As British Foil Airline Terror Plot, It's Clear Danger From Islamic Fascists Growing

To start with comparatively small things first, the New York Times Website has it all over the L.A. Times Website this morning in covering the dramatic news that the British have foiled a monstrous terrorist plot to blow up airliners over the Atlantic, and that airline security measures have been sharply tightened in both the U.S. and Britain.

This shows once again the deterioration of the L.A. Times as a national newspaper. The War on Terror day in and day out is the biggest story of our time. If the L.A. Times is going to stay competitive, it is going to have to do a much better job on its Website.

Two days after Connecticut Democrats showed, by defeating three-term incumbent Sen. Joe Lieberman in the party primary, that they are ready to cut and run in the war, the news today is strong evidence that Lieberman and other candidates like him who are determined above all else to defend America should be returned to office this November. Lieberman is now running as an independent.

We have no other sound choice than to put our and the nation's safety first. So I think financial contributions to the Lieberman campaign are surely in order. He needs help, and we need to help ourselves.

That a major terrorist plot is uncovered at this moment can come as no surprise. The Islamic Fascist enemies of the United States in Iran, Pakistan and elsewhere in the Muslim world most notably have made no secret of their plans to undertake the most diabolical plots they can conceive, and we must not only be ready to defend ourselves, but be ready to take preemptive action as appropriate to smash these evil forces.

Specifically, I hope we have an elaborate plan, ready to be carried out at any moment, to seize control of Pakistan's nuclear weaponry in case this is required by a furthur development of al-Qaeda within that nation's boundaries. Pakistan has already emerged as a potent foe of America and Europe in Afghanistan, providing a privileged sanctuary to the Taliban forces seeking to undermine our position there, but it probably shelters Osama Bin Laden himself and certainly serves as a training ground for terrorists seeking to strike at Europe and the U.S. In the first announcements of the terror plot disrupted by the British this morning, it was stated that most of those arrested were Pakistanis living in Britain, some of whom would have been trained back in Pakistan.

A recent survey found that one-fourth of all Muslims living in Britain sympathize with the terrorists. This is a threat neither the British nor us should any longer ignore. Those people should be rendered powerless and probably deported in masse.

In the United States, most Muslims, according to all indications, are loyal to American values. But we must be careful to take action against the minority who are not.

We were lucky this morning. Thanks to alert British security, a vile plot for what was accurately called by a British official "mass murder," was averted,

But we may not be so lucky the next time. As President Bush stated directly this morning, this nation ia at war with the Islamic Fascist successors of Nazism, and we must not make the mistake of thinking, or acting, otherwise.