This is the problem with reform when complicity spreads to the class of people who are supposed to police these types of high crimes. A similar thing happened in WWII with Germany's business class.

The corporate class in the Reich was suspicious of National Socialism from the very beginning, as the core belief in the Nazi creed was government ownership of all major industrial facilities. Nevertheless, they went along with it, in no small part because during the process of de-Judification, the Nazis handed over the repossessed Jewish businesses to these same corporate leaders.

Having been made complicit of similar crimes as the Nazi High Command, the corporate heads also realized that if the regime fell,they would go also-- hence the militarily irrelevant and highly destructive Allied bombing campaign at the end of the War. The German leadership would rather see their country destroyed than be held to account for their crimes.

The parallels are stunning, if not the severity of the crimes.

For those interested in more detail, read "The Splendid Blond Beast" by Christopher Simpson. Stunning analysis.

Is it a surprise that Joseph Smith read Milton and ripped off one of the central ideas of Paradise Lost? He ripped off every other part of the constructed Mormon myth.

I think it's great, though-- a huge theological war in the R ranks about Jesus and the devil because their followers are too ignorant to know about classical literature.

Serves 'em right.

Glenn--

Thank you for caring enough to write all the time.

Noonan and her ilk, as well as an unfortunate critical mass in the Congress are sociopathic cretins. They know nothing, and they have no feeling for others' pain.

I was in the Amsterdam airport, talking to an Iraqi woman, who had lost two brothers, both doctors, in the war. Her pain was palpable, and real, as we talked, waiting for our luggage. All I could do was apologize. The fact that idiots like Noonan sit around and justify such appalling behavior on our part is the sign of mental illness.

I'm not religious, but you've got to pray for a God with a hot little corner for all of these people.

All you say about torture, habeas corpus, telecom fraud and such is true.

But I get the constant feeling that we are overlooking what is probably the biggest crime that has been perpetrated over the past 10-odd years-- the proliferation of a pretty-much unfettered air war strategy in our military actions. There is a fine line that both Clinton, and especially Bush, have walked about using air power-- theoretically considering the effects against civilians, but in reality having little concern for the actual casualties.

By the Geneva Conventions, the Current Occupant is most probably guilty of war crimes for their use of air power alone. And this has had far more profound effects on people's lives than any of the aforementioned.

We're living this particular fantasy right now-- except our kids are 7 and 9. It's actually working out really well-- because our kids are 7 and 9, and because we live in one of the great cities of the world that is about as safe as anywhere and really set up around a pleasant lifestyle-- Vienna. I also speak German, am a natural extrovert, and have no problem in wading into the middle of any difficulty with my modest language abilities. Our kids are both in German school, and both are now moving toward some level of fluency in the language-- but it wasn't easy, and to say there was no anxiety associated with the experience, even for them, would be a lie.

But leaving your husband for months at a time, with a couple of pre-schoolers? They won't remember anything. They will be bitterly angry. They will miss their father. It is true-- pre-schoolers crave routine, and they simply can't get that in a foreign situation, because YOU can't have a routine until you've been somewhere for a couple of months. And marriages need care as well. I don't care how special a person is.

Even when we travel from Vienna for week-long excursions, they are trying with the age that our kids are. They do not have to be watched every moment, and in their routine in Vienna, they are actually much more independent than they are in the U.S. But venturing out is a different story. Field trips MUST be taken mostly for the kids-- and our kids are some of the best troopers out there. Expecting a 7-year-old to hold a multi-day focus on anything is wildly unrealistic. And the other reality of foreign travel is that it usually involves cities, which cannot be comfortable for kids. Cities are designed around adult pleasures.

Wait five years. You're in the period that my wife and I called 'The Black Years.' They are over soon enough-- as all the parts of life.