No, not in his fight to cut-and-run from Iraq. Or his efforts to cut off needed funding from our troops. Or his blockade of important appointees to the Defense and Intelligence communities.

Senator Levin has a much more aggressive way to fight the jihadists and make America more safe and secure.

He wants to make sure that airline baggage handlers and metal detector operators can... wait for it... wait for it... unionize.

Just as the terrorists had always feared.

I, for one, feel much more safe. Every time I have to take off my shoes, or take my laptop out of my briefcase and put it in a separate tray, or watch them wipe that chemical-detecting paper on my suitcase, I've always thought how much more effective they would be if only there were in a union. That would undoubtedly help them pick out the terrorists from the average travelers like me.

It would be a joke, if it weren't so serious.

Every day, America faces new threats from the terrorists who seek our demise. They are always plotting new ways to take American lives, strike blows to American strength, and inject fear into the American mindset. They are laser-focused on just one issue: destroying the United States.

Which makes it even more disturbing that the unionization vote came during debate over the recommendations of the 9/11 Commission. I happen to own a copy of their report, which I promptly pulled off my bookshelf. It has many suggestions for making America more safe and correcting the types of systemic problems that allowed the horrific attacks of 9/11 to occur. Some of them are good, some are bad, in my opinion. But they are all ideas that move us toward a more secure homeland and strengthen our defenses against our terrorist enemy.

I couldn't find greater unionization of transportation safety employees anywhere in the Commission's report.

I'm not taking anything away from these employees; they, in fact, do tremendous work that has made America more secure. They should be lauded for their efforts.

But there are simply more pressing issues of national security than whether or not they form a union with collective bargaining. As Chairman of the Armed Services committee, Mr. Levin should know this.

We face an insurgency in Iraq that hopes that every cowardly roadside bomb and horrific suicide attack will make America lose its resolve to win. We face growing threats from Iran and North Korea, who harbor the same deeply anti-American sentiments as Osama bin Laden. And we face the allies and followers of bid Laden, who continue to proclaim that the fight will not be over until the streets run red with the blood of American children.

Yep, these are times to worry about the organizational structure of baggage inspectors.

Carl Levin could be a powerful force standing up for the safety and security of the people of Michigan and of America. He could be fighting for a greater security measures for our big cities or our vaccine and chemical manufactures. He could be standing up and fighting for our military bases or our courageous men and women actually fighting the terrorists.

Instead, Levin is fighting for Democrat interests, Democrat dollars and Democrat talking points.

But maybe I'm wrong. Maybe he really was on to something.

Maybe the solution to improving safety in Iraq is unionization for the al Qaeda suicide bombers. Maybe if they just got those mandatory breaks every few hours...