I hardly expected to be, but I was pretty impressed with Bush's speech. Among other things, he made it quite plain that wemay see overt military actions taken, and then again we may not! Now, that may seem ambiguous, but under these bizarre (to Americans) circumstances, it isn't. It's pretty obvious that a lot of what is going to take place will be covert. And that's the way it should be. Has to be.

I heard a couple of programs earlier today (9/20) that featured some pretty knowledgeable people (experts on terrorism) discussing how terrorists were handled in their countries, how effective it had or had not been, and what they thought the U. S. should do. Bush (or his advisors) seem to have picked up on some of the better ideas -- which do not include wholesale slaughter in Afghanistan. One of the ideas was the creation of a special office to handle and coordinate all matters relating to terrorist activity, and that is exactly what Bush has done by creating a new cabinet post.

Using a sledge-hammer is a really dumb way to try to swat mosquitoes. You get damned few mosquitoes that way and you do a hell of a lot of unnecessary damage. If Bush doesn't know that, I'm pretty sure that his advisors do.

Before you conclude that the country is under the control of a total idiot, listen to or read the speech -- carefully.

No, I didn't vote for him. And if I had the chance, I wouldn't vote for him again. But there he is, and I think he did pretty well tonight.

Don Firth