The following is a letter to the editor that I submitted to the Richmond Times Dispatch on October 9, 2001. An edited version was published on October 17. Editor, Times Dispatch: Freedom was assaulted on September 11, and it didn’t take long for our nation’s “intellectuals” (see any college campus) and other opponents of rational self-interest and capitalism to launch their own assault on America. They have attempted to rationalize that the attacks were the result of our “isolationist” policies. They say that we are isolationist because we rejected the Kyoto Treaty, even though the “treaty” is an anti-Man, anti-industry environmentalist scheme based on contradictory and subjective computer models that cannot even predict the current day’s weather. They also declare that we are isolationist because we don’t more fervently aid poorer countries, when in fact poverty and environmental problems are caused solely by government rejection of capitalism and property rights. These same “intellectuals” claim that we must now forget about a national missile shield. However, there can be no rational denial of our missile defense need. Islamic terrorists wish to kill themselves for Allah, but dictatorships like North Korea will lob missiles from afar because they are not willing to kill themselves for anything. Their only god is the State, and all others must be slaughtered on the altar of the collective. There is hatred for the United States because of our embrace of individual rights and capitalism. The solution to terrorism is not to sacrifice our freedoms through “national ID cards” and the like. The only way to prevent further attacks is to wipe out the terrorist networks, starting with toppling and replacing the governments of Iran and Iraq. We must replace terrorism’s ideology with our own – life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. -Bob Murphy. Richmond