MORE "NEWNESS" IN THE WAR ON TERROR - NOT - AT 8:10 A.M. ET:    Soon we'll be told that air conditioning is a new idea.  The Washington Post informs us of the Obama administration's "new" approach to fighting terror, as follows:

The U.S. government must fundamentally redefine the struggle against terrorism, replacing the "war on terror" with a campaign combining all facets of national power to defeat the enemy, John O. Brennan, President Obama's senior counterterrorism adviser, said Wednesday.

Previewing what aides said will be the administration's most comprehensive statement to date on its long-term strategy to defeat al-Qaeda and other violent extremists worldwide, Brennan said in an interview that the United States will maintain "unrelenting" pressure on terrorist havens, including those near the Afghan-Pakistani border, in Yemen and in Somalia.

However, Washington must couple the military strikes that have depleted al-Qaeda's middle ranks with more sustained use of economic, diplomatic and cultural levers to diminish Islamist radicalization, he said, exercising "soft power" in ways that President George W. Bush came to embrace but had trouble carrying out.

COMMENT:  Sound familiar?  I love these stories that announce some new policy that isn't.  This approach has been around for a long time.  It's included in David Petraeus's rewrite of counterinsurgency tactics in Iraq.  It has great merit, but it should not be treated as another pronouncement from the Obaman equivalent of Mount Olympus.  I's an evolving strategy.  The key element is how good the Obamans are at developing it further and carrying it out.

August 6, 2009