Undercover Genius: Fake Terrorists Buy Fake Missiles And Launch Hysterical Media Spin

There's an old expression in the Bush Administration that if you can't find any terrorists to fight the war on terrorism against then make some up. Yesterday, a British arms dealer, Hemant Lakhani, was arrested yesterday in Newark, N.J., on charges that he tried to sell a Russian-made, surface-to-air missile to an American undercover agent posing as an operative for al-Qaida, law enforcement officials said.

The Russians, alerted by the U.S. authorities, supplied the arms trader with a fake missile, built by American and Russian agents to appear to be a real one, which he tried to sell to American agents posing as terrorists. No real terrorists were ever connected to the plot.

The Bush administration has insisted that it is moving aggressively to respond to the threat of terrorism, but it has refused to support legislation now in Congress that would require the government to spend billions of dollars to outfit thousands of passenger planes in the United States with the antimissile technology now used on military planes.

Vice President Dick Cheney reiterated the Bush administration's stance against terrorism on Tuesday, saying the United States is prepared to take aggressive action to protect its citizens, even if they have to use fake terrorists and fake missiles instead of real ones.

"We've come to realize that if we are to protect the American people against FBI agents posing as determined enemies, we cannot always rely on the old strategies that were good enough during the Cold War," the vice president said. "It isn't easy keeping Americans terrified enough to ignore the pathetic disaster of an economy we oversee and to ignore how we slaughter innocent civilians in Iraq to "save" them. In order to keep Americans on the edge, and because frankly, the elevated alert status was getting too costly for the states we've bankrupted, we decided it would be just as effective to make up a story about terrorism so everyone can go back to being scared and ignoring the real issues around them. After all, the real threat to the United States and its people as well as our friends and allies, is the truth," he said.

Cheney, in a rare public sighting outside of his nornally "undisclosed" location, told a crowd of more than 200 supporters that the defining moment for himself, President Bush and the rest of the administration was Sept. 11, 2001. He said it was a day none of them will forget because "it gave us a great basis for making up this ridiculously vague "war on terrorism" that allows us to pretty much do whatever we want in the name of fighting terrorism."

Cheney acknowledged that the administration's strategy in the war on terrorism has been challenged by those who believe the country should not engage in military action unless attacked first. He argued that those who do not agree with the administration's strategy are either terrorists or terrorist supporters and should be either imprisoned or killed, whichever is easier.

"And make no mistake, this president is prepared to give the appearance of protecting us against further attacks even if that means making it all up with fake terrorists and fake missiles," Cheney told the cheering crowd.

In a traditional case of "do as I say, not as I do," federal prosecutors and FBI officials characterized the Lakhani case as an "important" victory in the war against terrorism, stressing that Lakhani had no qualms about dealing with terrorists. Although the United States has routinely sold real weapons of mass destruction to real countries that sponsor terrorism, an individual doing the same thing on the open market to fake terrorists with fake missiles apparently is the wrong thing.

So, to review, for those of you terrified by big headlines and idiot media coverage that plays to it because FEAR sells:

1. The "terrorists" weren't really terrorists, they were federal agents who were "posing" as al Qaeda operatives.

2. These dangerous missiles that were smuggled into the US were actually inert, SA-18s. Duds. Useless missiles.

3. The arrested man was NOT connected to a known terrorist group, but was thought to be more of an arms dealer or smuggler.

4. While the Bush Administration continues to refuse to spend money to outfit airliners with the sort of antimissile technology needed to protect civilian airlines from real terrorist attacks, they ARE willing to spend all the time and effort and resources necessary to conduct an 18-month long "sting" operation that nets a weapons dealer, NO terrorists and NO missiles but does allow the Administration to project the illusion, through the magic of a lapdog media, that they are actually doing something to protect its civilian airliners.

5. In the absence of capturing "real" terrorists who are really plotting acts of terrorism against the United States, the Bush Administration is happy to support creating fake news of fake terrorists in hypothetical situations so it appears they are actually going about their war on terrorism with some degree of competence. This fake news, projected and analysed via the media then becomes big headlines that the average American reads and then thinks: "Ooooooh. Terrorists were going to kill us all. Good thing the Bush Administration is here to protect us!"

Good thing indeed. As U.S. Attorney Christopher Christie summarized, "the terrorists have lost an ally," proving once again that a hollow victory is better than no victory at all.

So stay tuned, at this rate, the FBI will have arrested every fake terrorist in America in no time.