HoyaBill

Not sure...the show is "Point After." A real charismatic guy, he comes across as very thoughful.

Right now... talking about London getting passed over, JP developing (says on the sidelines he keeps telling the D, "get me the ball back, we'll put it in")...talking about Peerless now, says he's a "father figure" for Roscoe...

Not sure if someone mentioned this, but it's worth repeating even if it had been: even if Plame was no longer working as a clandestine officer, she still had contacts back "in the field" who are now in jeopardy. More importantly, next time someone thinks about committing espionage on behalf of the CIA, will they stop and think: "I can't trust these people to keep MY secret safe either." THAT, is why this is a big deal, IMO. When Hansen spied for the Soviets many many Russians died for helping the US. More importantly, no one will ever know how many decided NOT to help the Americans because they didn't know if their secret could be kept. Just food for thought for the "she wasn't undercover any more so it's not a big deal" crowd.

As a practicing Catholic I have to weigh in on this debate: I love the "God of Gaps" theory. Once upon a time, we didn't know what lightning was - so we assigned causality to God. In fact, God was used to explain everything that science couldn't. If you showed a caveman a TV roday, you know what they would say? "It's a miracle!" Slowly but surely as scientific accumen has decreased the "It was God" explanation has slowly shriveled to a few small gaps here and there. Eventually, it'll all be science. Maybe evolution is incorrect (I don't think so) but shouldn't it be replaced with science? Man, it is such anathema to think in a science class we would tell kids: "I don't know, God did it." At least we'll save money on experiments, right? We won't need any more beekers! "Daddy, how did we get men to the moon?" "I don't know, Jimmy, God did it." I still can't believe this is even a debate.

Dave - You might want to wander over to MCI Center this Saturday at 4 pm. You're missing a heck of a turn around led by JTIII and a great group of kids. "We Are Georgetown." Meet Jeff Green

Was that addressed to me? I agree - and I doubt I ever implied otherwise. If anything, when he's killed (killed, not caught) there will be an immediate series of retaliations, but it's neccesary, and as someone who knows people in the Trade Centers who were killed, I'd like him dead.

Thanks, Tom. Obviously the Powers that Be had a much deeper analysis of the situation than the one liner I provided, but there have been plenty of reports suggesting dissenting views never made it past the deputies. A lot of those reports are unconfirmed, or anonymous sources, but I submit as evidence to the jury: "where's there's smoke..." Anyway, point taken about the varied history of the various tribal, ethnic and guerrilla groups in Afghanistan - I appreciate your POV. That said, I still think bin Laden's appeal to Muslims is underestimated - even tied though he was to the Taleban (while his support for the Taleban was 'controversial,' how many of the Afghan fighters - veterans of the Soviet conflict as you rightfully pointed out - still supported his call for a defense of Islam from the 'colonialist? I would guess many). If it weren't the case that the Afghans tolerate, if not support bin Laden, presumably the money (in the billions now, no?) on the table would be sufficient for some warlord to go into the mountains now and take him out, don't you think?

I see where you're coming from, Tom, but don't you think the Afghan fighters were probably less motivated to continue the fight into Tora Bora than American troops would have been? The Northern Alliance troops where not exactly pro-American, so much as they were anxious to extend their own influence in Afghanistan. Any other troops loyal to a warlord where exactly such - loyal to their warlord. I guess my question is, do you think Franks, or the White House, or whomever made the decisions to rely so heavily on the warlord's troops, overestimate the Afghans desire to capture bin Laden? Likewise, do we currently overestimate Musharraf's desire to stir up trouble in the tribal regions of Pakistan? I think, as a corollary, politicians rely too much on their own intial reactions in these situations. You can imagine DoD civilians sitting around the situation room saying: "The Afghans know the region, are well trained in low-intensity warfare, and the American Public won't be in an uproar if they are killed. Send them in." It makes sense, but only if they properly judged there motivation.

Actually, John Stewart has a point...if you've ever seen Tucker Carlson's show on PBS you know he's much more of a libertarian, much more critical of Bush, and much more open to thoughtful discourse thank you see on crossfire. Begala left policy discusion awhile ago, and has joined the 'I just hate Bush' crowd. While the show is entertaining, it's really just two people making partisan hacks at each other. As Stewart said, he might not have a hard-hitting news show, but he's on a channel with puppets making prank calls -- CNN calls themselves a news channel.

Not attacking you personally, but why do you feel this way? I hope you're right! If you read some of bin Laden's transcripts, you'll see he's calling on Muslim's to defend Islam. He's saying: "Look, the West is killing you because you're Muslim - defend yourself!" this message was getting through to some before, after Iraq, it's getting through more...if more states are attacked, more countries join in? I'm not sure what will happen...I fear we're playing into the killer's hands. But what should we do? That's rhetorical - I don't know.

BadDad: I think the government finally bought into the neo-conservatives in the Whitehouse after 9/11 for several reasons. 1) They wanted a more forceful response to 9/11. Overthrowing the Taliban was small potatoes, the Whitehouse wanted to send a message: "if you harbor terrorists, we're coming after you." (I think people here have touched on it before: the 'shock and awe' of war also extends to the populace in our own country. That's why instead of routing the villages in Afghanistan for al-queda they held cities like Kabul. Also, I think because they would have been accused of being too bloodthirsty...so a lot of al-queda surviced, but I'm off topic...). On the surface Iraq seemed much easier than Iran to pacify. 2) People like Wolfowitz saw the intelligence they 'wanted' to see. They did not intentionally mislead, but they were careless. 3) Global Pax Americana. Democracy is the key to peace. No two countries with a McDonald's have ever attacked somebody. Bring democracy, and wealth, and McDonald's to the Middle East and they'll be peace-loving. Tom Friedman's old schtick. Anything else; oil, bloodthirst, Machivellian designs, might be true but didn't - in my opinion - come into deciding to go to war.

A fine point, but only if Turkey is viewed from a very narrow lense, removed from context. A couple of points, which you can freely disagree with: 1) Turkey's secularism is a lot different from what we view in the West. In other words, it's not the American Revolution, spawned by the French secularism/enlightenment. Rather, Attaturk completely squashed any show of religion in Turkey in the 1920's. An effective move then, but would it have the same effect now in Baghdad? 2) The military in particular bought into Attaturk's reforms, enforcing the no-religion rule in the the beginning, as well as while he slowly lifted the ban (the govt dictated when and where someone could worship). Would the Iraqi military support such a ban? Could the US military enforce one? 3) Turkey's pro-Western stance came from the Soviet threat, not neccesarily a desire to embrace the West. Does Iraq's government face such a similar threat that it could convince its people to look West? Or, is the threat they feel from the West? 4) In many ways, democracy came to Turkey at the muzzle of a gun, but it was not the feared Western bayonette - rather, 'one of their own' ruled them. Right now, Allawi and Karzai are outsiders in their countries - are they viewed as reformers or Western pawns? 5) Recently the AKP, an Islamic based party came to power. Washington has rightfully so embraced it because after 80+ years Turkey's democracy has taken hold...but to ignore the context in which those 80 years past would be a lot like looking at the US's democracy and not including the contextual factors (going back to 1215) that formed it. Overall, a fine point. Democracy isn't anathema to Arabs. But ask yourself what the context - the ideational forces - that effect current forced democratic movements. (Thanks to Prof. Bernard Lewis for the historical points about...if you want citations, you may need to wait a couple of days or guy to the library yourselves).

I don't excuse Kerry, so I'll ignore the last part. It's possible, or so I've been told, to not support either. I understand the rational for attacking Iraq as part of the GWOT. Granted, the nexus Cheney spoke of in Cleveland was more likely found in Pakistan, where Al-Queda thrives, and the government controls nuclear weapons, or Iran, where the government has long supported Hezbollah, and continues to search for WMD - but still, I understand that one of the first lesson analysts learn before hitting the desk at Langley is that 'perception is reality,' ie you'll find what you want to find in information because you're mind is predisposed to what you want to see, and so Wolfowitz, et. al, the infamous Jim at CIA, where going to find their evidence eventually, and attack eventually. My problem? By simply using checkables in unclassified , open source intelligence, you could come to the likely - though not certain - conclusion that: one billion soldiers, or one infantry division, one trillion dollars, or one dollar and change spent, Bush, Kerry or Nader, countries in the Middle East will eventually return to.... wait for it.... a muslim theocracy with a leader from the tribal majority that will defend itself based on it's own perceptions of threat to Islam.

Perhaps, unlike what President Bush suggested, Sen. Kerry did NOT read the same intelligence reports he read. It appears he was unaware of the internal debate about the use of the aluminum tubes Iraq had ordered: "At the Democratic convention in Boston this summer, Senator John Kerry pledged that should he be elected president, "I will ask hard questions and demand hard evidence." But in October 2002, when the Senate voted on Iraq, Mr. Kerry had not read the National Intelligence Estimate, but instead had relied on a briefing from Mr. Tenet, a spokeswoman said. "According to the C.I.A.'s report, all U.S. intelligence experts agree that Iraq is seeking nuclear weapons," Mr. Kerry said then, explaining his vote. "There is little question that Saddam Hussein wants to develop nuclear weapons."" NY Times Of course, to excuse him entirely for his vote, you'd have to assume it wasn't politicaly related, which I'm not about to do. A pretty interesting read, this article also makes me shift my opinion - some might say 'flip-flop' - on the National Intelligence Director. It seems Tenet was only exposed to his own analysts' opinions, and not those from Energy. In theory, it seems a NID could have been able to pool reports from the different agencies better than DCI.

Tangently (thinking outloud): What about Rumsfeld's/RMA proponent's plan to break down the size of units, making them lighter and faster? Not neccesarily trained in spec ops but in moving faster, and making decisions in the field faster (as info is available rapidly). Is it neccesary to fight an organization like Al-Queda? On China: The problem is that if you use China to find the solution, then China's role as a hegemond increases...something the US has always been against. I'm undecided on which is worse: increasing the PRC's influence in Asia, or risking not being able to contain North Korea. On the debate: I hate hearing politicians (both of them did this - hell, all of em' do it) over simplify the GWOT by saying things like: "They only hate us because we're free." I think by under-thinking the problem, and casting as enemies as only hate-filled barbarians, we lose debate on non-traditional ways to win and risk the military sin of underestimating their tactics. ...