In all the fulsome talk about rigged elections, I never see mention of a new election. The people who rig elections are not going to stop work when a new count is ordered; they'll rig that, too. The only way to be sure is to redo the disputed elections, but no one says so. "The cost," officials would say, if compelled to comment. Given the cost of seeing American democracy subverted, the price tags for new elections--especially low-tech ones that don't involve voting machines but do involve focused human examination and counting of ballots--is inconsiderable. This doesn't apply only to Ohio. The world's holding its breath.

Mitch Clogg
Mendocino, CA

Much has been written about America’s role as the world’s policeman-that it is a part no one has asked us to play, that we do so ineptly, etc. But even a cursory examination of the behavior of the United States for the past three years will reveal that our country has not acted in such a manner during that period. Consider that Bush is now beginning his prewar rampup to a war in Iran by sending Colin Powell onto stage to claim that those evil Persians are building missiles and warheads to deliver nuclear (nucular to you, Mr. President) weapons against America. Then Mr. Bush started talking tough against North Korea again, warning it that no nuclear weapons would be tolerated within its borders. Watch out, Mr. Kim Jong Il, he’s got a mandate in his pocket. Then, to top things off, our chief executive demanded an explanation from President Putin of Russia as to why he had taken actions that Bush felt were undemocratic. I guess the latter didn’t realize that he had been reelected President only of our country, not the world. Vladimir had better shape up, or George W. will “preempt” him.

Following the president's re-election by the electoral synod last week, the sentimental apoplectic in me couldn't help picturing the last scene in "The Day After," the movie about a nuclear holocaust. Shredded and shrunken, Jason Robards' doctor-character sits on the rubble of his house as the camera pans out to reveal a flattened Lawrence, Kan.

What hydrogen bombs couldn't do to the Democratic Party, Karl Rove and George W. Bush finally did, with a little help from a ringer. Five votes swung the election Bush's way four years ago. It took just one vote this time -- Osama bin Laden's, cast with impeccable timing over the last three years to keep fear the value-added commodity it's been for the Bush administration. Without fear, there could be no crusade (against heathens abroad and at home, but mostly at home), and, without crusade, there could be no appeal to the deciding factor in American politics: the religious bloc. So, the 2004 election panned out as a choice between committed evangelicals and committed secularists. Evangelicals won.

AUSTIN, Texas -- Whilst the punditry wanders weak and weary in the deep fogs of the "moral values debate," what say we pay some attention to what is going on, eh?

According to Newsday, "The White House has ordered the new CIA director, Porter Goss, to purge the agency of officers believed to have been disloyal to President George W. Bush or of leaking damaging information to the media about the conduct of the Iraq war and the hunt for Osama bin Ladin ..."

Bad Nooz. In the first place, the concept of "purge" has not hitherto played much part in our history, and now is no time to start. Considerable pains have been taken to protect the civil service from partisan pressure for extremely good reasons.

"Disloyalty to Bush," or any president, is not the same as disloyalty to the country. In fact, in the intelligence biz, opposing the White House is sometimes the highest form of loyalty to country, since when we fight without good intelligence, we fight blind.