Latest threats from ISIS.

Dear ISIS,

You want to bring that here? Well, bring it.

You want blood? We'll give you blood. We'll give you blood until you gag, until you choke on it. We'll give you blood until you're wading in it, until you're swimming in it, until you're drowning in it.

We'll give you blood until the only place they speak Arabic is in Hell.

You may get me, send me to Valhalla, but there are plenty more behind me.

You may convince those in power to leave you alone, but this is America. We have a long history of not listening terribly well to those in power.  Those in power are finding they have a tiger by the tail, and the more they tighten their grip, the more furious that tiger becomes--and the sooner before their grip slips.  And when that grip slips, the tiger will spring forth in all its fury.

In times of stress societies tend to revert to their founding myths*. The founding myths of the US include things like:

"Is life so dear and peace so sweet as to be bought at the price of chains and slavery? Forbid it, Almighty God. I know not what course others may take, but as for me, give me liberty or give me death.

"Stand your ground, don't fire unless fired upon, but if they mean to have war, let it begin here."

"Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security."

"The tree of Liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants; it is it's natural manure."

"Live Free or Die."

"Sic Semper Tyrannus".

And so on.

Evoke that at your peril.

So bring it, if that's what you want. We'll be hurt, no doubt. You can hurt us,no question about that.  But you can't destroy us; only the most deluded think you can.

Then it will be our turn.

By the time the smoke clears and the rivers running red with blood drain away to the oceans, you'll either be extinct or the survivors nice, meek little lambs who remember Tamerlane as "Timur the Gentle" by comparison.

Count on it.

*"Myth" in this case does not mean "false story" but rather the collection of stories and concepts that provide the ideological underpinning of a culture. Ours include true items like the above as well as invented stories like Washington and the cherry tree, "the Midnight Ride of Paul Revere" (yes, Revere was a historical figure, but his ride went nothing like the poem), and so forth.