George Bush leads us into the world of Kafka.

at the end of the day, a siginificant number of you guys (and girls) voted for this and continue to support this.

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The man who trades basic liberties for temporary security does not deserve either and will end up getting neither.

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- Benjamin Franklin

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'nough said.

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"In life, you have to face that some days you'll be the pigeon and some days you'll be the statue."

wooaaaaa.... you should really think more carefully about making statements like that.I sincerely hope the word "unprovoked" popped in there as the result of a copy and paste accident rather than a reasoning process.Next you'll be telling us that those murderous Iraqi civilians attack innocent US soldiers in downtown Baghdad totally unprovoked !

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"In life, you have to face that some days you'll be the pigeon and some days you'll be the statue."

Too right! a good example here in Britain is the Thought Police's term for speed cameras: 'safety cameras', though they have very little to do with safety and a much more accurate moniker would be 'money cameras'.If people get used to calling them 'safety-cameras', however, they will tend to think they're there for their own good, rather than the establishment's.Similarly, if people in the US tend to think of the terrorists' attacks as 'unprovoked' they will find it much easier to accept and approve aggresive, illegal and immoral actions, such as the current Iraq/Afghanistan saga or the Kafka-esque methods Bush is trying to establish, as per the OP.

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"In life, you have to face that some days you'll be the pigeon and some days you'll be the statue."

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Consequently, if the use of these cameras make more people obey the speed limit, there will be fewer accidents and loss of life.

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while risking getting off-topic I must say this is one of the greatest myths propagated by the anti-speed lobby, a.k.a 'Traffic safety' lobby (another great spin for a feel-good name).Speed may compound the effects of an accident but it very rarely by itself contributes to its cause.Excessively low speed limits are just another way of exercising control over minute details of people's lives while reinforcing the Big Brother mentality that it's all for our own good.

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"In life, you have to face that some days you'll be the pigeon and some days you'll be the statue."

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Okay, no offense but how does that get Brits off the same charge that Americans are stuck with?

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we get off the charge because who we (Brits) vote for doesn't make a difference. We could have voted in a stuffed dodo as prime minister instead of Blair and it wouldn't matter. The war in Iraq, Bush's policies , etc would have happened in exactly the same way they already have.It's because the British prime minister holds as much sway as a US state governor (or even less in the case of Florida and Texas) as far as US policy goes.You (Yanks) on the other hand do make a difference. You could have stopped all this (war / civil liberties clampdown / et al) but you didn't.

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"In life, you have to face that some days you'll be the pigeon and some days you'll be the statue."

The US has directly and indirectly interfered with the internal affairs of a number of Muslim countries and people starting with its one-sided support for the state of Israel (beginning in the 1940s), which many Arab states feel is a threat to their very existence (imagine, if you will, how Americans felt for countries that supported the Soviet Union at the height of the Cold War and multiply it by ten)Ofcourse the latest shiny example is when they recently invaded a Muslim country that posed absolutely no threat to the US killing (and still are) tens of thousands of Muslims in the process. I dread to even think how many thousands of Bin Ladens this war created.It's all in the history books. Or do you seriously think that a bunch of Muslim fanatics just woke up one morning thinking "what shall we do today...I know, let's go kill some Americans!" The emphasis here is not on 'civilian' but on 'unprovoked'. The IRA bombings, however despicable, were provoked by British government actions. The 9/11 attacks, however horrendous, had been provoked by US foreign policy over the last four decades.The future terrorist attacks that we (US & UK) will have on our soil will be tragic, detestable and will have been provoked by what we're doing now in Iraq.

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"In life, you have to face that some days you'll be the pigeon and some days you'll be the statue."

Oh my God!!You do believe that a bunch of Muslims just woke up one morning thinking "what shall we do today...I know, let's go kill some Americans!" !!! ??!!!You don't attack Belgium because Belgium doesn't interfere with your government.You don't attack Belgium because Belgium doesn't want to control your petrol through their own cartels and sell it on their own terms.You don't attack Belgium because Belgium doesn't give money and arms to your number-one enemyYou don't attack Belgium because Belgium doesn't invade your country and torture your citizens.You don't attack Belgium because Belgium minds its own fucking business and lets you mind your own.That's why you don't attack fucking Belgium !!

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"In life, you have to face that some days you'll be the pigeon and some days you'll be the statue."

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Having said that I recognise Tony Blair didn't need any persuading to join Bush

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There are plenty who backed this up on both sides of the Atlantic, true enough, but the point is that for us in the UK backing it up or not doesn't change anything. Bush was dead-set on doing what he did and he has both the power and fanaticism to carry it through with or without the rest of the world, as should be evident by now.We (Brits) could have toppled Blair and elected a new PM. So what ? What would that have changed ? Nothing, that's what. Americans, on the other hand, could have not voted for Bush, or at least not given him the percentage to justify the coup-d-etat that he effectively pulled.

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"In life, you have to face that some days you'll be the pigeon and some days you'll be the statue."

True on both counts but neither of these factors were essential in his determination or ability to wage war. but the world community, especially major European allies like Germany and France did stand against it. The only reason he wanted backing was so that he could give the invasion some legitimacy and call it a 'Coallition' rather than the Rambo-lets kick-some-arab-ass event it really was. yes it would have been more difficult in that you would have to commit more troops and therefore would have more casualties and more logistics to deal with, but nothing worse than that. well, there really wasn't any armed resistance to speak of during the Iraq invasion. I don't think there's a single nation today that can stand up to the US militarily and he knows that. If, however, at the last elections 3 million americans hadn't voted for him I doubt we'd be having this conversation now. Granted, he could still seize power by other means but he would have lost any trace of legitimacy and respect he may be having today. He would be a dictator in the eyes of his people and he would know it. Instead, today he goes around thinking that he's a democratically elected leader who enjoys the support of his people and can get away with anything in the name of their safety.That's what fuels the zeal you mentioned and that's something no other nation in the world has the power to change.

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"In life, you have to face that some days you'll be the pigeon and some days you'll be the statue."

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Yep - talk is cheap. If they were that upset, why didn't/don't they do anything more than whine? I guess it's kind of fun to beat up on the US, while at the same time conveniently forgetting about their own lack of action.

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it's a bit like watching a car accident happen on television. You can scream 'stop, don't do it!' all you like but there's fuck all you can do to prevent it from happening.That's what you'd expect the people at the scene to try to do.

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"In life, you have to face that some days you'll be the pigeon and some days you'll be the statue."