Cnote, I think you’re reacting against religious rhetoric without recognizing what it is that is most bothersome (in a case like this) about religious rhetoric.
When fundamentalist Americans speak in much the same way as the fundamentalist Taliban what gets lost is any objective assessment of right and wrong. That is, both sides can claim that God is on their side and the dialogue is reduced to an age-old battle between us and them. Once that happens one is no longer discussing and forming one’s opinions in a context of what is actually happening; one has simply determined to credit one’s own side with divinely-sanctioned “right” and the other with divinely-condemned “wrong.”
The thing is, that this kind of us vs. them position can easily be displaced from a religious to a secular context. Secularism itself doesn’t prevent simplistic distinctions between right and wrong (just as religion does not necessarily prevent nuanced distinctions). So, for me, when Bush or anyone else paints the attacks as on attack on “freedom” or “liberty,” I’m just as heartsick as when they are painted as diabolical assaults on a God-annointed American people. The reason isn’t that I don’t think that the US is more free a country than is Afghanistan under the Taliban: I don’t doubt that for a second. The reason is that I don’t believe that Osama and Co. have attacked the US primarily to assault our Western democratic way of life. (Were that so they might have chosen a Belgian disco, a Swiss supermarket, or a public school in Norway rather than what they did choose–the symbols of US financial and military power.)
Although cultural and religious difference is certainly a factor, the terrorists are first and foremost driven by specifically political motives, some of which relate to US policies, some of which relate to their goals in their own backyards. It’s really important to remember that, because if it weren’t the case–if this really were the first sign of an unbridgeable rift between West and East–it would mean that we could not make peace with the entire Islamic world. And that is patently false–not least because here in the United States Muslims can and do co-exist peacefully with their Christian, Jewish and atheist neighbors. It is important to remember how much denunciation there has been of these attacks from within Islam.
So, I think part of the “temptation” Tom asks us to resist must therefore take the form of avoiding simplistic characterizations of any kind; cultural as well as religious.
One point: I’m not especially exercised by “evil,” though I don’t think it should be used too much. The attacks of September 11 were, to my mind, evil, and those who did them were evil-doers. I’ve read that language being used in The Nation, which is as secular and Western a publication as you can find. Though I agree that overusing “evil” will, ultimately, discourage rational reflection.
P.S. elucidator, I too am really proud of the United States dropping food rather than bombs. I might just go out and get myself a flag ;).