Unfortunately the answer to several of Eric Alterman's question is, "Because the government is short of money."

A great column and some good questions: is it too much "I told you so" to refer to another guest on David Letterman's television show, Walter Cronkite, pointed out that the press needed to act as a watchdog on the acts of the government, that American Democracy requires it?

Simon Shoedecker's response, above, makes me wonder why, if the government is short of money, the Bush administration is planning to spend billions of dollars attacking Iraq? Won't that lead to more taxes and, as any good Republican knows, a further impediment to the recovery of the economy?

Except, of course, that defense industry corporations in places like, um, Florida, will do well turning tax money into shrapnel. And an "acceptable" government in Iraq would be able to export a lot more oil, which would feed a lot more profit to the poor, suffering American rich.

And if a government imposed in the wake of America conquering Iraq might "have to" arbitrarily imprison, kill, and torture, heck, they'd just be bad guys left over from Saddam Hussein, so that wouldn't count, right?

And if I can invoke Jean Chrétien's recent comments as applying to the future instead of the past, such an action will build up more resentment in the poor part of the world, which will perpetutate and amplify hatred of the arrogant rich nations among those looking to blame anyone but themselves, and continue to fertilize the fields where evil demagogues like bin Laden find the raw materials to turn into terrorists.

We aren't responsible for the attacks on us, but at some point we really need to get back to winning the hearts & minds, as we were supposed to be doing in Afghanistan.

Sorry for the digression. The point that to me spoke most to the "unintended consequences" aspect of becoming aggressors was, "About this pre-emptive war stuff, who gets to go next? China against Taiwan? India against Pakistan? Or is it just a white guy thing?"

Here's another: That Iraqi attempt to assassinate the first President Bush - did that really happen?

(Note: This is a sincere, not a rhetorical question. I suppose that, since Electrolite has been recently and aggressively in touch with its Democratic roots, the fact that Bill Clinton SAID it happened might be taken, in these parts, as closing the matter. But I'm a right wing crank.)

No, I don't take it as "closing the matter," and I've wondered that myself. It's striking how little of what we "know" we actually, you know, know.

(On Unqualified Offerings, this would be a post headlined "Wilderness of Mirrors, Part 467.6.")

Bob Webber: Republicans, of course, are as eager as Democrats for vast deficit spending on their pet projects, when they have some - they're just a bit more hypocritical about it. The lack of money to which I referred was pre-9/11 money for prevention, which lack may be laid to the feet of anti-tax maniacs.

Simon Shoedecker: You're quite right, of course. The current campaign for huge spending on military ventures in the teeth of a recession makes me see things in a particularly ugly shade. Your comment just rang the bell for me: sorry if I got saliva on you.

This Democrat likes to spend money on programs that improve the community and, just by the way, create useful jobs. Our flakey, bleeding-heart social programs do, after all, create useful jobs - and a lot more of 'em than war does.