 2017:

CAIRO (Reuters) – Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi and U.S. President Donald Trump discussed ways to boost the fight against terrorism and extremism on Monday and the new American leader underscored his commitment to bilateral ties, the two countries said.

Trump told Sisi in a telephone call he appreciated the difficulties faced by Egypt in its “war on terror” and affirmed his administration’s commitment to supporting the country, Sisi’s spokesman Alaa Youssef said in a statement.”

As I argued in my last posting, Baby Steps, this kind of shortsighted Realpolitik is all well and good in the short term; but the danger of the global revival of Islamic Jihad is not in the short term; it's in the long term.  Based on the intelligent development of a "Realislamik", we should anticipate and plan for an arc of time lasting a century from this point forward, based upon a reasonable dot-connection and assimilation of the mountain of data on Islam that we already have, pored over by innumerable, motley analysts over the past 15 years.

One way to undermine that kind of long-term planning is for the West to continue reinforcing, through these Baby Step measures, our collective blindness to the links between Islamic "terrorists"/"political Islam" and mainstream Islam.