I realize that this will simply be downgraded to "workplace violence," that this woman simply wanted to keep her head after she refused to convert, but I think this might cause Americans to fear the Islamic State...

http://kfor.com/2014/09/25/reports-police-respond-to-possible-shooting-near-moore-grocery-store/?cid=sm_t_main_1_20140926_32356326

Yeah. No worries:

http://newyork.cbslocal.com/2014/09/25/iraqi-pm-plot-to-attack-us-paris-subways-uncovered/

Bravo. Outstanding episode. The analysis of ISIS fear-mongering was very perceptive. The discussion of nihilism was entertaining and quite appropriate. Keep it coming, guys.

Most of the follow up comments prove that the PROPAGANDA really works.

WITH VER GOOD REASON! Law Enforcement Bulletin: ISIS to obtain U.S. & British Soldiers Address via Google, FaceBook & LinkedIn to slaughter them at home in Jihad Attacks. Please forward to ALL U.S. Soldiers you know!!! A law enforcement bulletin obtained by FoxNews.com warned that Islamic State fighters have increased calls for "lone wolves" to attack U.S. soldiers in America in recent months, citing one tweet that called for jihadists to find service members' addresses online and then "show up and slaughter them."

In one example cited in the bulletin, a British jihadist encouraged radicals still living in the West to use Facebook and LinkedIn to find and target soldiers.

"You could literally search for soldiers, find their town, photos of them, look for address in Yellowbook or something," the tweet read. "Then show up and slaughter them."

BREAKING! ISIS to obtain U.S. Soldiers Address via FB & LinkedIn to slaughter them at home
http://www.foxnews.com/world/2014/09/17/law-enforcement-bulletin-warned-isis-urging-jihad-attacks-on-us-soil/

IT'S EVEN MORE INTERESTING HOW LITTLE WE HEAR FROM MUSLLIMS DENOUNCING ISIS... Denmark: Poll shows that only 14 percent of mosques denounce the Islamic State
TV2 East television station contacted a number of mosques in East Jutland and asked them the simple question whether they would denounce the Islamic State.
A mosque in Horsens took clear and unambiguous distance from IS and called it a terrorist organization. Two mosques in Randers and Silkeborg did not respond. In Aarhus, only one in six mosques say that they distance themselves from the Islamic State. Three mosques were impossible to get hold of, despite extremely strenuous efforts from the journalist to make clear what the question was, and how to contact him. Two mosques refused to comment — including the Grimhøjvej mosque (known for recruiting jihadis)….
It would have been the easiest thing in the world for the mosques in this survey to denounce the Islamic State, if that had been what they wanted to do. But they obviously do not wish to. This trend aligns with the fact that no imams wanted to attend last weekend’s demonstrations in Denmark against the Islamic State.
The TV station’s poll is a harrowing indication of how strong radical Islamist views are in mosques.
{ http://denkorteavis.dk/2014/fem-moskeer-i-aarhus-vil-ikke-tage-afstand-fra-islamisk-stat/ }

Maybe there is fear because they're here:

http://nypost.com/2014/09/22/americans-who-joined-isis-now-back-in-the-us/

Can we talk about the hypocrisy in the U.S., Europe and especially the Arab world for a second. Two beheadings on Tweeter (gruesome and wrong for sure) and we are willing to go to war/use drones/send weapons to factions we hope wont turn on us later (i.e. Bin Laden as a Mojhaidin fighting the Russians and later Sep 11). This I remind you happened thousands of miles from any European/U.S. border. We know that in any of the actions above we will put innocents at risk, maybe bread a new generation of "west haters" in the process. But our security is top priority.
On the other hand, Israel is defending itself from tens of thousands of rockets, and other munition lubed at it for more than five years and we are upset at them. No doubt that civilians were hurt in the process of bombing Hamas, but that is a labeled as "war crimes". Apparently when a dead child is out of Gaza it is OK for him to be dead. Not because of the location but because he or she were killed by non-Israelis.
Shame on us.

From a Big Lebowski fan, thank you for ending the show today with a clip from what was going through my mind during the whole discussion on nihilism.

When I grow up i want 2 be as smart and COOL as Brooke Gladstone. LOVED the discussion on Nihilism - and Brooke's deft guidance through it's maze. Also Loved the way you both discussed it - as it was a truly CARING dialectic. I am proposing, that dialectic itself, is a cure for Nihilism ( if one wants a cure, and i do ). I've recently shot a film ( eVe n' god™this female is not yet rated™ now in post-production ; Cali Lili Indies™ Pictures Words Music In Motion™FeMtO™StudiO ) which, tonight - via your discussion, I am realizing, "argues" that point. Thanks for a wonderful show ! I heard the companion piece on RadioLab and - obviously, you have moved me to comment twice. Cheers and Huggs 2 U All : Life Is Beautiful, because it MUST.

President Obama ran in 2012 on the premise that Al qaeda was on the run. The media helped to promulgate this myth. The beheading videos resonated because they brutally and clearly illustrated to Americans how false the prevailing narrative was.

This episode reminds me of Terry O'Reilly series (on CBC) on advertising "Under the influence" where he explains the arcane of not-so "Mad Mann" to chumps, aka American public. This is all about marketing of war again which coincides with a dismal economic reality: diversion techniques 101. It is also very ironic that WP's poll is being quoted by OTM , despite WP being a corporate organization that is thoroughly discredited as corrupt member of media complex (hello money for access to "opinion makers-gate" or Wikileaks to mention recent sins) which again reinforces huge and systemic conflicts of interest. How about a new vocabulary of spin that does a marketer's trick: Isis, Isil, Daash, IS etc. Let's play this game here: torture= enhanced interrogation technique, rape= enhanced seduction technique, lie and omission spin=enhanced reality perception. I think OTM should go into business of cross word puzzles.

Most Americans fear whatever they're told to fear.

The ISIS be-headings are different (from Daniel Pearl's) because most Americans are still reeling from our economic downturn. We are feeling vulnerable because we've been shaken after loosing control of our personal financial base.

The ISIS atrocities are a quick and cheap way to focus a large group of Americans. The Bogey Man is coming after us. Kill it before it strikes us.

As with the WMD atrocity (probably tens to hundreds of thousands dead for a lie) we will likely look back on this in a few years and see we were again played for suckers.

Not one of OTM's better pieces. Gladstone probed Marc Lynch about the volatility of US public opinion WRT war, and Lynch's explanations were sooo unconvincing--I was reminded of the post-hoc "explanations" of stock-market noise. E.g., if beheadings have some magical media quality, why is it that there has been zero coverage of the 41 Saudi beheadings--41 in just the first 8 months of 2014--in the US corporate-funded media[1]? *That* would be an interesting question; the Lynch piece, by contrast, was just a waste of OTM's listeners' time.

By contrast, there has been recently some quite good media criticism on USCFM militarism. Lee Fang in _The Nation_[2] (and on _Democracy Now!_: audio[3], video[4], transcript[5]) disclosed that many talking heads have undisclosed financial stakes in the militarism they advocate. And _CounterSpin_ has allowed Raed Jarrar[6] to detail how airwar against Islamic State will fail, and Vijay Prashad[7] to clarify how earlier intervention in Syria would have failed (just like intervention in Iraq did).

One more media-critical question that I'd like to nominate for OTM's (et al) attention: why is it that, when USCFM are "debating" (usually, promoting) the proposed military adventure du jour, money is never discussed? Whenever USCFM attention turns to *any other* sort of federal action, attention quickly turns to cost, even when the amounts are relatively small. (Recall the Republicans demand that $8 billion absolutely *had* to be cut from food assistance in the 2014 farm bill. Because "we're broke," right?) But in all the discussion of bombing ISIS, I can recall *zero* discussion of cost, or of the fact that (IIUC) the recently-passed House and Senate authorizations contained *no* funding. How/why is this? If the projected cost is negligible, why not say what it is? And if the projected cost is *not* negligible, or if the militarists have no cost projection, shouldn't that be an issue?

Work to do, OTM! Time to, umm, "get back in the game" :-)

[1]: as opposed to, e.g., Al Jazeera: http://www.aljazeera.com/news/middleeast/2014/08/what-behind-spike-saudi-beheadings-20148247123955103.html
[2]: http://www.thenation.com/article/181601/whos-paying-pro-war-pundits
[3]: http://traffic.libsyn.com/democracynow/dn2014-0915-1.mp3
[4]: http://publish.dvlabs.com/democracynow/ipod/dn2014-0915.mp4
[5]: http://www.democracynow.org/2014/9/15/who_pays_the_pro_war_pundits
[6]: http://www.fair.org/audio/counterspin/CounterSpin091914.mp3 (first main segment)
[7]: http://www.fair.org/audio/counterspin/CounterSpin081514.mp3 (first main segment)

What to call ISIS?

Jamaat un nefaq

Remember, all of them acknowledge a Quraish deity which once had attributions of progeny named Laat, Uzza and Manaat. This excludes them from the traditions of Avraham. If such people claim to be Muslims (submissive to God), they are hypocrites (munafiqeen). All of them, of all sects.