The Washington Times has declared holy war with a three-part series excerpted from a new book by Tony Blankley, a former Gingrich chief aide who now serves as the paper’s editorial-page editor. “Multiculturism,” he declares, is heir to fascism and communism, and thus must be fought on just as complete a footing — primarily by attacking Islam.

“Even before Pearl Harbor,” writes Blankley, “President Roosevelt understood that a Nazi-dominated Europe would be more than a fearsome military and industrial threat. It would be a civilizational threat.

“Now we face another such threat in insurgent Islam.”

How does this threat operate? Terrorism, says Blankley, undermining his own claims that the “threat” comes from only one small portion of “Islam.” But more important, suggests Blankley, are the expanding “Muslim populations” that “might lead to the fall of Western civilization.”

What to do? Embrace what Blankley calls the “old war spirit.” Here’s an example: “the burning of mosques in traditionally tolerant Holland is evidence that the European instinct for survival has not been fully extinguished.”

Would even Hearst have tolerated such murderous hate in his pages? This isn’t even yellow journalism. It’s blood-red.