Well, now at least we know why Congress never officially declared war on Afghanistan. If we were officially at war, then al-Qaida and Taliban members we captured would be prisoners of war. And if they were prisoners of war, we would have to give them some scrap of human rights under the Geneva Convention. And if there's one thing President Bush hates, it's an international treaty. As long as we're not at war, we can treat our prisoners of not-war (which he calls "unlawful combatants," since it's unlawful to fight someone unless they're at war with you -- convenient, no?) however we like, and if anyone complains we can just say "hey, they're the evil bad guys, they don't deserve better."

So now we've dumped the ABM treaty, refused to sign the Kyoto Protocol and the land mines treaty, and we're doing our best to get out of our obligations to the UN. Look for the Feds to revive the time-honored tradition of kicking Native Americans off their reservations sometime later this year.