I know you are not a fool, Don ~ that, if you look back, was my point.

I still think that, by reasonable definition, 'terrorism' cannot be applied to an act of, or approved by, government ~ ruling by terror is not the same thing ~ & that to call it so is linguistically & semantically counterproductive. There are, alas, far too many words once useful but which have now lost their effect by such over-definition. I am simply trying to defend the language, not the government.   I guess that, as in all such cases, it is a vain endeavour (as McG reemarks above, there are too many definitions]; but I still, as a well-known taxonomic pedant {"MtheGM's pedantry is legendary" wrote a correspondent on another MessageBoard site I am a regular on: she meant a putdown I suspect but I never tire of quoting it!}, think it a pity.