It was as though a Chinese firecracker went off in my mind. There I was, half-delirious and guided only by instinct, a shopping list and the desire to find a good deal on anything and everything.

I still can’t believe I didn’t see it sooner. The “Made in China” label that is synonymous with a bargain is, in reality, a warning of the coming invasion.

The poisonous dog food should have clued me in, but like most Americans, I bought into the cover story. The seemingly accidental poisoning of our pets was a result of agricultural chemicals used on Chinese farms.

A mistake was made, maybe a miscalculation somewhere between the manufacturer and the unwitting farmers and their application of the deadly chemical.

Then, I learned that toys containing dangerous levels of lead have been finding their way into the hands, and mouths, of American children.

I tried to reason that this is precisely why toys come with age-appropriate guidelines. After all, if you’re older than 5, you should know better than to eat your toys. I chalked it up to a case of modern-day Darwinism.

At this point, like most true-blue Americans, I was convinced that our good friend China would never intentionally harm us. After all, the long history of human rights abuses is in the past. I would never have suspected a thing until I read about the straw that broke the camel’s back: Aqua Dots.

Aqua Dots are a Chinese-made toy that, when eaten, become a chemically identical version of the date rape drug. It all made sense to me. China is staging an attack on the U.S.

Stage 1 of the attack is to hook Americans on affordable Chinese products. The proliferation of big-box stores in nearly every American town is a good indicator of this. So too is our near total addiction to good deals.

Even our president can’t be trusted. In fact, he may be one of the invasion’s architects. Consider his advice to the nation following Sept. 11. Our leader never told us to sacrifice for the coming war. No calls were made to buy war bonds or to grow victory gardens. Instead, he told us to keep buying things, things he knew all too well originated overseas.

Stage 2 of the attack is characterized by the steady “dumbening” of American youth. I propose that the Chinese toy makers knowingly put lead in those toys for the sole purpose of stunting the mental growth of young American minds.

But now the tactics have changed into an attempt to diversify their poison-delivery systems. Enter Aqua Dots.

Within the next two generations, we can expect the final stage of the invasion to occur. Unfortunately, our future generations will be too weak from lead poisoning to fight, too strung out on toys that metabolize into drugs when eaten and too forlorn over the loss of their pets to care.

My fellow Americans, now is the time to act. We must fight now while we still can. We must save the future generations from themselves. Waste no time, write to your elected officials immediately, tell your friends and beware: Stage 3 is coming.