Whew! We Survived Christmas!

by Becky Akers, LRC Blog
Dec. 27, 2010

You may not realize greater dangers threaten at this festive season than Aunt Stephie's Jello-salad or Cousin Hal's interminable jokes. But Our wise if cowardly Rulers do: they fear the "Terror Threat Loom[ing] Over U.S. Holidays."

I'm not sure exactly which "holidays" we're talking here. So far as I know, only Christmas falls between "now [Dec. 24] and "the new year," when "CBS News homeland security correspondent Bob Orr says U.S. officials are openly nervous about a possible attack…" But hey, CBS actually brings itself to utter the dread C-word by the report’s third paragraph, so let's not quibble.

Meanwhile, visions of deadly thermoses rather than sugarplums dance in the heads of those "U.S. officials": "the Transportation Security Administration is ... ordering its officers to check insulated drink containers for hidden explosives."

As usual, Our Rulers balance precariously between insisting there's no real peril and demanding that we relinquish more of our freedom anyway. "Sources say there is no intelligence suggesting an imminent plot involving thermos bombs, but a statement on the TSA website warns: 'The possible tactics terrorists might use include the concealment of explosives inside insulated beverage containers.'” Count on CBS to regurgitate verbatim the TSA’s propaganda.

So in addition to protecting us from cancer's victims and whistle-blowing pilots, the TSA is now defending against those addicted to caffeine. I don't know about you, but I'll definitely sleep more soundly tonight.

Or would, had ol' "White House counterterrorism advisor John Brennan" not prattled, “We’re going to do our best to disrupt these plots and their plans before they ever make it to the homeland." Somehow, Nazis spouting terminology from the Third Reich always convince me that prostheses, thermoses, and even Al Qaeda on the Arabian Peninsula don't threaten us nearly as much as Al Qaeda on the Potomac.