Once again, you've got the wrong end of the stick, Ake.

In the United States, it was the ultra-Conservatives (Neo-Cons) who wanted the war in Iraq, and it was they, along with their propaganda mouthpieces such as Limbaugh and Fox "News" Service who flooded the media with the administration's (Bush, Cheney, Rove, Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz, et al) lies to support it. This, along with such things as muzzling news correspondents and intelligence agents who knew the real situation. It was the propaganda blitz and the inability of the American populace, along with many politicians, to get accurate information.

One notable exception was the Congressional Representative from my legislative district, Jim McDermott (Democrat), who had been to Iraq and knew that Sadddam Hussein had absolutely nothing to do with Al Qaeda, and in fact that Hussein and Osama bin Laden hated each other's guts. He tried to spread the word. The administration coulden't muzzle him, so they tried to slander him instead. Called him "Baghdad Jim." And then tried to sue him when he caught Newt Gingrich (Republican) in some illegal behind-the-scenes political hanky-hanky and exposed him (after all, McDermott was on the Congressional Ethics Committee, and that sort of thing was his job). And they tried to do the same thing to one of my Senators, Patti Murray (Democrat), who spoke out against the impending war: they dubbed her "Taliban Patti."

That's the kind of cheesy, lying government the Bush Administration was running.

The Junior Senator from Washington State, Maria Cantwell (also Democrat), went along with the administration, but she is a bit more experienced now and has seen the error of her ways.

The vast majority of Liberals saw through the whole thing:   the establishment of a military presence in the Mid-East to safeguard American oil supplies, and, of course, the U. S. oil companies—and also to keep a hand on the tap and be able to determine which other countries (such as China) would get a share of the oil the U. S. would then control, and how much, depending on how nice they were to the U. S.

In the United States, it was Liberals, not Conservatives, who opposed the Iraqi war.

There must be vast differences in terminology between American and British politics. Unless, of course, you, Ake, have things completely turned around.

You're attributing all the Evils of the World to "Liberals," in exactly the same way people like Limbaugh, Coulter, and Bill O'Reilly of Fox News do and generally talking the same hysterical line And nobody but nut-cases and arch-Conservatives take those shriekers and bellowers seriously.

Don Firth