One always has to question whether this is really a threat or whether it is something cooked up like the WMDs were. Some politicians are psychopathis and have no conscience about anything that offers political advantage. For example, you may remember the South Carolina primary when one candidate's presidential hopes were dashed when the other candidate floated rumors that he had fathered an illegitimate Black child. Psychopathic politicians will start a war if it helps them at the polls. And, now that a completely unknown candidate has won the primary here in Connecticut on an anti-war platform, the Hawks need a new basis for letting YOU know that YOU NEED them to protect you from . . . let's see now . . . oh yes, being blown up on a plane, that's it, yes, . . .

Though we Americans are taught in school to regard our leaders as people of the highest ideals, the schools do not -- unfortunately -- make it clear that the ideals this country was founded on by Jefferson, Washington, Franklin and others are no longer paramount in our present-day politician's minds.

Far from it. Ideals be damned; just get re-elected by any means whatsoever.

From time-to-time, I've written here about psychopaths. Good people have a hard time understanding that psychopaths are not just serial killers, but people who live amongst us and appear to be like the rest of us. They are inevitably charming and cunning; the difference between them and us is that we are not as charming because we have our limits; we are not as cunning because we have our limits, and they -- because they have no genuine human emotional attachments -- have no limits except what they calculate is in their best interests.

Because they are charming, cunning, and have no limits, they are excellent at politics. And, without any doubt among therapists, a great many of our political leaders are genuine psychopaths.

Make no mistake; this is not an anti-Republican statement, as I am a registered Republican; there are psychopaths in both parties, and their numbers are not small. I am sending your this special newsletter because I do not want you to be victimized by their efforts to control you with fear.

But you may ask, what if this is genuine? It may be. But consider this. Politicians decide whether to let you and me in on genuine threats when it is in their interests to do so, and not to let us in on genuine when it is not in their interests to do so.

I loath politicians who toy with people's minds. I ask you to give consideration, whenever you read the news or watch television, to ask yourself what is the reason behind what you see. What you see is not there for your benefit; it is there for someone else's benefit. Do not allow your emotions to be manipulated.

Acceptance that our government is dominated by psychopaths is not easy to stomach. But there is a fascinating way to gain insight into this. Rent a copy of 'House of Cards Trilogy' available at Netflix and Blockbuster. This is an excellent British series done in 1990 about events in Britain. But, as the lead character says, 'Don't be shocked. This goes on everywhere and always,' as he has someone disposed of in a way that makes it appear it to have been an IRA killing.

Now, back to this issue.

If there is anything to it -- and remember this came from Britain who is with us in Iraq, and not France or Germany who are not -- consider this:

• terrorists are not stupid enough to always focus on aviation, as they know people would deal with that by simply not flying; after targeting aviation, their ideal (and easier) targets are non-aviation targets; hitting aviation again doesn't make sense;

  
  
  

• 9/11 could not happen today simply due to the cockpit doors we now have;

  
  
  

• if there were no security whatsoever, the chance of any one person being on a plane with a terrorist is incredibly small; take note that and add security to that.

Rationally, then, anxiety about terrorism does not make sense. But what about emotionally? But it in the 'Strengthening Exercise'. Go to your positive experience; relive it and capture the strong feeling of connectedness. Then picture Marge or Homer Simpson sitting on a plane. Everything is fine, but the cartoonist has drawn a picture of an imaginary terrorist in the 'balloon' over the cartoon character's head. Immediately return to the positive experience and the strong feeling of connectedness.

This then restores proper emotional weight to the issue, emotional weight that matches rational consideration.

If you don't know the 'Strengthening Exercise', it is available in 'The Control of Anxiety' at http://www.fearofflying.com/store.shtml.

P.S. Here is Patrick's take on this.

For more of Patrick's blogs, go to http://dir.salon.com/topics/patrick_smith/.

Terrorists intend to destroy several jumbo jets over the ocean using liquid explosives smuggled aboard in carry-on luggage. The plot is foiled by police.

August, 2006? No, it's 1994, and the sinister plan, nicknamed 'Oplan Bojinka,' is directed by Ramzi Yousef and Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, a pair of terrorist conspirators then living in Manila, Philippines. Khalid would later lead the 9/11 attacks. Ramzi Yousef had already organized the World Trade Center prelude bombing in 1993.

Oplan Bojinka is Arabic slang for 'Operation Big Bang.' It is funded by Osama bin Laden and Riduan Isamuddin, an Indonesian operative who goes by the name 'Hambali.'

Ramzi Yousef is a master mixer of hard-to-detect liquid incendiaries. By the time he is apprehended in Pakistan in 1995, he has completed a Bojinka test run on board a Philippine Airlines 747, killing a Japanese businessman with a small underseat explosion. Yousef had personally smuggled aboard the necessary components, including nitroglycerin hidden inside a converted bottle of contact lens solution.

After his arrest, Philippine police uncover the Bojinka plot from one of Yousef's computers left behind in Manila. At his trial in 1997, it is revealed that eleven jetliners, all belonging to U.S. airlines, traveling between Asia and the United States were to be targeted over a two-day period in January, 1995. The bombs were to be assembled in lavatories, then hidden inside underseat life jackets. The conspirators would disembark upon landing, with timers set to detonate during the next flight.

The 'microbombs,' as they were called, used Casio watches for timers, stabilizers that looked like cotton balls, and undetectable nitroglycerin as the key explosive. A pair of 9-volt batteries would provide a power source. Light bulb filaments would serve as a detonator.

All of this happened more than eleven years ago. Although we had more than a decade of advance notice that something like this was possible, it seems that did very little to prepare for it, choosing instead to focus relentlessly on boxcutters and knitting needles.

Following today's revelation that a copycat Bojinka scheme was underway in Britain, we're suddenly in a state of full-blown panic. Predictably and tragically, airport security has been thrown into a state of chaos. There is no reason it has to be this way -- though few of us who've been writing about airport security issues over the past few years are surprised.

The underlying lesson here is that no matter how hard we try, it has always been, and it will always be. relatively easy to smuggle a potentially deadly weapon onto an aircraft. The easily concealable components of the Bojinka microbombs demonstrate the futility of trying to root out every possible terror tool. Look at the ultimately be impossible to thwart a terror attack using hands-on, frontline resources.

Ultimately, protecting commercial aircraft from terrorism is not the job of airport security, it's a job for police, government investigators, and national intelligence agencies. The alleged plot at Heathrow was not unraveled by the keen eye of a concourse screener; it was unraveled through careful investigation ahead of time. By the time any attacker makes it to the metal detector and x-ray machine, chances are it'll already be too late. There are simply too many ways to outwit that final line of defense. We continue to dump our resources into foolish pursuits.

Here we are initiating yet another absurd crackdown on carry-on luggage, gravely inconveniencing millions upon millions of innocent travelers. The fact remains that the true weapon of mass destruction is the imagination and resilience of those who wish to harm us -- a fact we continue to ignore at our own peril.

And I would add to what Patrick says, politicians who orchestrate these matters -- without regard -- except for political advantage. We ignore that politicians do that at even greater peril: the loss of everything our founding fathers stood for.