The neo-cons are desperate to re-write history, but we must not let them do so. When the neo-cons sold the invasion of Iraq to the credulous mainstream media, they said there would not BE a war. The invaders were to be greeted as liberators; the fighting (if any) was to last six weeks at most; the U.S. occupation was to last six months, tops; reconstruction would be pay for itself from Iraq's oil revenues; and anyone who disagreed with any of the foregoing claims was an imbecile or a traitor, or both.

Thus, according to the policymakers' own statements -- none of which proved even remotely accurate -- U.S. policy has already failed. By virtue of having to fight a war that wasn't supposed to happen, and thus wasn't planned for, the U.S. has already "lost". Even if everyone in Iraq were to lay down his or her weapon and go home tomorrow, it would still be true that the neo-cons led the U.S. (and Iraq) into disaster. Instead, their failure just gets more catastrophic every day.

Meanwhile, Osama remains free, and al-Qaeda still threatens the West, nearly four and a half years after 9/11. Imagine how these same neo-cons would be shrieking for impeachment had any of this occurred under a President Clinton, Gore, or Kerry.

Thank you, Mr. Danner and Mr. Engelhardt, for that brave and fascinating interview. Two quibbles:

1. It is wrong, even as an analogy, to describe this administration's policy as governing through 50.1% of the people. The whole point of the last six years is that a flawed electoral system has allowed a minority of rural red-state Americans to control the federal government. And as much as we might hope that THEIR flirtation with right-wing extremism is coming to an end, nothing has changed, institutionally, since 2000. A vote for president in Wyoming in 2008 will still carry four times the electoral weight of a vote in San Francisco; most mid-term races in 2006 will take place solely within the many small red states; and the result will again be a federal government that neither reflects nor respects the wishes of the people.

2. Mainstream media have been willing participants, rather than innocent victims, in the subjugation of truth. As proof, consider the so-called case for war made by Colin Powell at the U.N. in February 2003. That "case" consisted of half-truths, exaggerations, and lies; and an independent media would have examined the various assertions, and reported accordingly. For example, the claim that a terrorist group associated with al-Qaeda was building WMD in a training camp "in a part of Iraq not under Saddam [Hussein]'s control." It is curious that the U.S. government, rather than, I don't know, SURPRISING the alleged camp and arresting the inmates, instead took aerial photos of it to display at the U.N., thus allowing the terrorists to esacpe. But never mind any of that: the immediate and unanimous reaction of the U.S. media was "Case closed (let's go to war)!"

Oh, and by the way, Oceania is at war with Eurasia. Oceania has always been at war with Eurasia.

Let me get this straight: partisan republicans (pardon the redundancy) impeach the last democratically-elected president over nothing. Then there is a fictitious election, and a fictitious president for fictitious reasons starts a very real and very disastrous war. Then the fictitious president really screws up, and lets slip the fact that he has knowingly and intentionally broken the law and violated the U.S. Constitution. And instead of apologizing, he says he's glad he broke the law, and that he'll continue to break the law, because he is above the law, or he IS the law, l'etat c'est moi, pardon my French. The so-called republicans in congress refuse to do anything to try to save the republic, so Sen. Feingold, as a last resort, bravely introduces a censure resolution. Yet his "fellow democrats" refuse to stand with him, in deference to Cheney & Junior.

Are you freakin' kidding me? Imagine if a President Clinton, or a President Gore or President Kerry, repealed the Constitution by declaring himself above the law. Do you think any republican would now be talking (and talking very loudly) about anything OTHER than his (or her) immediate resignation or impeachment?

Even America's corporate media, despite all of its problems, seems to be waking up and starting to do its job again. Why are the professional Democrats so completely and utterly worthless? There is no excuse for this.

The unwillingness of Democratic Insiders to stand up for what is right has long been a source of frustration. Now that so many Americans finally seem to be waking up to the ugly truth about "neo-conservatism", their apparent cowardice is more than frustrating; it is bizarre and inexplicable. Some additional comments:

Note to current as well as former Democratic Party chairmen: when Chris Matthews asks if illegal immigration is a problem in America, YOU SAY YES!! And it will remain a problem for precisely as long as U.S. businesses feel compelled to offer unfairly low wages that only illegal immigrants can afford to accept.

Note to Sen. Clinton: when republican scumbags attack you as "angry" two and a half YEARS before the 2008 election, you point out that if they'd spent as much time preparing for the war in Iraq or the hurricane in the Gulf as they do worrying about you, the U.S. wouldn't be in the mess it is today.

Above all, a note to Senators: when the President of the United States effectively repeals the Constitution by declaring himself above the law, and one of your colleagues has the courage to at least offer a censure resolution, YOU SUPPORT IT!! Otherwise, you are as guilty of ratifying his tyranny as you are of his war.