Marvin Kalb, just now on Fox News Channel, said "you'd have to be a fool" to not recognize that we're in a "clash of civilizations" with radical Islam.

The lights begin to go on. With luck enough lights will go on before the burkas and the sharia hit squads start coming out in Hollywood, Berkeley, New York, and other hot spots of cultural sensitivity.

Related:  The New Normal by Dean Barnett, guest-blogging at Hugh Hewett:

Just as is the case with an illness, there are a lot of people willing to tell us that are fears are overblown. If you want to believe that George W. Bush and the Patriot Act are the greatest threats to our way of life, you won’t have much trouble finding a professor on a nearby college campus to buttress your theory. If you want to think that there was nothing really going on in London to warrant any concern and all the news this morning is just Karl Rove’s response to Joe Lieberman’s defeat, you’ll easily locate a prominent blogger to offer his concurrence. (HT: Allah)

But it’s past time we face the facts and realize that this our New Normal. It’s worse than the old normal, the one that we had before 9/11 when we felt completely safe even though we weren’t.

It’s time we stop having a sphere of things that are “unimaginable.” Let’s imagine airliners exploding over our cities. Let’s imagine a mushroom cloud over Tel Aviv. Let’s imagine a mushroom cloud over New York.

Let’s imagine how such things might happen. And the let’s resolve to stop them.

I got up about 2 am this morning to go to the bathroom and get a glass of water.  I don't know why, but I turned on the TV to Fox News and discovered live Sky News coverage of the breaking plot to blow up airliners between Britain and the U.S.

The good news:  no boom today.  Yet.

The bad news:  no liquids allowed in your carry-on.

Seems like an OK trade to me.

Michelle Malkin meditates.

(Alliteration ends here)

(Click on the link to read the details)

The reputation of Old Media is in freefall right now, based on their dependence on biased Islamic stringers and photographers to provide them with "unbiased" reports from the Middle East.

Old Media needs to come clean, cut their losses, and start eyeing information they're getting from local sources much, much, much, much, much more critically, if they want to retain that small shred of credibility that they have remaining. (That's five M-words in a row, kind of a call-back to the previous alliteration. It would be funny if it weren't so serious.)

If they don't, it will be obvious to any reasonable observer that the Emperor is naked.

Update:  OK, it's late.  It was six M-words in a row.  G'nite, all.

Some readers may not be aware of the blatant propaganda which was being distributed by media giant Reuters. A stringer in Lebanon named Adnan Hajj doctored two and perhaps more photographs with the result that the damage being done in Lebanon by the Israelis was exaggerated. This column from Canada's Calgary Sun is a good overview:

They say the first casualty of war is Truth. Yesterday, the respected news agency Reuters issued an unprecedented announcement. Essentially, it admitted it unwittingly published propaganda as straight news.

In a released statement, the wire agency announced the withdrawal of all 920 photographs by freelance Lebanese photographer, Adnan Hajj from its database "after an urgent review of his work showed he had altered two images from the conflict between Israel and the armed group Hezbollah," said the statement.

Wishful thinking on Reuters' part.

The breaches go far deeper than just two photos.

The American Thinker discusses the problem with stringers:

But beyond the problem of Hajj the fraud is the larger problem of QA for the entire reporting force Reuters and most other news agencies field in Muslim lands. For language reasons, and for personal safety reasons, stringers, not full-time employees, are used to work the ground in places like Qana. Who are they?

One thing we can be certain of, is that they are people who feel reasonably certain they will not be murdered by Hiz b’allah (or Hamas or Saddam, when he was in power) for reporting news inconvenient to those with the guns. This alone is reason to suspect their fairness.

Reuters and other news agencies employing stringers need to be forthright with their public about who these people are and what are the limits under which they operate. Of course, doing so will limit the degree to which their reports are trusted. No doubt, that is why such caveats have rarely if ever been supplied.

When Reuters was still backing Hajj, it made no mention of his status as a stringer. But once he was repudiated, words like "stringer," "part-timer" and "freelance" became suddenly visible.

This will not do.

Trust is not given, it is earned. And it once trust is violated, it is very, very hard to regain. The next time you see a photo or a news item from Reuters, ask yourself why you should trust it, given this sorry spectacle.

Update:  the hits just keep coming for Reuters, from Dinocrat.com (via the American Thinker):

We just asked, "What if it were true?" It wasn’t. The Reuters story was wildly wrong. A new Reuters story now reads this way in the second paragraph:

Choking back tears in an emotional speech to an emergency meeting of Arab foreign ministers in Beirut, Siniora said more than 40 civilians were killed in an air raid in a southern village. But he later revised the toll to one.

"He later revised the toll to one." How then did Reuters get the reactions from the residents of that village, Houla, who said they feared that up to 60 people had been killed, and identified them as children and shepherds? Did they get that information from their Hezbollah handlers and allies? You may believe any story from Reuters / Hezbollah at your peril.

I really hate to sound like some wacko conspiracy theorist, but:

You are being lied to.  Again.  Still.  Had enough yet?

Lanny Davis, sensible Democrat extraordinaire, discovers to his horror that the left wing of his own party are totally nuts:

My brief and unhappy experience with the hate and vitriol of bloggers on the liberal side of the aisle comes from the last several months I spent campaigning for a longtime friend, Joe Lieberman.

This kind of scary hatred, my dad used to tell me, comes only from the right wing--in his day from people such as the late Sen. Joseph McCarthy, with his tirades against "communists and their fellow travelers." The word "McCarthyism" became a red flag for liberals, signifying the far right's fascistic tactics of labeling anyone a "communist" or "socialist" who favored an active federal government to help the middle class and the poor, and to level the playing field.

I came to believe that we liberals couldn't possibly be so intolerant and hateful, because our ideology was famous for ACLU-type commitments to free speech, dissent and, especially, tolerance for those who differed with us. And in recent years--with the deadly combination of sanctimony and vitriol displayed by the likes of Rush Limbaugh, Ann Coulter and Michael Savage--I held on to the view that the left was inherently more tolerant and less hateful than the right.

As Mr. Davis notes in his OpinionJournal article, he is relating some of the milder invective tossed his way by the out-of-control leftists who are very close to taking over the Democratic Party.  You can get a taste of the rhetoric by browsing some of the discussions at Daily Kos or (especially) at Democratic Underground.  A reasonable person will see that the discussion there is light-years more nasty and mean-spirited than on sites such as Free Republic or Townhall.

At some point, sensible people on both sides will become weary of shouting at one another and start talking, again.

An article in Science Daily reports findings that a gene called TOR may greatly affect insulin resistance, glucose and lipid (i.e. cholesterol) levels in the blood.  This is the key scientific basis underlying the Atkins diet and most other limited-carbohydrate diets:

TOR is an ancient gene, found in nearly all animal and plant cells. The researchers discovered that their new mutant fly reduced TOR function, allowing them to observe what happens when TOR's influence is removed.

Reductions in TOR function lowered glucose and lipid levels in the body. They also blocked the function of another important insulin regulator, a factor called FOXO, which is known to be a critical mediator of insulin signals and therefore glucose and lipid metabolism. In addition, flies with the mutated form of TOR had longer life spans than control flies.

"It has been unclear how TOR signaling affects the insulin pathway," said Oldham. "Our study adds another dimension to TOR's activity by revealing unexpected and novel levels of beneficial regulation of insulin metabolism, by reducing insulin resistance. This study provides the first details of how TOR may regulate energy homeostasis and responses to aging, in particular the coordination of weight reduction effects caused by caloric restriction and, in humans, it may explain the effects of the Atkins diet. It suggests that reducing TOR function could lead to a possible treatment for any or all symptoms of metabolic syndrome and insulin resistance."

Ready for $4 gasoline?  The oil companies have a big excuse, er, reason to tighten things up--BP has shut down the Alaska oil pipeline:

Oil prices jumped by more than $1 a barrel Monday following a production shutdown at an Alaskan oil field that accounts for about 8 percent of U.S. production.

BP Exploration Alaska Inc. began shutting down oil production Sunday at Prudhoe Bay due to severe pipeline corrosion.

Once the field is shut down, in a process expected to take days, BP said oil production would be reduced by 400,000 barrels a day. BP officials said they didn't know how long the Prudhoe Bay field would be off line.

We gotta do something ASAP about getting away from a hydrocarbon-based energy economy.  Actually, we have to do a lot, including building a bunch of new nuclear power plants--that way we have the juice to go to biofuels and/or hydrogen.

Apparently, the Code Pink wackos invaded and tried to close several Quik Trip stores in Kansas City, Missouri (all hail Quik Trip, best convenience store in the known world!!!). And I missed it.  Aw, shucks! That's what I get for living in the evil urban-sprawl suburbs.

But, Gateway Pundit comes to the rescue by linking to the Pitch article (references to "Cheney" refer to a Quick Trip customer who to the article's author looked a bit like our beloved (heh!) Vice-President). In this episode, Code Pinkos encounter real live Midwesterners who have better things to do at a Quik Trip than sit around and let a bunch of bicycle-riding holier-than-thou harpies close down Our Beloved Quik-Trip:

Law student Badgerow chose not to confront the rampaging Cheney, though he has mulled pressing charges. As the protesters cleared out en route to the Broadway BP station, Cheney and a trio of other QT customers shouted after them, relishing the fact that some had climbed into a car.

"That got gasoline in it?" a customer called.

Midtown resident Ben Bryan saw no sense in the protest. "They come here in cars to tell us that every tank of gas counts. Every single thing that they own or have on or groom themselves with comes from gas. They're hypocrites."

Cheney was less expansive. "It's harassment. It's crap. This is private property," he fumed. "What a waste of everybody's time."

. . .

Next morning, out on $500 bail, (protest organizer Sarah) Finken admitted that the protest hadn't gone as she'd hoped. "The message wasn't communicated effectively," she said.

Comedy is, above everything else, all about timing. Oh, and pictures. Click on either the Gateway Pundit or the Pitch links for a (same picture, two links) slice of Cops-Busting-Code-Pinkos photo goodness.

Lastly, did I mention we love Quik Trip? If they ever go public, we're buying a lot of stock!

A Convenience Store with a Commitment to Quality.
When walking into QuikTrip convenience stores, you know this store is different. The convenience store people are friendly and helpful. The convenience stores are clean and well-lit. Merchandise is fresh and easy to find. Most important, you can sense the overall attitude of a convenience store company doing the job right. Every time you visit our convenience stores, you'll know why they have an enviable national reputation for quality and customer service. You can see the difference in our convenience stores.

A Convenience Store with a Commitment to Do Things Right.
We've been doing things right in our convenience stores over the years, and it's paid off.

We have over 460 convenience stores, all open 24 hours a day, 365 days a year and no store is franchised. Each QuikTrip convenience store meets our standards for variety, fairness, and service. Every convenience store is compulsive about getting things right. That's why we enjoy over 5 billion dollars in sales annually, and why our convenience stores ranked 32th on the Forbes List of Privately Held Companies.

Quality In Everything We Do. We Guarantee It.
Our promise to our convenience store customers is simple: everything we do or sell is guaranteed. If you're not completely satisfied, we'll refund your money. Our convenience store gasoline guarantee is even stronger: if your car has a fuel-related problem, bring us the receipt and a statement from your mechanic and we'll pay for the repair. Our convenience stores make this promise because it's the right thing to do. For a company so dedicated to quality, how could we NOT have a guarantee so strong?

From Yahoo News:

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Democratic senators blocked their own goal on Thursday of raising the U.S. minimum wage for the first time since 1997 after Republicans added a huge tax break for the rich to the legislation, actions sure to reverberate in this election year.
. . .
The Republican plan would have eventually excluded estates valued at up to $5 million per individual, or $10 million for married couples, from any taxes.

Estates over $5 million to $25 million would have been taxed at 15 percent and anything over $25 million at 30 percent.

Now, I tend to think the minimum wage is a meaningless, borderline-harmful meddle in a routine economic exchange, but I don't really lose sleep over it one way or another.

Even so, I have come to expect no more of Democrats than cynically blocking the wage hike (which allegedly helps the poorest workers in the economy) in order to preserve the issue for the Fall elections while also perpetrating class warfare by opposing the trivial estate tax reform.  Considering that "the rich" pay 90% of taxes right now, any tax break "helps the fat cats."

In other news, tax breaks work.

So what do you do if you want to grow the economy, provide more jobs, provide better jobs?

What you do is cut taxes, you don't raise the minimum wage.  This is unfortunately too abstract for many people (most of them Democrats) to understand.

James Lileks has Screed again:

The US continues to support Israel. This is becoming difficult, since many important nations with well-dressed, urbane spokesmen have decided that Israel should stop its strange policy of firing rockets on UN-run stem-cell research facilites for no apparent reason. These diplomats will tolerate a little wartime madness – we all have our moments, after all – but enough is enough, and now they must go home and sit in the basement and wait for more rocket attacks. If they’re good, they will get a snack.

Just the right note of sarcastic scorn for those who think Israel is somehow the bad guy here.  Hat tip:  Hugh Hewett