Bring back the fear

Also via Cryptogram: the Onion has an amusing editorial on terror.

"We must all do whatever we can to preserve America by refocusing our priorities back on the contemplation of lethal threats—invisible nightmarish forces plotting to destroy us in a number of horrific ways. It is only through the vigilance and determination of every patriot that we can maintain the sense of total dread vital to the prolonged existence of a thriving, quivering America...

Not so very long ago, we winced every time we saw someone with facial hair or a backpack. Average people were terrified of opening their mail for fear of getting a face full of anthrax. Those were perhaps our country's greatest days. Yet that once-phobic spirit that defined our times is drastically changing...

We can no longer rely solely on our enemies to menace the populace—we must find that horror within ourselves. Though we have made great strides in frightening ourselves about illegal immigrants, bird-flu pandemics, and random psychotic school shootings, it is not enough. What happened to that country I used to know and love, where a Korean grocer could be killed out of irrational xenophobia merely because someone thought he was an Arab? Such an act is, I am disappointed to say, almost unthinkable in today's increasingly less-than-utterly-petrified climate...

Let's all come together as in fearful days of yore and do what we must to keep America free from peace of mind once and for all."