If you happened to be looking for a demonstration of the utter uselessness of "bipartisanship" as an approach to the world's problems, you'd be hard-pressed to come up with a better example than the Bipartisan Policy Center's latest terrorism-threat assessment, a report titled "Assessing the Terrorist Threat" [PDF of full report here].

It does offer a lot of useful information on what is indeed an important developing phenomenon -- namely, the growth of homegrown terrorism with an international orientation, that is, radical Muslims of American background. But -- even as it urges the government to prepare for and deal with "the radicalization and recruitment of Americans to terrorist ranks" -- it proceeds as though radical Islam is the only component of that problem.

This, of course, is exactly the kind of narrative that the Muslim-bashers at Fox love to run with, as you can see from the above video. Likewise, "mainstream" media like the Wall Street Journal did likewise, while NPR's execrable Dina Temple-Raston -- who not so long ago was writing warm and fuzzy profiles of the "new, kinder, gentler militias" -- chimed in with a piece headlined "Homegrown Terrorists Pose Biggest Threat, Report Says".

No doubt these homegrown Islamic radicals do pose a real threat. But whether they are in fact the "biggest" terrorism threat Americans face or not is very much open to question -- because the longest-running, most consistent and in fact currently fastest-growing domestic-terror threat comes from a component completely ignored in the BPC report: radical right-wing American extremists.

Just this week we had a clear-cut case of this:

Federal authorities charged a Concord man this week with providing information to create explosives he believed would be used to blow up a North Carolina abortion clinic. Justin Carl Moose, 26, who the FBI alleges referred to himself as the “Christian counterpart to (Osama) bin Laden” in a taped undercover meeting with a federal informant, was arrested on Tuesday, according to U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Middle District of N.C. Moose is charged with providing information related to the manufacture of an explosive, destruction device or weapon of mass destruction to the informant, who he believed was plotting to bomb an abortion clinic. In an undercover operation, federal officials state they had the informant provide Moose with a name and address of a clinic he was supposedly targeting. ... Agents verified Moose’s ownership of the web page and noted it contained numerous anti-abortion postings, videos and images that support others convicted of murder or attempted murder at abortion clinics, along with links about building explosives. On the Facebook page cited in the complaint, which was still online Thursday, Moose describes himself as: “Whatever you may think about me, you’re probably right. Extremist, Radical, Fundamentalist...? Terrorist...? Well... I prefer the term “freedom Fighter.” “End abortion by any means necessary and at any cost”. “Save a life, Shoot an abortionist.” The FBI analyzed the links regarding explosives and found they provided credible information for building functioning devices. In one post, Moose allegedly taunted federal authorities by acknowledging he was likely being monitored, writing:

“To all the feds watching me: You can’t stop what is in motion. Even if you bring me in, my men will continue their mission. Furthermore, I will not go peacefully. Do you really want another Waco?”

Of course, this is only the latest and most recent example of right-wing American domestic terrorism manifesting itself. Indeed, when you consider the litany of the past couple of years alone, we're compiling quite a record:

That's sixteen major incidents in a two-year period -- significantly more than we've seen over the same timespan from domestic radical Muslims. The BPC's report enumerates a total of seven incidents in 2009 -- two attacks and five serious plots (not to mention four attempts to join terrorist organizations). We've had the same number of right-wing extremist-related incidents of domestic terrorism in 2010 so far -- and the year isn't even over yet.

This has in fact been quite predictable, especially considering that both the Southern Poverty Law Center and the ADL have reported a significant increase in recruitment by right-wing extremists, particularly white-supremacist and radical "Patriot" groups, in the wake of President Obama's election. These two factions, after all, have been responsible for the overwhelming majority of domestic-terrorism cases of the past thirty years and more. Indeed, the problem is serious enough that the Pentagon has finally begun to clamp down on the far-right extremists who have been infiltrating the ranks of U.S. troops in recent years.

But right-wingers are always eager to dismiss the reality of right-wing extremists -- even in the face of overwhelming data. So this means, evidently, that when we now assess terrorism on a "bipartisan" basis, we must omit them altogether.

I'm sure it makes for wonderful comity inside the Beltway. But it creates a dangerous level of ignorance -- and concomitant vulnerability -- when that becomes the standard media narrative.

Digby has more. Be sure to read D-Day too.

[H/t Sonya Somander at ThinkProgress.]