Whatever, your opinion of his abilities aren't something I share. I do not believe he believes in theocracy. If he's a true conservative, he shouldn't.

Every administration since Kennedy has been more "authoritarian". That isn't the point. The point is right now, what level of freedom is consistent with the level of security we want. There isn't a correct answer to that question. No one knows. I do not believe it is a question in your mind, since you seem to have already made up your mind. But I think it is question. And I do not think it is an easy question.

Recycled folk to you are experienced folk to me. We'll see how they do. The past 4 administrations have failed. I expect, and I hope, this administration does better. From what they are saying, they aren't going off half-cocked to nuke the Afghans back to the Stone Age...which, by wild coincidence, they already appear to be at.

And I appreciate your not using the usual crap that you presume passes for English you usually use. I didn't call your opinions crap, those I merely disagree with.

My own opinion of Ashcroft is that he's more of the liberatarian wing of the conservatives than the religious conservatives. I do understand his opposition to abortion and I agree with it. But he also says (in this respect) he'll uphold the law of the land whatever that is. I want him to keep that and I think he'd have to go through (for him and me) mind-boggling contortions to break with that attitude. BTW, do you know who was the co-sponsor of the Freedom of Information Act...James Buckley, brother of William.

I don't like the DCMA anymore than you do. But there's is a problem with sunset provisions on restrictions designed (well, we hope they are designed) to curtail terrorist activities. When do we declare victory? What conditions did we ever lay down to declare victory over Communism? It's impossible, in my opinion. I think, rather, in this sense the terrorists have won. We cannot allow no snooping on things like stock trades because a terrorist has a distinct advantage to manipulate the market. The toothpaste is out of the tube here. When do you relinquish the controls? 5 yrs? 10 yrs? There's no right answer.

Being wrapped in the flag is fine as long as we don't get blinded by the damn thing. Personally, the best thing we could right now is pump aid to the Iranians and Pakistanis (under our control or oversight) to support Afghan refugees. The next thing we should do is bomb the Afghanis back to non-famine levels with grain, simple stoves, etc. Anything that allows the people to function as people, not some damn extension of a politico-religious organization. The Taliban are nothing more than a reification of Nietzche's Will to Power.

The Taliban are mainly Pashtus, they are 40% of the pop. and are based in S. Afghanistan. There are a lot of other groups: Uzbeks, Hawaris, Tajiks, etc. The BBC reports that the Taliban have used their Arab "friends" to do the dirty work on these other minorities. Most Afghans are Sunnis, but the Hawaris are Shi'ite. Iran supports them, but these guys are just as bad as the Pashtu Taliban. We are should not be interested in remaking a country, we should be interested in making people safe, non-hungry, and understanding that we (and I really hope that is WE) care about THEM as simple human beings. ( and it if that necessitated we push democracy on Arab world ( the Afghans are not Arab ), then we should do that and tell the Arab regimes to change or die).

From all reports, at least Colin Powell is on top of this. Bush...geezes I wish he'd keep his mouth shut. But most of the foot'n mouth disease is because he actually has to make statements every day or else allow Americans to devolve into "kill'em all, let God sort'em out". It ain't easy, and his words get mixed up, but I have yet to see him make a wrong decision. That's easy, he's not made any decisions...and that is good sign. I hope it keeps up.

That being said, we cannot allow an attack to be unpunished. It need retribution, but it needs to be smart retribution. It needn't even involve killing anyone, but it if does...so be it.