Television host Chris Matthews and a distinguished panel of experts were debating the efficacy of America’s global war on terror. The commentators were Katty Kay of the BBC, Dan Rather, former CBS News anchor, Andrea Mitchell of NBC News and Lawrence Wright of The New Yorker. Matthews asked this provocative question: “Imagine you are having coffee with a group of young men and women in their 20s and 30s in a Cairo cafe. Is there any way to change that conversation from ‘Screw the United States’ to ‘I want to go to Michigan State and get an engineering degree’?”

The panel […]