Political leaders and pro-war commentators may not know what they are for or where they are heading or where they stand in the Culture Wars or what ever happened to tradition and morality or why every domestic initiative ends in crisis or why major institutions are always beset by scandal....but they do know one thing for certain. They Are Against Terrorism. They are opposed to mass murder, to nihilistic bombings, to the killing of 200 innocents as they travelled to work on a Thursday morning. This is the morality of the lowest common denominator, an empty political vision defined in response to empty terrorist acts. To paraphrase Tony Blair: 'It is as pathetic as the terrorists are opportunistic.'

And where does defining your worldview through terrorism get you? It gets you to a place where, although you don't like to admit it out loud, you secretly, guiltily welcome massacres like that in Madrid, as an opportunity to berate your opponents and as a reminder of your own moral indefatigability. Nice.

Brendan O'Neill of Spiked (link via "Australia's most respected blogger")