By James S. Robbins, Aug. 6, 2014, Usatoday.com

Last January, President Obama dismissed the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) as a mere junior varsity terrorist outfit compared to al Qaeda. "The analogy we use around here sometimes, and I think is accurate," he told TheNew Yorker, "is if a JV team puts on Lakers uniforms that doesn't make them Kobe Bryant."

Flash forward to this summer. Islamist radicals control vast swaths of land across Iraq and Syria, and this week crossed the border into Lebanon. Their victims' heads festoon telephone wires in Raqqa, Syria, and they have posted videos online showing mass executions of prostrate Iraqis. Other terror groups are rallying to their black banner. ISIS has been so successful that at the end of June it shortened its name to simply the Islamic State (IS), with its leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi assuming the title of caliph. President Obama may think they are j.v., but they clearly see themselves as big league.

The Islamic State is metastasizing much the same way al Qaeda did, but on an accelerated timeline. Bin Laden's network grew in the 1990s by recruiting foreign fighters who had battled the Red Army in Afghanistan in the 1980s. The Islamic State has developed its own deep bench of transnational terror talent, recruiting from countries throughout the Middle East, Europe, and even the United States. Franchises are reportedly opening in Libya and Tunisia. The North African terror conglomerate Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) has aligned with IS. Nigerian Boko Haram leader Abubakar Shekau has sworn allegiance to al-Baghdadi, as has Abu Sayaaf leader Isnilon Hapilon in the Philippines. The Islamic State currently controls more fighters, more territory, and has a vaster alliance system than al-Qaeda ever did.