TERRORISM REAL AND STILL ALIVE - THE SUNDAY COMMENTARY

The July 4th Congressional recess is nearing completion and both the House and the Senate will resume their places on Capitol Hill with the usual fanfare and rhetoric. With the debate on immigration ended by the defeat of the Senate bill the temporary hold on war funding and the handling of the war will once again take center stage.

With the recent attempts in London and the nearly failed attempt in Glasgow, Scotland still making headlines as British authorities continue the hunt for participants and interrogate those already in custody, the Congress again faces the reality that terrorism still poses a great threat.

The attempts in London also emphasis a vulnerability that the west and especially we in The United States have to this form of terrorism. Remember, the attempts in London failed not because they were thwarted by intelligence or the finding of the devices but because the devises themselves were faulty and did not explode before they were discovered.

Large car bombs or truck bombs that can take out a heavily populated building or explode in a busy pedestrian area are a vulnerability that is nearly impossible to detect or prevent. Terrorist cells have the capability in a free society to drive what they please and purchase what they need then freely place the devise with rather conventional materials anywhere that a parking place is available.

The Muslim terrorists who planned the London and Glasgow attacks used simple devises with everyday materials that if they had succeeded could have killed hundreds. These terrorists also were not subject to the scrutiny of the usual stereotypes since many of them were licensed members of the medical profession and trusted by many.

Yet as the investigation is revealing several can be traced back to Al Qaeda training in Iraq. So the face of terrorism encompasses more than just the down trodden and poverty stricken that many , "experts, "claim is the hold that terrorist leaders have over their soldiers in order to brainwash them into action by providing them with the necessities of life that their impoverished existence lacks.

Also these recent attempts prove that terrorism and the Muslim participants still live among us and cells while operating independently have their birth, training and initial orders from Al Qaeda in the Middle East.

Yet regardless of these facts and that each of the recent attempts have taken place in his watch and beneath the British Union Jack Flag, new British prime Minister Gordon Brown is sanitising terrorism in his country. He has instructed all Cabinet Ministers to no longer refer to a, "war on terror, " or , " the war against terrorism." He has also instructed his Ministers to refrain from making any reference to Muslims or Islam in any statement about terrorism.

This despite the reality that each of the terrorists in custody are Muslim and follow radical Islam. It is a proven fact that while all Muslims are not terrorists, all Islamic terrorists have been Muslim. But political correctness in Great Britain no will no longer recognize this fact.

This in itself increases the vulnerability to terrorist attack as it reduces identification of a possible terrorist because of denial of their origin and the religion that they preform their acts for.

Here in The United States a similar move has been in the wings with Democrats whose political correctness is more important that identifying the enemy. Additionally as the Congress re-convenes the battle of sound bites will resume as House and Senate leaders will run to the cameras calling for an Iraq pull out, insulting the capabilities of our military and especially the top commanders. All disguised as debate over military appropriation bills that must be renewed soon.

Again this will take place knowing that the British evidence directly links the participants in the London and Glasgow attempts to training and birth as terrorist cells under Al Qaeda in Iraq, which is one of the battlefields in this war that our troops are beating the enemy in order to prevent an attack in our country. Fighting them on their own turf rather than ours.

But this is a political football to Democrats who want to take the White House next year and continue as the majority in the House and Senate. So facts will not deter them from their political agenda nor will it silence their false rhetoric about how the strategy has failed, though every indication shows just the opposite.

They will continue to use daily media body count as a means to chide the American people into condemning the war. They will make the same lame and false claims about the failure of our troops and the strategy in general. They will once again cry that the war is lost, that we were lied into war though each of them saw the same intelligence and came to the same conclusion.

They will again play games with appropriations bills and add millions in pork spending while challenging the President and claiming that because he won't sign a bill with withdrawal scenarios and massive pork spending, that he does not support the troops.

Yet somewhere in this country a cell with similar ambitions as those in London waits to make their move or receive instructions from a leader in Iraq we have yet to find and if Democrats have their way will not find because we won't be there to find him.

Maybe the bomb designer in the US cell is better than the London bomber and maybe rather than duds as the London bombs were these car bombs will go off in Times Square, The Washington Mall, or even the airport in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania for example, which would be an unexpected attack like that of Glasgow.

But to Gordon Brown and Congressional Democrats, the war on terror does not exist, Islamic extremists are not a threat and the time has come to surrender and come home.

Ken Taylor