I meant to say this in my post about dogmatic absolutist pacifism: We've gone from shrieking that we have to Do Something or else it's World War Three to shrieking we have to Do Nothing or else it's World War Three. Is this our only possible paradigm of thought -- we must Do Something, or Do Nothing, or it's World War Three for certain this time?! Is World War Three always the alternative we're avoiding?
This is what I mean by lurching from one hyped-up absolute to the other. We haven't improved our mode of thinking -- we've just change what we claim will result in World War Three this time.