"'Well, this isn't a forced decision. there is no decision tree'.

You sure TALK like someone who has all his discussions at college coffee houses. Throw in enough jargon and maybe nobody will notice that there isn't any "there" there."

Tom! Chill out! YOU brought the decision tree analysis in! I quote you:

"you have trouble with a decision tree that has only two forks, say so. Assuming that there must be a third fork can be argued forever."

YOU are getting too nasty and demeaning here. I respect you as one of the best on the zone, but you are running around and getting personal, even to the point of misdirection! Be Honest at least! Was I wrong about you!?

Back to the matter at hand:

This decision is NOT forced because we have NO honest knowledge that there is IMMEDIATE danger form Iraq. There WAS time to come up with other options EVEN IF we are to believe in the eventuality of Iraq attacking the USA.

"Two choices MEANS two choices. Not making a choice was one of them.

- We take Saddam out.

- We don't take Saddam out. The status quo."

This is false, tom. I am thinking about buying a house, I just saw one I liked. It is NOT a choice of buying THAT house RIGHT NOW or NEVER buying a house. This is elementary reasoning here, tom.

"This coin has no goddam third face. One would think I would have proved this by now since I have blanked pretty much every one of you out with the question of "what IS the alternative?""

This is not a goddam coin tom. Thats the problem here.

"All the blathering in the world about how there MUST be a third face to a two-dimensional object if we just looked hard enough is meaningless. "

You simply claim it is two dimensional- I see no reason to buy it. Few things in this world are EVER that simple.