Wolf! Wolf!

With not much more than 100 days before the mid-term elections, we can expect to hear much more about plots and terrorists.  Just as a few rusty artillery shells can be “weapons of mass destruction” if it suits Fox News to make the argument, a couple of guys e-mailing each other about blowing up something can be a terrorist plot.  Of course you have to take such things seriously, but the advantage to the administration of inflating dangers is obvious.

The plot to blow up the Sears Tower in Chicago, seems pretty inchoate and speculative. The “plot” uncovered in England a few weeks ago that involved in the shooting of an innocent man seems to have been nothing and although the jury is out on the current scare in New York, it doesn’t seem to be anything like a specific plot to blow up the Holland Tunnel and flood lower Manhattan as some papers have said.  None of these things of course have the credibility of the report George the Unready ignored in August of 2001.

The Holland Tunnel Plot, in fact may have nothing to do with that tunnel.  "At this time, we have no indication of any imminent threat to the New York transportation system or anywhere else in the U.S.," said FBI Special Agent Richard Kolko to CNN.  U.S. Sen. Charles Schumer said that no money had changed hands, no explosives were purchased and that nothing had been done to implement the plot.  Indeed that the Holland Tunnel was part of the plot at all may owe more to the New York Daily News than to sources familiar with the arrests.  The fact that Lower Manhattan is above sea level and water is somewhat uncomfortable with running uphill or remaining in large piles does not seem to have occurred to those willing to believe.

The announcement certainly was planned to coincide with the anniversary of the very real bombings in London last year even though the arrest of Amir Andalousi in Beirut occurred a month or so ago.

It’s hard not to be a cynic and it’s hard not to think that the limits of credulity will be stretched in coming months in order to depict George W. Bush as being an effective fighter against terrorist plots.