Cry for war drowns out common sense

The problem with incessantly beating the drums of war, as this national administration is currently doing, is that the noise begins to drown out reason, common sense and, eventually, sanity.

Reason was the first to be sacrificed when Bush proclaimed his "axis of evil" and put Iran, Iraq and North Korea -- and possibly Russia and China -- on a list of suspect-nations with which the United States would prepare to do battle in the name of demolishing weapons of mass destruction. In at least one of the three pariah countries, a fierce political battle is being waged between moderation and fanaticism; consigning the country to the ash bin of evil managed to ineptly breathe more life into the fanatics and their cause.

Common sense quickly followed when it was announced that Vice President Cheney would make a grand tour of the Middle East in order to convince Arab leaders of the importance of joining America in the effort to topple Saddam Hussein -- or at least not to stand in the way while we did so. Most Arab leaders sit on a tinder-box of poverty, illiteracy and religious fundamentalism for which no spark would be greater than the prospect of the United States trying to overthrow the leader of an Islamic nation -- no matter how much he might be despised. (Lay aside, of course, the question of how -- in the absence of a declared war -- we justify going into someone else's country to wipe out its government.)