One might indeed think that the Republican Party was thrilled at the prospect of nine commercial airliners blowing up over the Atlantic Ocean, given the broad-spectrum reaction by the GOP to the news. In truth, however, they are scrambling to manufacture the one element that has served them over these past five years: fear. They cannot stand on their record; their rhetoric has grown bone-thin, and so they are pulling that hoary old club out of the bag one more time.

William Rivers Pitt "The Frightened"