"Well, I certainly wouldn't have been in favor of it if I knew then what I know now."

"I just thought it was important to trust the president when it came to matters of national security, especially when the threat was as grave as we were told it was. As it turns out, that trust was unjustified, to say the least."

"It seemed like a good idea at the time -- a quick shock and awe, a victory in the 'war on terror,' spreading freedom and democracy and all that, with minimal downside. I guess the situation was a lot more complex than we realized. A whole lot more."

"The devastation and loss of life is simply staggering! Not to mention the financial cost! And gasoline at $4.60 a gallon?! Who could have imagined it would come to this?"

Yes, it will all seem rather obvious at some future point. The attack and/or invasion of Iran (or Venezuela, Syria, Cuba . . . whoever's next on Junior's "what can I do to exude a manly image" list) will look pretty foolish.

But, once again, as with Iraq, that realization will come too late. The damage will be done, and will likely be irrevocable.

So we'll be encouraged to hunker down and sacrifice (but keep shopping!), and not play the blame game, and move forward not backwards, and pay no attention to the obscene war and oil profiteering going on, and support the troops, and maybe we could authorize a commission to study what may have gone wrong, and the media may want to do a slightly introspective study on whether they acted as journalistic watchdogs or as cheerleaders, but not to assign blame, cause we're wanting to move forward not backwards, and after all who could have known it would trigger such a dire chain of events, and how come the Democrats didn't try harder to stop it, and apart from this latest blunder we sure are special aren't we, and maybe this will help usher in the Rapture, and gosh wouldn't it be great if we all got one of those new "Support The Troops" license plates, and . . .

Everyone, please, take a moment to calmly think about the consequences of yet another attack on a sovereign country. And do it now, before the propaganda machine gets rolling with the "irrefutable proof" of Iranian (or Venezuelan, Syrian, Cuban . . . ) intent to kill us all if we don't get them first, and/or before the next "terrorist" attack occurs, and/or before a smirking George W. positions himself, once again, over our nation's collective punch bowl.

If we speak up now, if we make enough ruckus, maybe the puppet masters behind the scene, the ones who created this Potemkin presidency out of this shallow and possibly psychotic man, will decide to pull the plug on the whole thing, or at least delay it long enough for us to get a less delusional "Decider" at the helm.

If not, if we just tune it all out and instead focus on what Brittany's wearing or not these days, then it will be d�j� vu all over again.

And there we'll be, after a snickering George W. has departed, gathered around that punch bowl with our little cups in our hands, pondering how best to mask the foul taste so we can proceed with the party.

Ideas will be proffered, all suggesting, of course, that we move forward not backward and not play the blame game, but none of it will matter. That bitter taste Bush left behind will be all but impossible to get rid of.

And the worst part about it all? The fundamental flaw with the "forward not backward, no blame party game"? No lessons are learned.

Therefore the very people who cheerfully invited George W. to the party to begin with, twice, will be equally inclined to invite someone just like him, someone who also shares an overwhelming psychological compulsion to do the "punch gag" to the next one!

It's way past time we dumped the no blame game, establish some kind, any kind, of mechanism to provide some semblance of accountability for the last six years of recklessness, and stop the next round of recklessness before it begins.

Now is the time to make yourself heard.

Now, not later.

If you wait until the bombing begins or the "attack" occurs, the media's "forward not backward, no blame party game" will accelerate with renewed vigor, and the invitations to the '08 bash will have already gone out.