Maintaining fear

Al-Qaeda - its leadership under pressure from a Pakistani army keen to find scalps to pass along to the master, its cells in the "West" being hunted by the police - has happily not been heard from for a while. Elements have joined the insurgency in Iraq of course, but that is hardly enough to keep people over here fearing for their lives, and so long as Iraqi - not American or British - soldiers and police are the victims of their despicable acts of terror (car bombs and all the rest of it) it is a matter attracting little attention. Headlines like "Bomb Killls 3 Iraqi Policemen in Procession" are by now so familiar that the only means by which they might induce shock would be by their disappearance. This is handy for those who have an interest in ensuring that headlines like "Insurgency is Fading Fast, Top Marine in Iraq Says" can be taken seriously. Less American troops are dying, the story explains, withuot noting that Iraqi troops have displaced Americans in the firing line, with predictable effects - the Iraqis are dying, not the Americans.
But if the insurgency is fading fast, then by whom are we to be terrified? That all-purpose safety net for stoking up fear in the UK, the IRA. They're coming back, so get frightened, and be sure to vote for the party most likely to save us all with "anti-terror" and "serious organised crime" legislation. Because after all, people protesting in Parliament Square could lead to political awareness. And we really wouldn't want that now, would we?