Amazing, isn't it, to watch a fit of hysteria in print?

You've never seen one? Check out Michelle Malkin's latest column. For rank paranoid lunacy, this one can't be beat.

Malkin is afraid, very afraid, and she wants you to be too. The government, she tells us, isn't doing -- can't do -- enough. She's getting her war on -- not in Iraq, here in the U.S. -- and she wants your help.

Poor Michelle. One can tell she desperately wants to praise the latest collection of doodlings and scribblings of Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge -- that which has been dubbed "Operation Liberty Shield" -- but she can't. ("Operation Liberty Shield"? Do these guys need writers, or what?) Malkin writes, "Instead of calling on Americans to 'prepare for the inevitability' of suicide attacks, the homeland security chief should be issuing a citizens' call to arms."

She really is a "gun nut," isn't she?

Malkin's column is a collection of oh-so-helpful and constructive advice to respond to the threat she believes surrounds her -- us, even -- at every moment. "Be sure to check out the FBI's photo gallery of most wanted terrorists on the Internet," she writes, incoherently. (It's not clear whether Malkin is referring to the terrorists most wanted by FBI or only to those the agency most wants to find surfing the web or whether there are indeed two such lists at all.)

And while the FBI may be devoting its best efforts (may being the operative word here) toward capturing suspected terrorists, for Malkin, that's not enough:

[T]he bureau needs all the help it can get....Law enforcement officials rely on civilians to look out for criminal suspects all the time. More than ever, they could use the services of citizen sentinels on guard against fugitive terrorists and sleeper suicide bombers.

Block committees of the world, unite!

And here's a gem of typical Malkin advice: "Report illegal aliens."

What a surprise. The daughter of Filipino immigrants, who can't abide the notion that anyone entered this country, legally or illegally, after her beloved parents, writes: "If you know or suspect an illegal alien, fugitive deportee or other criminal alien, call the feds."

College students, professors, administrators, and even the cafeteria ladies, have a special role to play in Malkin's hysteria: "Watch the campuses. If you study or work at a college or university, be alert....Be especially on guard against suspicious behavior if you are in the computer or engineering fields. Don't let political correctness paralyze you from reporting unusual activity."

As Malkin reaches her crescendo, the level of her psychosis becomes readily apparent:

Be always prepared. Take nothing for granted in your daily life: your trips to the mall, your commute across the bridge, your stop at the library or Home Depot.

And do what, Michelle, as we head to the mall, cross the bridge, visit the library, or buy our plastic sheets and duct tape? What, pray tell? Ah, but she has the answer:

Sharpen your powers of observation. Take note that the Islamists abroad are recruiting women suicide bombers. If you are trained and licensed to carry a concealed weapon, don't leave home without it. [Ed.: Emphasis added.]

That last statement leads me to wonder whether Malkin is herself packing heat. If so, we need far stricter gun control measures than we have in place now.

Malkin concludes: "War is here. The choice is ours: Shields or sheep? Let's roll."

Lisa Beamer, please call your office.

(Keep in mind, bloggers of all political persuasions, those dozens, hundreds even, of you far smarter and more thoughtful than Malkin could ever hope to be: She gets paid to write this tripe. Then again, Norah Vincent, she of the late and unlamented Norah's BlogJam, is continuing to scam the otherwise intelligent editors of the Los Angeles Times.)