Don, I agree with everything that you said.

Mike you said that,
" You are so wrapped up in your hatred of G.W.Bush, you can't see past it. Somehow, you reckon, the REpublicans are to blame. My God, do you really so fear them that you believe them capable of creating and maintaining a reign of terror? Yes, I guess you do. I am afraid. I admit it. But I am not as afraid of the Fedayim as you are of the RNC. Lighten up, guys. We have survived regimes even more right wing than this one and, like my wandering people, we're still here."

I don't hate W either. I think his policies however are somehow tied
to a despotic mindset regarding foreign policy and a use of cynical misuse of paranoia to acheive his ends. In short, politics as usual.

I think that hysteria does create an atmosphere of a "reign of terror" and I don't think we have ever come into contact with an
administration more right wing than this one. The Patriot Act is
very scary and tramples on the Bill of Rights. The Second Patriot is
initiating a kind of "reign of terror" in which innocent people's rights can be taken away and they can be unduly punished without proper safeguards for their liberties. It's the kind of approach used in many military juntas in Central and South America in the past
and I can see it opening the door for American "Disappeared". I don't remember corruption in corporate America being so rampant and supported by an administration since from the times of Jay Gould and the Robber Barons.

The problem is that Reactionary suppression of human rights is like a disease whether it comes from the Middle East or the US. The solution is not "counter-terror" which is another form of "terror" but a growing resolve to overcome fear with support from the world community. This is why the United Nations was organized and needs to be supported. The World Court is another source of true advocacy that we promote in a democratic society. The concentration of political power in the hands of an increasingly irresponsible Right-Wing in the US that vitiates diplomacy and alienates former allies
is part of the problem, not the solution.

It must be acknowledged that Palestinian school children are equally
as affected by reaction as Israeli.

Sharon is on a collision course with history. Theocracy is the enemy of democracy whether Evangelical Right-Wing pseudo-Christianity, distortions of Islam or a failing Zionist policy in Israel today.

Frank