Hi Bill -- You've been busy. I'd like to respond to your ideas:

"In case I'm mistaken, when Israel was re-created in 1948, outside countries invaded them. Yes, they have not enjoyed peace since their creation. And what is the reason for that? It's because their neighbors want to kill them. Why? Simple - their religious leaders (including Mohammed) tell them to." -- O.k, Israel was invaded b/c they took land that belonged to someone else. This is a huge thing and not easily solved. My thoughts on Israel are that whatever they are doing, however they are responding (attack back if attacked, ad nauseam), it's not working. Somewhere, there's got to be a solution that both sides can live with. The solution has to come from ideas and thought.

"So let me ask you this. Is it a fallacy of logic to deduce that because Israel has not enjoyed peace, they (or the USA) are somehow to blame? (Ok, I took a couple of philosophy courses.)" -- See above. No, Israel needs to defend itself, but after 60 years, it gets old and people need to search for a viable solution. Ideas.

"We know why the terrorists are against us: it's because of who we are (infidels, we support the Jewish nation, and we are considered a Christian nation). You are either blind, stupid, ignorant or evil not to recognize that. And I am not trying to be inflammatory." -- Point taken that the Arab (NOT Muslim) world hates us because we support Israel. Once again, see above -- we've got to find a solution. If that problem is solved (along with US in Saudi Arabia and other Arab nations), do you think that terrorists will attack us because we where short skirts and have sex out of wedlock? Well, they might now, because we've pissed them off so much.

"Ok, I am an armchair political activist, but using your logic is flawed. Osama bin Laden works for somebody. He's not a one man show with a few followers." -- OBL comes from a rich family and he's being supported by wealthy interests. He's Saudi. There's been talk that the source of his money is from Saudi Arabia. (Makes sense.) He got pissed off in the first place because there was/is a U.S. presence in Saudi Arabia. OBL was never funded by Saddam Hussein. Repeat: OBL was never funded by Saddam Hussein.

"The West has been duped to think that the Muslim nations are simply "not understood". What a public relations victory for them to have people like you think that Osama bin Laden is [not] the enemy." -- This is where you start veering off into nutso, Republican-speak territory. NOBODY I KNOW THINKS THAT MUSLIM NATIONS ARE SIMPLY 'NOT UNDERSTOOD.' However, it would behoove us to understand their thinking, their customs, their language. 'Know thy enemy.' Which brings me to the public relations victory. NOBODY I KNOW THINKS OBL IS NOT THE ENEMY. However, here's the biggie: Before the Iraqi invasion, OSAMA BIN LADEN HAD NO CONNECTION WITH IRAQ. NADA. ZILCH. The only connection was that he was Muslim. The automatically made him the same as Saddam Hussein. Faulty thinking, there.

"Another fallacy is that we started the war. I believe the war was started in 1983, or thereabouts, with the first bombing of the World Trade Tower. That's like saying we started WWII by invading France and that we bombed Japan without cause." -- The U.S. invaded Irag, a pre-emptive strike (per W) because they supposedly had WMD. WE INVADED A SOVEREIGN COUNTRY WITH A NASTY DICTATOR THAT HAD NOTHING TO DO WITH THE ATTACKS IN 1983 OR ANY THEREAFTER. Absolutely faulty thinking on your part. Japan bombed Pearl Harbor, we declared war on Japan. Terrorists from Saudi Arabia, Morroco (?), and some other countries, BUT NOT FROM IRAG, flew into the WTC and our response is to go to war with Iraq. Faulty logic; does not compute.

I would feel so much better if the right-wingers didn't automatically and always paint every Muslim with the same brush. Osama Bin Laden had nothing to do with Iraq. Saddam Hussein, a nut job in his own right, was the dictator of a secular country that didn't care for OBL's religious rantings. Please, get that through your head and we can start talking about solutions.

"dems original votes apparently were based on them being stupid, feeble, gullible and unable to look into the future."

Joe, you've conceded that W was wrong, wrong, wrong.

Thanks, Joe. You've made my day.

"Blah blah blah blah bah. . ."

Yeah, because you know, it would be unheard of to have some right winger go to a prostitute. Wouldn't happen. Never.

Cripes! With political advisors like this, who needs enemies?

So we got 3,000 pages of paper, which are not easy to index -- as one writer already pointed out -- instead of electronic copies, which are easy to index. And here's another thought:

The DOJ is trying to deluge the press with all this paper, but think of the emails, etc. that it's NOT giving up. Think of how much they're withholding.

Couldn't we have some computer expert go through the DOJ's computer? Would that take an Act of God? I'd love to see the now-deleted emails that are not part of the 3,000-page package.

P.S. Great post, Peter Marcenci!

Ah, Tony Snow: King of absurdspeak.

"because the revenues associated with the tax cuts have been phenomenal." -- What the heck is he talking about? The Trickle-Down theory??? The trickle has been phenomenal?

"Salon: But a lot of that [spending] was the war and the war on terror?

McCain: Mmmm. Very small. Very small amount, if you look at the overall budget. Most of it is just overall spending. The biggest increase in the size of government since the Great Society. " -- Yeah, that was the Bridge to Nowhere.

Well everybody, we've already found out how fiscally conservative Conservatives are. They're not.