What is "Extremism" though? If denied legal venues to address legitimate grievances, then one is forced to take "extreme" measures to create change. Certainly when populaces are held in conditions of poor governance there will be many with less than noble goals who step forward to exploit such situations for their own ends; but they are more "opportunists" than "extremists."

Governments create these conditions, not those who emerge to exploit them. When we promote and protect those same governments, we redirect focus at ourselves. I suspect most populaces would prefer employing effective legal means of promoting change, but such means are pretty scarce in the countries where so many of these "extremists" come from. Simple Cause and Effect, and until we stop labeling the effect (extremism) as the cause (governance), we will continue to be one significant step behind on this one.

The extremism that concerns me is the version that sits in power over much of the Middle East. We know its wrong to promote governments so contrary to our national principles and ethos, yet we also know we cannot simply walk away from relationships that help secure critical LOCs and resources. We need to find a new balance point. First step is to identify the extremists we need to focus the most on; and those are primarily the current governments of that region. I think we can out compete AQ as the champion of the oppressed, that we have more to offer through enabling legal and peaceful evolution of governance than he does through violent revolution of governance.

We'll see. Current focus appears to be to reinforce the status quo, and build their military capacity to more effectively suppress their populaces. Then conduct "nation building" to presumably buy off these same populace so that they will stop complaining and lending their support to these extremists organizations. "Denial" is not just the name of the river running through the heart of much of this...