Not at all ridiculous. You need to work harder if you're actually trying to troll people--I'll assume you are not, however.

1) Most modern societies are becoming increasingly secular.

2) Global warming demands that we get off of petroleum as much as possible anyway.

3) Not poking our nose into geopolitical nightmares is quite doable, thanks. Bush Sr. sure showed how it was done.

4) You can fix massive unemployment or you can get violence out of young men. This is pretty simple cause/effect. If young men have no prospects, they never settle down and you wind up with a large disgruntled population segment with nothing to lose.

5) Mental health care needs to be better. Period. This includes the young and the old.

You're never going to find a solution to a hard problem by appealing to the whims of the masses.

Finding a solution which appeals only to Hacker News readers isn't a solution if you live in a democracy.

One of you is answering the question "What should the country collectively [i.e. the government and people, negotiating and communicating with each other through elections and media] do about the destruction caused by terrorism?".

One of you is answering the question "What should the government do about popular fears of terrorism, which might cause the government to lose elections?".

You're in violent agreement that the easy answer to question 1 doesn't solve question 2, and the easy answer to question 2 doesn't solve question 1. Why not moot some other answers to those questions, instead of sitting on your high respective horses?