> "some people have decided that the war on terror is passe."

Being a conservative blog, Instapundit doesn't have comments. So I can't ask whether the "some people" include Mr. Bush, who thought Osama bin Laden was "not a priority," and going after nonexistent WMDs and working out daddy issues in Iraq was more important than fighting terrorism. Or would that be Bush's CIA, who disbanded their bin Laden unit a few months ago? Or the various Republicans who thought stopping gay marriage was the most important issue facing America?

At least we can rest assured that, next time Al Qaeda hijacks an American plane, if the hijacker is gay, he'll be single, damn it! And he'll be killing Americans in a world where Iraq may be a breeding ground for terrorists in the midst of a civil war, but it isn't run by anyone who tried to kill Bush's dad!

All I can say is, thank God Mi6 is on the ball and no one managed to gut that agency and replace it with unqualified GOP loyalists who do a heckuva job when the chips are down...

Clinton put together an anti-terrorism task force, with the heads of various intelligence agencies and people like Richard Clarke, which met every week to discuss threats facing the country.

Bush pawned off anti-terror to Cheney, who convened a task force that met exactly... never. At least, not before 9/11.

After the first WTC bombing, Clinton assigned a naval task force to the Persian Gulf, with all guns trained on Osama bin Laden's last known location, so that if we ever got credible evidence of his whereabouts, we could blow him to smithereens. The "Wag the Dog" incident was one such attempt, although you wouldn't know that from watching the news that week.

As soon as Bush took office, that fleet was reassigned and sailed away.

Clinton had levied sanctions against the Taliban and had no diplomatic relations with them.

Bush not only lifted the sancetions and recognized the Taliban, he started giving them foreign aid, right up until 9/11.

Look at the facts: Clinton may not have had a perfect record against terrorism, but he did make an ongoing effort to keep this country safe. Bush basically rolled out the welcome mat.

I'm 100% convinced that if 9/11 had happened on Clinton's watch (or Hypothetical President Gore's), the plot would have been foiled. Besides keeping the pressure on Al Qaeda, you can be sure either of those men would have heeded warnings about the imminent attack, and you can be damn sure neither of them would have sat reading to children when they should have been ordering air cover for D.C, the Pentagon and other targets.

Let's face it - short of putting Mullah Omar on the Supreme Court, letting Bush into office is about the biggest gift to terrorism America could have given.

Which issues the show tried to tackle, or running out of lesbian-specific themes, wasn't the problem with season 3. Most of their overarching stories are pretty universal - Bette & Tina's marriage in a rut; Alice crushed out on her best friend; Shane torn between being the aloof loner and the warmth and stablility of her group of friends; even Jenny gradually revealing herself to be an amoral sociopath - none of that stuff is lesbian- or even woman-specific. Just human.

The problem with S3, besides that brain-meltingly awful theme song, was just bad writing, plain and simple. Everyone acting out of character, stumbling through clumsily melodramatic storylines about as subtle as a ton of bricks. Alice stays by Dana's side night and day, and the first time she goes out for a smoke... Dana dies! Oh, the incredible irony!!! Contrast that with a year before, when the Christian Right are calling Bette an abomination, not so much for being gay (although that too), but for promoting art - that was masterfully done. You felt her frustration and fear and defiance through the whole thing; with Dana you were watching an artificially-constructed Big TV Moment that left pretty much everyone cold.

Bad writing. Just that simple. Bring back the writers from Season 1, play Sleater-Kinney's "Get Up" over the opening credits, make Jenny a whole lot less pretentions, and pretend all of Season 3 was just a bad, poorly-plotted dream. Problem solved.

"His persona is very much that of the big brother ..."

Yeah, the guy who listens in on my phone calls thought exactly the same thing!

What doesn't bode well is that the sample joke was ripped off from Dave Chapelle. The first episode of his show opened with the disclaimer, "It's not HBO... It's just regular-ass TV!"

Justice Brandeis wrote that government is the great teacher. For the past six years we've had a government that's utterly indifferent to human suffering, and completely willfully blind to the consequences of violence. Don't you think some of that attitude is going to filter down to the masses? Just as Clinton's optimism was infectuous, Bush & Cheney's cynical ruthlessness has been as well. If life is suddenly so cheap in Iraq and in New Orleans, why wouldn't it be cheap everywhere?