That's what the President said, derisively, as he spoke of protests across the country and around the world against his demands for war against Iraq.

George W. Bush's dismissal of protests against war as irrelavent set up a strawman position and beat it down. He said: “Some in the world don't view Saddam Hussein as a risk to peace. I respectfully disagree.”

Now, I don't think that the majority of protestors took the position that Saddam Hussein is not a threat to peace. I think they were saying that George W. Bush is a greater threat to peace at the moment; that there are other ways to achieve a resolution of Hussein's recalcitrance that might not shed quite as much blood or cause as many long-lasting problems that would call for additional bloodshed.

But George has cotton in his ears. He's made his decision. Nobody is going to change his mind, least of all people who didn't vote for him.

“Democracy is a wonderful thing.” Especially when it can be ignored.

The digout continues. We've had a reprieve; the snow is no longer falling. The emergency order keeping people off the roads has been lifted. The governor and mayor have gotten their opportunity to look manly in their winter press conference gear,and pronounce the battle with the snow joined.

Here on W. 41st St–the most heavily-covered stretch of street on television, due to its close proximity to TV Hill (home of three out of the four local TV news operations)–the digging has begun. My kids have dug tunnels through the snow in our front yard as Paula and I and our neighbor Anna shoveled the walks. Zoë, our two-year old, displayed her displeasure at the cold, so we packed her back inside after a few minutes of exposure to the elements for a photo op.