¢ Retired Gen. Richard Myers’ speech at Kansas University last week is cited in a blog on the Washington Post Web site._First a little news item many might have missed last week: In a talk at the University of Kansas, former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff retired Gen. Richard B. Myers disavowed the entire premise of the war against terrorism, likening U.S. strategy to a game of “whack-a-mole.”__Myers, who assumed the top military position just before 9/11 and retired in 2005, called the threat of “violent extremism” and the terrorists’ 100-year plan the greatest challenge to America since the Civil War.__The conflict with al-Qaeda, he said, was “all about will and resolve.”__Terrorism, Myers said, thrived on an environment of fear. “That’s how they want to work,” he said. “When we’re afraid we don’t think logically.”__Myers says that the United States needed to evolve from the current strategy of whacking terrorists one at a time to a long-term focus on the non-military aspects of changing the ideology of the men and women driven to join Al Qaeda through bolstering diplomacy, economic development, education and information._