Dark Days

There's a storm coming - and it's not like one we've ever seen before.

Another American journalist, Steven Sotliff from Miami, was brutally beheaded in the latest video released by ISIS. The killer, thought to be a failed British hip-hop wannabee calling himself "Jihadi John," is the same man who recently beheaded James Foley.

"I'm back, Obama," says the masked killer, "And I'm back because of your arrogant foreign policy towards the Islamic State."

Currently, that policy includes using airpower to kinetically turn some ISIS members into rapidly expanding clouds of pink mist. And despite the human tragedy of the beheadings, it is a policy which should be increased.

Whether or not the president has a strategy, it's clear that ISIS does. These monstrous lunatics represent the cultural and spiritual equivalent of the ebola virus. Neither can be "cured," but with enough diligence and the right use of technology they can and must be eradicated.

But...that will take an effort of will and leadership which is clearly and frighteningly missing from the White House.

Consider this: new leaks have revealed that Obama has been getting specific and detailed intelligence briefings on the growth, ambition, and ruthlessness of ISIS for over a year - a time when he publicly declared the war on terror to be at an end, and described ISIS as a feckless "JV team" unworthy of his attentions (which is pretty tough talk from a scrawny member of the Debate Club).

There are reports that at least some of the intelligence was highly actionable: pinpointing terrorists who desperately needed blowing up. But someone refused to take action. Surely the same someone who now claims we have no strategy, even though increasingly frustrated military and intelligence experts are telling us exactly the opposite.

Indeed, the reason Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel has gone public with his warnings of the ISIS threat, and the reason the president's top secret briefing materials were leaked, is indicative that the terrorist threat of radical Islam is known all too well inside the White House - and concerned officials who can't make the president listen or act are desperately going public in hopes of forcing his hand before we suffer the next 9/11 attack.

We hope they succeed. But those fast-moving storm clouds are awfully dark and frighteningly near.