I'll take a rain check on the Tang

Well, we now know why liquids are banned on aircraft. A British court was presented with startling evidence concerning the "liquid explosives terror plot" dismantled by UK police in August 2006. The ingredients for the bombs intended to bring down seven jets were shockingly commonplace: Tang, hydrogen peroxide and a digital camera.

Prosecutors say the suspects had planned to hide the Tang-and-bleach mixture in plastic soda bottles and the HMTD in hollowed-out AA batteries. The initial charge would have been set off in the HMTD, causing a larger explosion.

Just one bottle-sized bomb could be powerful enough to rip a hole in a plane’s hull — certain tragedy for the passengers aboard the seven targeted flights... Prosecutors say the attack was planned for between August and December, two of the busiest months of the year for air travel. Had the planes been full, nearly 2,000 people would have been killed.

...Scientists at the Forensic Explosives Laboratory in London re-created the device, but as a precaution they left the testing area and had a robotic arm mix the deadly chemicals... It was a smart move: The tiny bomb destroyed one of the video cameras and sprayed the lab with pieces of the protective walls meant to contain the blast...

Remember how the left-wing blogs described the plot at the time?

Once again, the astonishingly incompetent notion of "fighting them over there so we don't have to fight them over here" has been shown to be nothing but ideologically-backed neoconservative bungling of the highest order.

A dangerous and blood-soaked farce that has gained nothing except expanded territories in which terrorism can flourish, and has not made the nation safer...

Even Juan Cole, writing at the time of the incident, could instantly shred the Kos-kook argument:

"So how did we find out about this plot, and the deadly mode of operation, which might otherwise have been so hard to detect? The investigation was kicked off by an arrest in Pakistan "last year."

I'll chalk this up to yet another simple error by the left -- we'll just add it to the list that includes "Great Society", Reagan's destruction of Communism, the Clintons' handling of terrorism, The Welfare Reform Act of 1996, Earmarks, "Draining the Swamp", etc., etc., etc.