I've noticed my conservative pals back in the Midwest have shut up on writing to me about Iraq and the economy anymore. The only thing I hear is a feeble defense of the tax cuts, which I like to point out to them, seems to be all they care about when it comes to this country.



U.S. HIGH HORSE NOW RIDERLESS
By Jay Bookman of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Some people are born humble. Others have humility thrust upon them.

Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, for example, was asked in a recent interview whether he still had faith in prewar intelligence claiming a link between Saddam Hussein and Osama bin Laden.

"I think that the, the, information we had over a period of time that I cited that the intelligence community gave to me and I read as opposed to ad-libbing was correct. It, it, it was carefully stated . . ."

Talk about carefully stated.

It's telling to see the bantam rooster of the Bush administration turn so halting and defensive, insisting that, hey, he had only been reading what somebody else handed him. Then again, there's a lot of that going around these days.

In fact, if Vietnam was the place where America lost her innocence, Iraq may be the place where we lose our arrogance.

The once-triumphant Richard Perle has gone underground. The sublimely smug William Kristol, editor of the Weekly Standard and stalwart champion of empire, no longer looks as though he just swallowed a canary. Crow is more like it. And we've heard more from Saddam Hussein in recent weeks than from Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz.

Maybe because Saddam, unlike Wolfowitz, has a plan that's actually working. . . .





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