While Donald Trump harangues President Obama for refusing to label the Orlando gunman a “radical Islamic terrorist” and Hillary Clinton undermines the president by repeatedly using the term herself, it seems more and more like it’s not particularly warranted.

It’s seems like this guy was driven primarily by generalized hatred and his desire to kill people and less by any coherent radical ideology.

FBI director: Mateen claimed loyalty to Islamist groups that are opposed to each other • 2016 Jun 14 • Matt Pearce • L.A. Times

Orlando shooter may not have understood differences between ISIS, al-Qaida, Hezbollah • 2016 Jun 13 • Times-Picayune

The distinction is critically important because of how law enforcement, national intelligence, and possibly military resources are deployed. If this guy was just some idiotic rando with no clue there’s totally no point in hard core counterterrorism measures. It’s a waste of our fucking time, energy, and emotional effort.¹

Using his declarations of allegiance to Islamist groups in opposition to each other as evidence that he was an Islamist and then deploying law enforcement, national intelligence, and military assets to investigate/surveil/neutralize Islamist groups makes as much sense as calling a mass shooter who declared simultaneous allegiance to the KKK, the Black Panthers, and Aztlán separatists as someone motivated primarily by racism instead of someone who just wanted to fuck shit up.²

And this is one of those issues where the difference between Clinton and Sanders (and Obama) is obvious, and a legitimate reason why lots of progressives don’t like her.