The more we get to know about Lt. Gen. H.R. McMaster, the more he impresses. President Donald Trump’s third pick to serve as national security adviser already is showing the kind of strong-minded independence we hoped he would demonstrate by urging the president to drop his gleeful insistence in describing jihadists as “radical Islamic terrorists,” and their grievous acts as “radical Islamic terrorism.”

If only his boss would listen. McMaster encouraged the president to drop the phrase in his address to Congress and the nation Tuesday. Sadly, Trump stuck to his guns.

The general’s point is that, coming from the president, it’s just too loaded a term. In the fight against jihadists, a goal for our administration, as it was in prior administrations, should be to find common ground with Muslims, and to continue to single out and denounce bad actors as corrupt manipulators, not as followers of their religion. President Barack Obama spoke of “violent extremism” in order to accomplish these goals.

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