Measure for Measure

It's sad that in an era of hyped terror alerts and FEAR Unit (Federal Even-yeared Anti-terror Repsonse), what appears to be a threat so legitimate that they shut down Heathrow Airport could even raise an eyebrow of suspicion. But, it's the necessary consequence of The Boy Who Cried Wolf. I prefer to read the accounts of today's events and see how they develop before making a definitive response.

I agree with Josh Marshall, however, that this response is kind of interesting:

President Bush just said the events in London are "a stark reminder that this nation is at war with Islamic fascists."

Also a pretty stark reminder that President Bush's War on Terror, the way he's chosen to fight it, is at best irrelevant to combatting this sort of danger. These are homegrown Brits apparently trying to blow up planes over the Atlantic. Good thing we've got 150,000 or so troops in Iraq to take the fight to them.

There are no anti-security Democrats. My personal challenge is how this Administration has chosen to fight this so-called war on terror and enhance security. So let's debate those issues, which is uniquely American to do, instead of the divisiveness of using the potential murder of innocents as a political cudgel. A measured response rather than a political one, in other words.

UPDATE: This is a disgusting moment for the nascent Connecticut for Lieberman Party:

"If we just pick up like Ned Lamont wants us to do, get out by a date certain, it will be taken as a tremendous victory by the same people who wanted to blow up these planes in this plot hatched in England. It will strengthen them and they will strike again."

Al Qaeda should, by all rights, be destroyed by now. It's been five years, longer than World War I or World War II. The fact that they aren't, that this threat is still great if not greater, suggests some problems with how this war is being fought. I mean, we didn't get out by a date certain in Iraq, we aren't picking up right now, and yet there was still a plot hatched in England. So, should we interpret that as meaning that our fortitude in Iraq has emboldened terrorists? Of course not, but that's the logical flow of such an ignorant statement.