I wasn't attacking your virility. I was attacking your thinking.

You know, I get a lot of things here where somebody comes out and says something along the lines of "I never said ANYTHING like that."

Your limb just broke Tom because I was as outraged as any other American but I was able to channel my rage into thinking instead of overreacting. The gut reaction is to paint the whole of Al Quaida as radical suicidal wackos and figure the only way to prevent attacks is to simply wipe them all off the face of the Earth. I'm human. Those thoughts went through my mind and, had one of my children been in those towers, I'd have been hunting Mr. Bin Laden personally.

Your initial reaction to an unprovoked attack on an America city was the same as almost everyone else's. But then, you "saw the light..."

The problem is that, once one gets over their initial shock, engages their brain, and treats the problem as a chess match, the black and white turns to gray. The cult-like, brain-warped soldiers of Al Quaida are not the ones we have to worry about. The leaders of the group are leaders because they are brighter, have charisma, money, and influence over others. They read voraciously and study the strengths and weaknesses of their enemies no less than any West Point graduate would. There's a strong possibility that their religious teachings and it's ties to their terrorist plans are mere manipulation agents and that they don't even truly believe the stuff they're putting out. These men are not suicidal or they'd be strapping bombs to themselves just as their pinhead followers do. Make no mistake that there will never stop being a source of suicidal followers as long as our side keeps playing into the plans of the terrorist leaders.

Are you truly that misguided that you think these guys lost sleep because we blew up some bombs in Afghanistan and destabilized Iraq? We played right into their hands. They can't beat us here. They can blow up a few buildings and scare some folks that can't think beyond their tv set but our country is too big, too strong, and has too many resources. In many ways we caused more damage than the planes did by overreacting to the attacks. Al Quaida didn't make our stock market drop out of sight. Our fear did. Al Quaida didn't cause our airline industry to hit rock bottom. Passengers will never again allow criminals to take control of a plane. We could've easily defended against the type of attack that occurred on 9/11 by reinforcing cockpit doors and putting air marshalls on flights. I would've gladly flown on 9/12. It would've been the safest day of the year to be in the air and yet we all sat shaking in our abodes.

Their only chance at making a dent in our power was to lure us into their enviroment and allow us to enrage the Islamic world. Bush dove right in.

I have my own macho side. You wouldn't want to ever see it unleashed. However, it hasn't been released because my intellect always steps in to ask what life will look like tomorrow after going postal today. Here's the rub Tom. I've always prospered in life with this philosophy. Nations work the same way.

Okay, you don't think attacking them was the right thing to do. You think violence is playing into the hands of people who might be "pretending" to be psychotic radical Islamists who cannot live under the same sky as infidels. Hey, maybe Hitler didn't really hate Jews, either. Maybe he was just acting like it.

What the hell's the difference what bin Laden really thinks?

You're the president of the United States. The fires are still burning in Manhattan. You're so goddamed enlightened, nuanced, and seeing things in "gray." So what do you do now? I'm looking for some verbs here. You're endlessly eloquent on all the wrong approaches we took. What are the right ones?

And for God's sake, please don't come back with some kind of gas like "doing it better." I get enough of that one.

You completely ignored my point on Arab culture, which is critical in this issue. You aren't dealing with someone who is impressed by diplomatic letters.

I have had so many discussions here on things like this, with people who have no end of criticisms on how badly we've handled terrorism, Iraq, you name it. Damn few have any better ideas, and I don't think you do either. Put up or shut up.

This is why Bush won the election, and why a Republican will win the next one, too. The Left has nothing in its quiver to deal with this kind of thing, and is trying to cover that up by tirades about how badly the other side is handling it.

We were attacked by people who see nothing wrong with wrapping shrapnel bombs around their own kids, and the right thing to do was respond in kind. People can make a valid case for whether or not we should have gone into Iraq, but if you are trying to tell us we shouldn't have attacked Afghanistan either, I think you might even lose quite a few liberals on that one.

You served on an ASW sub, "Skipjack" class, if I remember right. If you have been assigned to a missile boat, would you have gone, considering the entire point of that particular armament? Or is this nuanced approach to being attacked a more recent development?

Now, as to the personal stuff:

I've seen the picture you posted wearing the Darth Vader helmet. Nowhere in the goofy, friendly smile is some hardened warrior or someone that has learned life from the streets. You're a spoiled little boy Tom that lives in some cowboys and Indians world where John Wayne comes riding to the rescue. I hope you can retain that sheltered life and never have to face the kinds of adversity I've had piled on me. Then again maybe you need that slap upside the head to teach you some humility in your white bread little life.

The goofy smile is a Dad making his kids laugh, one of which had a camera. The Photoshop job was done for the same reason. Maybe I don't have a problem looking a little silly if it makes people laugh. Don't you think Robert would take that picture down if I asked him to?

I don't know what kind of adversity you've had piled on you, and don't see any reason it should have anything to do with a conversation on foreign policy.

Your underwear bit might have made a dent if I were eleven years old. I've got something in my house that runs in a little metal wheel all night that craps bigger than you.