EEEEWWWW. Not sure about anyone else but if Dick Cheney were on my political side with his robust 18% approval rating, his charming scary old cyborg personality, and not to mention his superb abilities with a gun, I'd want to kill myself. But Ego Joe (is he still holed up in the hotel fortifying the walls of his fantasy world?) must be so pleased. What with the rest of us blue-state, terrorist loving, anti-war extremists (all 60% of us)leaving him to truly 'be himself'. He has shaken off the taint of the Democratic 'out of the mainstream' extremists (all 60% of us). He is free to kiss whichever of Bush's body parts he wants. He's got Rove begging the Repubs not to abandon their senatorial candidate (the political equivalent of a toaster)so that the vote will go to Ego Joe. Sitting pretty Joe, is all I can say.
In the meantime, on a more serious note, as yesterday's events in London illustrated we are clearly no safer, and quite possibly even less safe from terrorism than we were five years ago. And all of this banning toothpaste and handlotion on airplanes seems a lot like closing the proverbial barn door after the horse is long gone. It's reminiscent of post 9/11 grounding all aircraft. Now I am no anti-terrorism expert like our much vaunted Department of Homeland Security but it seems to me that an appropriate way to fight the terrorists is to be two steps ahead of them at all times instead of one step behind. I understand that one can't imagine all possibilities but if the would-be terrorists could figure out that you can make a bomb with Gatorade, peroxide paste, and a cellphone is it too much to ask why the anti-terrorism experts can't assess the possibility of seemingly benign substances used in a non-benign fashion and proactively deal with the threat.
Gotta shout out to the Brits though for busting what appears to be an actual threat. Their operation seems on the surface at least to be much more credible and professional than the infamous terrorist cell we managed to break up in Miami a few months ago. Please, the threat to blow up the Sears tower was credible because one of the suspects had visited Chicago. I've visited a lot of places. Does that mean I have plans to blow up landmarks? Come to think of it the statue of Nathan Bedford Forrest in Memphis is pretty offensive........
