It's been an eye opening experience for me to see how a forwarded email can be altered as it makes its way through cyberspace. Recent versions have me (a moderate Democrat) saying "I" advocated bombing Afghanistan back to the stone age (a phrase that's not even in my vocabulary) and they've changed Mr. Ansary's gender from male to female and have made him a professor at Stanford University or at Hastings or a Harvard Law student.

He is not. He's a writer. Period.

I have never suggested savagery or barbarism, or a leveling of a nation of mostly innocent people. What I have suggested is that our response has to be severe. Unfortunately, this will involve some number of civilian casualties for the enemy and also military casualties for us. Who in the world ever said that war was antiseptic?