"Tell me, answer me, are the inspectors to search the house of every government official, every Baath Party member and every scientist in the country to find the truth, to get the information they need, to satisfy the demands of our council?" --Colin Powell, today before the UN Security Council

Yes. I do in fact believe that searching the house of every government official, every Baath Party member, and every scientist in Iraq in order to be secure in the knowledge that Iraq does not have capabilities for various types of destruction is preferable to spending a single American soldier's life to attain the same thing. Because - for now - that's really what this decision is about - time, effort, and money, or our brothers' and sisters' lives.

The evidence Powell brought forth today is pretty convincing. But I'm going to have to be *really* *convinced* before I can believe that sending Americans in to fight and to die is the right thing to do. There are so many factors (e.g. the military-industrial complex seething and drooling like a dragon-beast at the prospect of war, the dragon-beast with its hand in the pocket of the president and its voice in his ear, the astounding ability of the administration to completely ignore that whole pesky little North Korea thing, to name a few) that make me lean toward distrust of the administration.