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Unpatriotic Conservatives
National Review Online ^ | 4/7/03 (advance) | David Frum

Posted on 03/19/2003 7:57:38 AM PST by Chancellor Palpatine

"I respect and admire the French, who have been a far greater nation than we shall ever be, that is, if greatness means anything loftier than money and bombs."
— THOMAS FLEMING, "HARD RIGHT," MARCH 13, 2003

rom the very beginning of the War on Terror, there has been dissent, and as the war has proceeded to Iraq, the dissent has grown more radical and more vociferous. Perhaps that was to be expected. But here is what never could have been: Some of the leading figures in this antiwar movement call themselves "conservatives."

These conservatives are relatively few in number, but their ambitions are large. They aspire to reinvent conservative ideology: to junk the 50-year-old conservative commitment to defend American interests and values throughout the world — the commitment that inspired the founding of this magazine — in favor of a fearful policy of ignoring threats and appeasing enemies.

And they are exerting influence. When Richard Perle appeared on Meet the Press on February 23 of this year, Tim Russert asked him, "Can you assure American viewers . . . that we're in this situation against Saddam Hussein and his removal for American security interests? And what would be the link in terms of Israel?" Perle rebutted the allegation. But what a grand victory for the antiwar conservatives that Russert felt he had to air it.

(Excerpt) Read more at nationalreview.com ...


TOPICS: Culture/Society; Foreign Affairs; Government; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: davidfrum; frum; oldcons; paleocons; pitchforkpat
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To: hchutch; rmlew; Luis Gonzalez; Poohbah; PRND21; daviddennis; mhking
Let not your hearts be troubled. They're shrill, but that's it.
301 posted on 03/20/2003 7:00:22 PM PST by rdb3 (rdb3, Tha SYNDICATE, and now bringing the FIRE to Project 21. Uh, oh...)
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To: hchutch
This has to be dealt with by conservatives, particularly those that want to have limits on immigration on the table for discussion. If they do not deal with those who are using racialist rhetoric, then this issue is going to be as welcome as a skunk at a picnic.

I wonder, though, who defines what constitutes "racialist rhetoric," and who has made the political/moral climate such that certain issues are "as welcome as [skunks] at a picnic?"

It seems to me that these calls to "purge" paleoconservatives just do the work of the liberals for them. The "anti-paleos" (dare I call them "neocons?") seem to take the validity of liberal definitions of "racialism" for granted, or at least they're too fearful to challenge those liberal definitions head-on. I sense liberal influence; they slipped behind conservative lines and told the neos and paleos, "Lets you and him fight!"

302 posted on 03/20/2003 8:50:37 PM PST by Hoppean
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To: Wavyhill
For one thing, up until 9/11 palecons made up a good proportion of local radio talk show hosts (as opposed to national hosts like Rush Limbaugh)

Your observation here may prove the paleos right when they say that conservatism has been "highjacked from the top-down" (from inside the Beltway, etc.)--there's a disconnect between the "national-level" officialdom RNC-style conservatives and the more "populist" grassroots. Over at NRO's "The Corner," Jonah Goldberg made a snide remark about South Carolina which he later backpedaled from when called on it, for example.

303 posted on 03/20/2003 9:00:34 PM PST by Hoppean
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To: Sabertooth
We have a containment breach.

We also have more useless graphics from you on a thread that describes your agenda, amnesty boy.

304 posted on 03/20/2003 9:01:39 PM PST by PRND21
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To: hchutch
Unless, that is, you are willing to believe that Frum, Jonah Goldberg, and a lot of other people have gotten together in some sort of nefarious conspiracy to make sure that nothing is done to address immigration.

Well, there are some Republicans who like having open borders as a way of guaranteeing cheap labor, even when "Middle America" feels harmed by the situation.

305 posted on 03/20/2003 9:02:46 PM PST by Hoppean
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To: Hoppean
Well, there are some Republicans who like having open borders as a way of guaranteeing cheap labor, even when "Middle America" feels harmed by the situation.

Some? LOL!

The American people have been screaming for relief from this epic invasion of criminals for years.......As the Democrats AND Republicans stand in stone cold silence..

306 posted on 03/20/2003 9:06:52 PM PST by Joe Hadenuf
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To: x
Interesting indeed to contrast the civil, informed arguments of such as you with the shrill, whiney name-calling of such self-styled "neos" as the one who posted that drivel from Frum and ol' sinkspur and the usual suspects who have zero respect for the individual and a pervertedly unhealthy reverence for the almighty State. They remind me of the "doctor" whose "love" died on him, so he kept her corpse for YEARS, treated her mummified remains like they were his wife, sleeping and having relations with her. The "neos" seem to have the same perverted lust for the decaying and putrid remains of the "almighty" Nanny State.
307 posted on 03/20/2003 10:16:50 PM PST by dcwusmc ("The most dangerous man, to any government, is the man who is able to think things out for himself.")
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To: Chancellor Palpatine
Other side of the story, from http://www.lewrockwell.com/callahan/callahan106.html
 

The Axis of Drivel

by Gene Callahan

David "I Coin 'the Axis of Evil' and My Wife Gets Me Canned for It" Frum has just "taken on" the antiwar right in an article called "Unpatriotic Conservatives." It is one of the most pathetic pieces of writing ever to appear in National Review, composed almost entirely of illogic and ad hominem attacks. Frum is so distraught at the thought that there is an antiwar right that the ability to form coherent sentences deserts him at times: "But here is what never could have been: Some of the leading figures in this antiwar movement call themselves 'conservatives.'"

Frum's first problem is one of labeling. The antiwar right is a broad coalition of people with divergent views. Within it are people who would call themselves conservatives, populists, paleoconservatives, libertarians, paleolibertarians, market anarchists, and probably more labels of which I haven't thought. But this is inconvenient for Frum: The bulk of his article will consist of trying to assign any view ever held by anyone on the antiwar right to everyone on the antiwar right. Therefore, he needs to treat it as a homogeneous group with a basically unified view. So, he lumps the entire antiwar right under the label "paleoconservative."

Is Robert Novak really a paleoconservative? Is the market anarchist, open-borders advocate Walter Block a paleoconservative? Are Reason Magazine writers Brian Doherty and Jesse Walker paleocons? Is the Cato Institute's Julian Sanchez? Sheldon Richman of the Future of Freedom Foundation?  High Clearing's Jim Henley? The Independent Institute's Robert Higgs? Are the "New Age" writings of Butler Shaffer paleoconservative? I think Frum is trying to pull a fast one on us.

He next lists the charges against the antiwar right:

"But the antiwar conservatives… have made common cause with the left-wing and Islamist antiwar movements in this country and in Europe. They deny and excuse terror. They espouse a potentially self-fulfilling defeatism. They publicize wild conspiracy theories. And some of them explicitly yearn for the victory of their nation's enemies."

Let's take up his charges one at a time.

Common cause: Frum lists several leftists to whom the antiwar right likes to link. No evidence is given that a single one of them is an Islamist or "anti-American" (rather than anti-American-foreign-policy). Doesn't National Review link to, and even publish, pro-war leftists like Christopher Hitchens? Of course they do. Everyone likes to bring in someone from the other side of the political spectrum with whom one agrees on a particular issue. First charge dismissed.

Terror denial: Here, Frum cites Robert Novak's disagreement with Condoleezza Rice about whether Hezbollah or al-Qaeda is the world's most dangerous terrorist organization. Frum is apoplectic that Novak did not mention two Hezbollah attacks on US personnel in Lebanon in claiming that Hezbollah focuses on Israel. Well, Hezbollah attacked US forces when it saw them as defending Israel's interests, so Novak's point stands. In any case, it wouldn't constitute "terror denial" even if he were wrong and Rice correct. Frum's charge is completely fatuous: Not a single person he names from the antiwar right, nor any other member of it that I know of, has ever denied that terrorists exist, and that they sometimes target the US. Second charge: rubbish.

Espousing defeatism: Frum goes after Novak once more, for claiming that bombing Afghanistan would not defeat al-Qaeda. But that is not "defeatism," that is a disagreement over tactics. Novak didn't recommend we offer bin Laden the presidency! And it's not at all clear that Novak was wrong: After all, bin Laden escaped and al-Qaeda is still in operation. In any case, the evidence presented has nothing to do with the charge. Dismissed.

Excuse-making: Here, Frum points to Pat Buchanan explaining why the US was targeted for attack on September 11th. The notion that explaining terrorist acts is equivalent to excusing them is so stupid that it shouldn't require refutation. But since the neocons use it again and again, I suppose it does require it. I've already addressed this elsewhere, so I'll just explain again quickly: When an historian says that Hitler was moved to act against the Jews by his belief that they were responsible for Germany's defeat in World War I, he is explaining Hitler, not excusing him. Do you neocons get it yet? Charge dropped.

Conspiracy-theorizing: Frum simply describes two theories put forward by Justin Raimondo. He makes no effort to dispute either theory, despite the fact that Justin and others (such as that bastion of paleoconservatism, Fox News) have assembled a number of facts defending the theories. (I have no idea if the theories are right or not, as I haven't had the time to research them myself.) Merely adhering to a conspiracy theory is supposed to be enough to discredit someone.

Does Frum want to deny that conspiracies ever exist? Does he deny that the 9/11 attacks were the result of a conspiracy, on the part of al-Qaeda? In fact, the neocon case for attacking Iraq relies on a conspiracy theory, namely, the one that holds that Hussein has been conspiring and will continue to conspire with al-Qaeda. Does Frum mean to say that only Arabs have conspiracies, but Israelis never do?

Pointing out that a single person on the antiwar right holds some particular conspiracy theory gets Frum nowhere. The entire staff of National Review has been engaged in "conspiracy-theorizing" for months. They just like their own conspiracy theories better than Justin's. If Justin is nuts, Mr. Frum, refute his case. Otherwise: charge dismissed.

Yearning for defeat: Frum contends that Eric Margolis was "yearning for defeat" when he advised the Arab world on how to "prevent a war of aggression against Iraq." But Margolis was writing about how to prevent war, not how to beat the US in a war. I am sure he realizes that even a united Arab world could not prevent the US from taking over Iraq if it attacked. He was simply hoping to forestall the attack. So were most of the other people in the world. Once again, there is a complete mismatch between the charge and the evidence. Dropped.

Frum next delves into history. He attempts to explain away the entire antiwar right by attributing its rise to disgruntled people who couldn't get jobs they wanted due to neoconservative opposition. He then cites exactly two cases: Mel Bradford and Paul Gottfried. I know nothing about the circumstances of either of their claims. But if the claims turned out to be entirely baseless in each case, how would that be relevant to Frum's case? The antiwar right is putting forward a number of ideas about the nature of America and its proper role in the world. If two "paleos" were wrong about what happened to their careers, how would this have any bearing on "paleo" ideas? But actually engaging the ideas of the antiwar right is not something Frum plans on doing.

Finally, Frum delivers what he hopes will be the coup-de-grâce to the antiwar right: he charges it with racism and anti-Semitism, the prime bogeymen of our day and age. Now, it is no doubt true that some people on the antiwar right hold to theories that different races can be "sorted" based on intelligence as determined by their genes. As a person who puts his faith in the human spirit, I give little credence to such schemes. I believe our genes are like a car our parents bequeath to us, while how we drive it depends on our own efforts.

But in any case, so what? How is holding to a genetic theory of intelligence relevant to one's views on attacking Iraq? Didn't National Review itself defend The Bell Curve, a book that posits just such a theory, when it came out? Didn't the magazine (September 12, 1994) sympathetically review the work of Philippe Rushton, who also posits a genetic theory of intelligence? Didn't Ernest van den Haag, a regular contributor to National Review, support William Shockley's sterilization program for those with a low IQ? Doesn't John Derbyshire publish ideas similar to the ones Frum is shocked by, right in National Review Online? And hasn't the pro-war right been full of racist theories about Arabs? I bring this all up only to point out that one's views on racial issues are irrelevant to the issue at hand. Frum drags them into the discussion only to smear people with whom he is unable to argue intelligently.

Frum next turns to the "anti-Semitism" of the antiwar right: "Who was the first paleo to blame Israel for 9/11? It's a close call, but Robert Novak seems to have won the race. His column of September 13, 2001, written the very day after the terrorist attack, charged that 'the hatred toward the United States today by the terrorists is an extension of [their] hatred of Israel.'"

Again, Frum has confused – quite deliberately I would imagine – an explanation for a justification. Whether Novak is correct or not, he does not "blame" Israel. Clearly, the people who flew the planes are to blame for 9/11. Novak offers our support for Israel as an explanation for why those terrorists decided to attack. Does Frum deny the obvious fact that our support for Israel bothers many Arabs? (Of course, that doesn't decide the issue of whether that support is right or wrong.)

Frum continues: "Raimondo himself soon began work on a book that alleged that 9/11 was in the broadest sense an Israeli plot." Now Frum is just making things up. Justin's view is that Israel knew 9/11 was being plotted – by al-Qaeda – but let the plot proceed. True or not, that is very different from the view Frum ascribes to him.

Frum proceeds to his melodramatic conclusion. "And now it is time to be very frank about the paleos," he tells us. At least Frum admits he has been b-s-ing us up to this point!

He continues: "There is… a fringe attached to the conservative world that cannot overcome its despair and alienation. The resentments are too intense, the bitterness too unappeasable." Let me assure you, Mr. Frum, I ain't got no despair or alienation. My resentments aren't intense: my main one is that I mildly resent my doctor for telling me I shouldn't drink, due to a digestive ailment. And my bitterness is easily appeased: just buy me a beer, but be sure you don't tell my doctor.

I know that the neocons' day in the sun will be brief, like that of all empire builders. In the end, they will face the truth: "Except the Lord build the house, they labour in vain that build it: except the Lord keep the city, the watchman waketh but in vain." I neither rejoice in nor wish to hasten the inevitability of their fate. However, in the meantime, without hatred, without resentment, without bitterness, but merely because it is my duty, I will do what I can to control the damage that their rampaging egos will cause.

Frum closes by saying, "The paleoconservatives have chosen – and the rest of us must choose too. In a time of danger, they have turned their backs on their country. Now we turn our backs on them."

Well, now I am filled with despair! David Frum is turning his back on me? How will I ever go on?

March 19, 2003

Gene Callahan [send him mail], the author of Economics for Real People, is an adjunct scholar of the Ludwig von Mises Institute and a contributing columnist to LewRockwell.com.

Copyright © 2003 Gene Callahan

Gene Callahan/Stu Morgenstern Archives

     

 

308 posted on 03/20/2003 10:18:11 PM PST by Hoppean
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To: Catspaw
After reading the entire article, it seems the common thread here is that these "conservatives" have a real problem with Israel.
309 posted on 03/20/2003 10:24:41 PM PST by ladyinred
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To: PRND21
We also have more useless graphics from you on a thread that describes your agenda, amnesty boy.

I'll stipulate that I like graphics, but I have a sincere interest in being amused, if you think you can coherently summarize my "agenda," Lasorda boy.




310 posted on 03/20/2003 11:04:28 PM PST by Sabertooth
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To: Chancellor Palpatine
Screw the Etherzone zealot types!!! There just angry that their all old and about to die and have never held the power that this young Republican in the Executive Branch has at this moment and looks like for the next 6 years. Greed, Envy, Covetous, Vanity, there all deadly sins and these old "hard-righters" are guilty of them all. Bite me Pat Buchannan.
311 posted on 03/20/2003 11:08:23 PM PST by Porterville (Screw the grammar, full posting ahead.)
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To: rdb3
They're shrill, but that's it.

Who?




312 posted on 03/20/2003 11:13:03 PM PST by Sabertooth
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To: hchutch; JohnGalt
Frum's approach is to try to throw as much dirt as he can and hope it sticks. He's exploiting the highly emotion state of public opinion now to deliver what he takes to be the final blow to those who disagree with him. And of course those he works with back him up. They would. Other people won't.

There's an interesting critique of Frum's article at Rockwell's site. It starts with the basic fact that those Frum lumps together as paleocons represent very different points of view from libertarians and anarchocapitalists to nationalists, traditionalists and religious conservatives. Right-wing critics of President Bush's policies certainly don't all agree on immigration, race or foreign trade, though it's in Frum's interest to pretend that a few well placed shots will take out the whole pack. The author goes on to show how Frum reshapes actual circumstances to fit his argument.

313 posted on 03/20/2003 11:58:02 PM PST by x
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To: Hoppean; x; rdb3; mhking; Luis Gonzalez; PhiKapMom; Miss Marple; Poohbah; justshe; dighton; Dog; ...
How else do you describe the rhetoric that Mr. Frum quotes? It's clearly beyond the bounds of decency.

I don't know about you, but me and a lot of other folks who could be described as conservatives would NOT want to be associated with people who make comments like these, nor will they tolerate those that make them:

"I respect and admire the French, who have been a far greater nation than we shall ever be, that is, if greatness means anything loftier than money and bombs."
— THOMAS FLEMING, "HARD RIGHT," MARCH 13, 2003

"[Clarence] Thomas calls the segregation of the Old South, where he grew up, 'totalitarian.' But that's liberal nonsense. Whatever its faults, and it certainly had them, that system was far more localized, decent, and humane than the really totalitarian social engineering now wrecking the country."
— LLEWELLYN H. ROCKWELL

"How horrible to realize, ten years after the Cold War, that the real evil empire is not some foreign regime, but the U.S. military state. It bombs buses, bridges, factories, churches, and schools, expresses 'regret,' and then continues to do the same. A host of innocents have died from U.S. attacks — a fact which should make every patriot wince. The propaganda should also make us wonder to what extent the old Communist Threat was trumped up to plunder the American taxpayer."
— LLEWELLYN H. ROCKWELL, "THE END OF BUCKLEYISM," IN SPINTECH, JUNE 12, 1999

"It is clear that neither laws nor any sense of fair play will stop this rampant U.S. arrogance. The time may soon come when we will have to call for the return of the spirit of the man who terrified the United States like no one else ever has. Come back Stalin — (almost) all is forgiven."
— GEORGE SZAMUELY, IN "TAKI'S TOP DRAWER," NEW YORK PRESS, JULY 11, 2001

"The civilization that we as whites created in Europe and America could not have developed apart from the genetic endowments of the creating people." — SAMUEL FRANCIS, SPEECH AT THE AMERICAN RENAISSANCE CONFERENCE, MAY 1994

"The Bush administration should not only ignore the advice of such characters as Mr. Ledeen and Mr. Podhoretz but consider placing them under surveillance as possible agents of a foreign power." — SAMUEL FRANCIS, IN CHRONICLES, DECEMBER 2002

"The U.S. government has probably killed more people outside its own borders than any other. Or am I overlooking something?"
— JOSEPH SOBRAN, SPEECH TO THE JOHN RANDOLPH SOCIETY, HERNDON, VA., JANUARY 1992

That next to last quote, by the way, is targeting a person (Michael Ledeen) who has posted here on an occasional basis in the past. Quite frankly, were I charged in the language Mr. Francis used, then I would have given Mr. Francis one of three options:
1. Provide proof of the charges
2. Issue a retraction of those charges
3. Name a second
314 posted on 03/21/2003 5:33:40 AM PST by hchutch ("But tonight we get EVEN!" - Ice-T)
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To: x
Thanks for the link; solid refutation of the boy-wonder. Frum is a David Brock of the new century only he's Canadian rather than 'confused.'
315 posted on 03/21/2003 5:36:24 AM PST by JohnGalt
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To: hchutch
Naw, I'd just handle it as the Kzinti of Larry Niven's "Known Space" series would.

First you scream, then you leap.
316 posted on 03/21/2003 5:37:35 AM PST by Poohbah (Beware the fury of a patient man -- John Dryden)
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To: hchutch; rdb3
"[Clarence] Thomas calls the segregation of the Old South, where he grew up, 'totalitarian.' But that's liberal nonsense. Whatever its faults, and it certainly had them, that system was far more localized, decent, and humane than the really totalitarian social engineering now wrecking the country." — LLEWELLYN H. ROCKWELL

Yet another reason that I've got no use for Lew Rockwell and his rantings.

317 posted on 03/21/2003 6:38:30 AM PST by mhking (Let's enjoy a great showtime!)
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To: mhking
Yep. It's a pretty damning indictment, if you want my opinion.
318 posted on 03/21/2003 6:45:25 AM PST by hchutch ("But tonight we get EVEN!" - Ice-T)
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To: dirtboy
Actually, the column does nothing but cite specific utterances of a few members of the old right. I'm curious how quoting someone paints them as racist.

There are two ways of using a person's words against him in a deceitful way.
1) by how one defines racism and
2) removing the context of a statement.

A perfect example is the wide spread quote of how Bucahnan praised Hitler in a column which is used as proof of his anti-semitism. Don't have the quote saved but I remember his original column and I clearly remember how it has been used. He mentioned how in W.W.I Hitler was a brave soldier and won several medals for bravery, being highly decorated as an EM was an exception in the imperial army of that day and quite an achievement. Besides being historically true the column from which it was lifted used Hitler as an example of how men with dangerous ideas should be taken seriously, deadly seriously and not made to look ridiculous and cartoonish. We mock or ignore these types at our own peril. That is hardly the praise and admiration it is portrayed to be by Buchanan's detractors.

- While I am an individualist and do not identify with any group nor understand the psychology of the need to I do not belittle those that feel that need through either national, regional or tribal pride. We seem to have a double standard these days where certain groups are fully allowed to publicly wave their pride and others are condemned for the same. Like whites in general, those who feel western civ is superior to stone age hunter/gatherers and especially despised is white Southerners. If someone is from a despised group, proud of it and defiant about it to the PC codes of the day so what? I haven't seen any of the listed malefactors call for another final solution or purification of the land or blood of the race nor have they called for the return of Jim Crow so where is the evil in their pride? Where is the evil in pointing out double standards? But this is being used as a negative for political reasons by those like Frum here, trying to say paleocons are all racists cranks. The reason is to specifically discredit all their ideas which will then nullify their position on foreign policy which is what this fight is really all about.

319 posted on 03/21/2003 7:42:17 AM PST by u-89
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To: hchutch
I've been checking out some left protests lately for a video project I'm doing, and their sheer venom against the Bush administration is incredible. The protests feel like a little war, in a weird world where Bush plays the role of a diseased figure, an evil combination of Hitler, Saddam Hussein and even a bit of Kim Jong Il.

The Left makes an interesting mistake: They enormously understate the amount of true evil in the world. Nobody who's read accounts of life under Hitler or Saddam can bring credibility to this "Bush as Hitler" nonsense. I argued with a number of these nice folks, pointing out that Saddam's way of dealing with this demonstration would be to torture and kill all the participants. Incredibly, they conceded my point gracefully but argued back, with the usual tired Chomskyist garbage. I don't think they have a visceral sense of what it's really like to live under evil.

It looks like some of these "right" people you quote should be moving to the left, where they would find their moral equivalents. Good riddance to them.

By the way, thanks for posting this and pinging me on this. I felt bad about not responding before, but I've been caught up in the war news.

D
320 posted on 03/21/2003 8:30:25 AM PST by daviddennis (Visit amazing.com for protest accounts, video & more!)
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