I'm pretty surprised how some commentators are taking at face value claims made by the Pakistani Taliban that they had a hand in the amateurish attempt to blow up a car in Times Square. Here's Mary Habeck:
'This attempted attack is also a reminder that the administration's conviction that "solving" the Israel-Palestine conflict will end the terrorist threat to the United States is mistaken. We cannot negotiate away or mollify the desire by al Qaeda, the Taliban, or other Salafi-jihadis to kill us, because the men who subscribe this ideology do not want a just peace between Israel and Palestine with two states living side by side: they want the destruction of Israel. They also do not have reasonable demands for the United States, e.g., a desire that the U.S. stop "meddling" in the affairs of the Muslim-majority world: they want the United States destroyed.
'
The truth is we can draw absolutely no insight from this attack until the facts are in. And in any event, whichever group (or individual) hatched this plot is certainly not going to "destroy" the U.S. with M80s and gas cans.
(AP Photo)