Mr Thomas, like the BA, is promoting an illusion of the "enemy." We are NOT fighting OBL in either Iraq or Afghanistan. We have no defined enemy anywhere in the world.

Osama Bin Laden is a criminal -- nothing more, nothing less. Al Qaeda is a criminal organization which employs terror tactics as its main instrument of extortion. They do NOT represent a soverign country, a religion, or even a well-organized militia. They are a band of criminal fanatics which were allowed to form and grow as an opposition group to the Soviets during their own misadventures in Afghanistan.

This pathetic "war on terrorism" is neither a war, nor an answer to the problem of OBL and Al Qaeda. In fact, the idiots in the BA are playing into OBL's hands by giving in to his extortion demands that we foolishly spend our national treasure, and cower in our own homes. The assinine "Terror Alert Level" system is a perfect example of what blows OBL's dress up.

The constant spin by Rove and the BA that we are "fighting them over there, so we don't have to fight them here," is smoke and mirrors. It fails to define who "them" is, because "they" aren't there. Like any criminal on the run, "they" are in hiding, and certainly would not be where we have most of our military.