The opinion falls absolutely flat with the last paragraph's hope-for-hope conclusion.

It was structured towards and should have been directed towards ARMED REBELLION, or if not, at the very least impeachment and conviction of this FRAUD of a president and his corrupt, illegal, administration.

Yes, if America is going to be able to face itself in the mirror, it will have to right its wrongs. Here's a beginning for your next president to set America on the right course:

1. Publicly admit its crime of violating the UN Charter, which prohibits aggression against sovereign states. (Tip: forget about 'winning')

2. Ask the UN, without any US participation, to assemble a peacekeeping force to replace US troops within Iraq to assist toward a political solution to the problems caused by the invasion, and to be fully funded by the US.

3. Ask the UN, again without US participation, to assess war reparations against the US for the illegal invasion of Iraq. (Remember: forget about 'winning')

4. Make a commitment to acquiesce to an international task force charged with eliminating all nuclear weapons in the world, and conducting regular inspections to ensure ongoing compliance from all nations.

There - that would be a good first few steps toward restoring the kind of values the US claims to hold.

Happy New Year everyone!

IRON HEEL by Jack London: "You have forgotten the editors. They draw their salaries for the policy they maintain. Their policy is to print nothing that is a vital menace to the established. The press of the United States? It is a parasitic growth that battens on the capitalist class. Its function is to serve the established by moulding public opinion, and right well it serves it."
This editorial is a slap in the face to all Americans who have long had the wisdom to see that our political system is made up of political whores pimping to corporate whores so the media whores can have something to talk about.
Hoa binh

The NYT just hired Kristol. Let´s have nothing more to do with them.

This is the paper that withheld the NSA spying on Americans story until after the 2004 election talking about fair and balanced?

If they want fair and balanced, why don't they bring in Jim Hightower to counterbalance William Kristol? Oh, I forgot, they are blind in the left eye.

Truly one of the best editorials the NY Times has run in years. It made me wonder why this lesson in moral values clarification comes out on the last day of 2007, contrasting so sharply with the much more subdued condemnation of Bush's torture and detention without trial policies that is sporadically voiced on the campaign trail by the Democratic presidential candidates.

Why in the hell hasn't the Dems' DC beltway brain trust figured out (like the Kerry campaign in 2004 couldn't) that torturing people and stacking naked Arabs in homoerotic piles at abu Ghraib is a "moral values issue" being handed to them on a silver platter by the blood stained hypocrites of the so-called born again Christian right?

Then, just when I'm thinking this might be a bell weather of good things to come, now I'm told that Bill Kristol comes on board in '08 to provide Times readers with better fairness and balance alongside David Brooks, William Safire, Thomas Friedman, et al.? Give me a break.

Maybe the powers-that-be at the Times think adding more right wing demagogues to their op-ed stable will bolster the spine of their editorial page when it comes to speaking truth to power, or that the right wing media machine will go easy on bashing them if more right wingers are just put on the payroll, giving Karl Rove's talking points yet wider mainstream circulation.

If that's the reasoning, I think they're sipping the same Kool Aid as the folks who think buying off the Anbar shieks will cure the insurgency. You sure as hell won't find the Wall Street Journal or the Washington Times reciprocating any time soon.

All the News That's Fit to Print?

Next thing we know, the nation's newspaper of record will bless us all with yet more of all the opinion fit to reprint under the by line of folks like Michele Malkin, Cal Thomas, or Ann Coulter.

God, how I miss Molly Ivins!

Bill from Saginaw

As disturbing as this realization may be,
the only thing I know is,
that I don't live under the Romans 'right' now,
nor under Attila, Ottoman or Pharaohs
and not under 'Hitler' yet.
All those megalomaniac 'Heroes' and their
disgusting boot lickers are now nothing more but
dust, mixed up with the excrements they
constituted.

RichM--I can't add much to what you said other than it makes sense for a newspaper that has Thomas Friedman to also hire William Kristol and proves why this editorial in no way reflects the true sentiments of the NY Times's owners--Actions speak louder than words.

As a former NYT forums participant, I read far too many of its jello-like editorials over the years, so it is heartening to see that perhaps they are finally growing a spine. Kudos, and please do keep it up.

Howsoever, if America does have a future in which historians look back honestly on these times, without any doubt they will deem our failure to impeach any of Bush's criminal cabal, and especially The Decider himself, as the most important reason why our Noble Experiment died.

9/11 was an inside job.
there was no panic on the part of the bush administration.
this was all planned long ago.
wake up america!
google "Freedom o Fascism"

"Looking at America" was a wonderful editorial and I've often thought in recent years how this country was beginning to have very little resemblance to the America I love. The flag has even been co-opted and become a symbol of an ideology so perverse and twisted that I would no sooner display it than a Nazi flag. I commend the editorial writers of this piece and would like to thank you for putting the thoughts expressed in "Looking at America" into words in the New York Times.

That said I also read with astonishment and disbelief the news that the NYT would be hiring William Krystal. In my view that would be analogous to hiring Ann Coulter or Rush Limbaugh. I have no gripe with NYT expressing different points of view but Mr. Krystal's ideology is not just an alternative view it is a dangerous, delusional and perhaps psychotic view of the US in relation to the rest of the world. There is nothing truly "conservative "about any of the neo-con brain trust but his ideas are absolutely radical and out of touch with reality. This man in particular has done so much damage I can't imagine the NYT giving him a platform on which to do more. Please don't hire this man!!! If he comes on board, as much as I respect your organization I will stop reading and taking as many others with me as I can.

Nice editorial.
The title is wrong though. It should be called 'Looking at Fascist America'.
Incomprehensible how that scum in the Dark House can not be exterminated.
Where is the 'National Pest Patrol' to smoke out all that filth in the Oral Office?
I guess it's going to be like Hunter S. Thompson said. He knew way more than
anybody could ever imagine and he knew what happens in America 'Right' now.
He called bush et al. '...fucking Nazis' and hit the nail with his assessment. Sad that
we have to go through all this repuglicon shit without the moral support of people
like Thompson or Vonnegut. Nothing written even remotely as poignant nowadays,
but I guess it doesn't really matter to the citizenry of the biggest shit pool anybody
has ever made out of the 'White House'.
All those fascists need to be rounded up, covered with fuel and burned alive.
Like so many of the innocent people those mass murderers killed in the last five years.
I know, the thought alone could worsen my Karma, but then, Buddhism is about Love
and Compassion. Love and Compassion for ordinary people like You and me leaves
unfortunately only this choice (or a 'clubbing squad' like the ones for little seals) to
prevent even greater tragedy.
Obviously the time gets cold feet now, kind of late though. We would have needed that
earlier.
Look at the whole picture. The hi-jackers in the formerly prestigious 'White House' write
themselves changes into the constitution that will prevent legal actions against them
in case they decide to leave this shit pool.
That's like good ol' Adolf Hitler would have come up with a few changes more regarding
the 'accountability' of the Nazis and their enablers.
It didn't work because Germany lost the accompanying war, as much as those miserable
creatures in the 'White House' are loosing their so called 'war on terror' an infamous phrase
invention that shows once more how war horny this whole country is.
You want bush to be removed from the 'White House'?
Just make the people believe that bush is going to take their guns or their SUV's away,
then You will see some action. A dying planet is not enough to get worried about. It's all
about the 'Pro Life- Pro Torture' movement, the tax cuts for the filthiest, squandering the
welfare of the United States of America with the Military Industrial Complex and their 'energy'
buddies.
There is nothing more to add as everybody should know by now that those people in the 'control room' of this country give a shit about its citizens. Only the dumbest of the militaristic bible thumpers
(5%?) believe everything is alright and the bush junta is the greatest administration this country has ever seen.
Man, if I would be American I would disappear in shame in some hole, much like Saddam, who shared that location for a similarly reason.
It is the shame that bush had put on US. Only a public execution of all those murderers will reinstate
the faith and the hope that America is indeed the 'greatest Democracy of the Universe'.
The only way to get there is consumer boycott. If You can't pull that through because You are fucking
addicted to shopping like to heroine, you deserve to disappear from the face of the earth.

Other than that I wish You a hypocritical 'Happy New Year' knowing that it will be
everything else but that. Sorry.

George Bush and Company didn't panic. They just took advantage of the situation. They had already written the basis of the Patriot Act prior to 9/11.

By the way, thinking that the New York Times is a liberal publication is like saying that Hillary Clinton is a Democrat.

If the New York Times (or any other mainstream media) was honest and brave enough to speak out against the war in a timely manner, we wouldn't be in Iraq right now.

Of course, we can't let peace and justice concerns slow down the economic machine. More war, more guns, more money. And as long as the masses are entertained by video games and TV while we continue to be ignorant of issues, I predict more of the same in 2008 (and beyond).

Can we just have less war is 2008?

George w Bush: "Full steam ahead."
New York Times: "Yes Sir Captain."

so it goes...

"...President Bush and his advisers panicked...:

The only time the President and his advisors were panicked was during the first few hours after the attack, when they didn't know (presumably) what was going on. I don't think there was much panic after that, except for fear for their stock portfolios, among the opportunistic nabobs surrounding the Prez. Those calculating minds were at work brainstorming the possibilities of the emerging situation before the Trade Center dust had settled. It was the American people and their rudderless Congress who let themselves be herded, like terrified chickens, into the new order of things.

The Times hired Kristol while publishing this editorial???!!! I'm speechless. Why do we even bother to take any note of them at all?

Last day of 2007... where the heck has the NYT and the rest of the media been for the past 5 years!?!? And, as others here have noted, where are the public demands of impeachment, censure, condemnation of the bought congress? Blah blah blah indeed!

One doesn't need syrup of ipecac anymore.

RichM: "This is a classic example of NYT sanctimonious hypocrisy — beating their little chests, wailing piteously, & pretending to be horrified by what they actually have helped to bring about, & have implicitly enabled every step of the way."

And don't forget Judith Miller's Iraq WMD lies under the NY Times banner.

To paraphrase The Times: We can only hope that this time, unlike 2001-2007, American voters will have a press with the integrity, principle and decency to fulfill its duty of honestly evaluating government policies and informing the electorate. Then when we look in the mirror as a nation, we will see, once again, the reflection of the United States of America.

The hope is, unfortunately, a faint one- this editorial forgoes yet one more excellent opportunity for The Times to explore its role in getting us into this mess.

Brian Concannon, Joseph, Oregon

Claim to moral purity invalid and hypocritical:

"this horror, this sorrowful sense of estrangement"

Too bad the NYT didn't have these emotions years ago, when they were still part of the GOP propaganda machine!

To the editor:
A fine editorial. Thank you.

"...and at the same time fulfilled the imperial fantasies of Vice President Dick Cheney and others determined to use the tragedy of 9/11 to arrogate as much power as they could." (from, December 31, 2007, Editorial, Looking at America)

And yet, one of the "others" -- Bill Kristol, will become one of your inner circle columnists. Whoever penned the editorial needs to keep a sharp eye as well as a sharp pen.

For a broader perspective of how these "humanoids" have been and are currently working us over, spend some time at this site:

http://www.sonic.net/~taryfast/destruction.html

This is a stunning editorial, a compelling, indeed shocking, argument against the re-election of right-wing neoconservatives to the executive branch in 2008. Unfortunately, the use of the corporate "We" as the subject of the penultimate sentence of the final paragraph reeks with the cynicism and rank moral insincerity of a Bush lawyer opining on the limits of torture. It is tragic that this editorial didn't appear on December 31, 2003.

Much of the assault on American democracy, ideals and international image which the New York Times deplores in today's piece was happening 4 years ago and the "We" of the Times editorial board and the company's management knew it was happening then. For example, by the paper's own admission, The Times knew long before the 2004 national elections that President Bush was using "…his powers on his own citizens, authorizing the intelligence agencies to spy on Americans, wiretapping phones and intercepting international e-mail messages without a warrant…" but the Times chose to remain silent until the election had passed evidently acquiescing in the Administration's argument that national security matters were at stake. I submit that act of journalistic cowardice did as much to enable a second Bush victory as any missteps by the Democratic opposition or the Swift Boating and other successful campaign tactics of the Republicans.

The editorial concludes with an aspiration that in 2008 the American people will have the renewed wisdom to choose a president with elemental wisdom and decency. That being the case, the country's leading national newspaper of record has a unique responsibility to publish fully and completely what it refers to as the "shocking abuses" of this Administration as they become known. As the Times eloquently argues, to do so is nothing less than a matter of national security because "…there really is no safety for Americans or their country when those ideals are sacrificed."

I submitted these comments to the Times this morning, but its editors refused to post it under its Readers Comments. I wonder why? Perhaps it was too offensive to those who have just evidenced their willingness to add William Kristol to its roster of right-wing Op-Ed columnists.

Eric Thorp

"We can only hope that this time, unlike 2004, American voters will have the wisdom to grant the awesome powers of the presidency to someone who has the integrity, principle and decency to use them honorably."

Hmm. Seems like a good start would be for the author of this article to acknowledge that the majority of American voters did have the 'wisdom' to vote in someone other than George Bush. The fact that the 2004 election election was messed with has been well verified...

"We can only hope that this time, unlike 2004, American voters will have the wisdom to grant the awesome powers of the presidency to someone who has the integrity, principle and decency to use them honorably."

No, the New York Times and the Democratic presidential candidates can do more than hope. They can loudly and forcefully call for the impeachment of George Bush and Dick Cheney for the crimes listed in this editorial (among many others). But, with the exception of Dennis Kucinich, they refuse to do so.

Good starting point on the criminal activities of the current regime, but too bad they didn't go the extra step and call for impeachment, war crime trials, or some other form of accountability and punishment for those guilty. Or mention the complicity of the majority of Democratic 'lawmakers'. Just more blablabla.

IN A NUTSHELLGAME

--What We're Up Against:

http://www.sfbg.com/blogs/politics/2007/08/political_art_of_the_week.html

This N.Y.Times editorial looks like the tipping point.The right wing press do not wish to appear to be rushing for the exits,but are beginning what will become a stampede in disassociating themselves from everything to do with Bush.You will also see the Murdoch press in such a move, that by the end of 2008 you will have the impression they have always been avid supporters of the Democrats.Ruperts reputation has always to be backing whoever looks like being the winner.Principle,truth,integrity have never played any part.

The New York Times should get immunity along with the telecoms; they were just "panicky and ideological".

Its not Bush, its not the NY Times, its not the Republicans, its not the Democrats.

The American people have not stood up in large enough numbers to right these wrongs. Too many Americans have accepted what the Bush administration has done... from people at the highest levels on down to the average person on the street.

We can only hope that this time, unlike 2004, American voters will have the wisdom to grant the awesome powers of the presidency to someone who has the integrity, principle and decency to use them honorably.

We can only hope? The mainstream media editors are trying to limit the US citizen to a role of powerless spectator, their agenda being to maintain elitist rule over the people.

But the power is in the hands of the people, always. The people serve themselves best by shifting their exchange/association away from the power centers and toward their local communities. The most visible payoff is in the greater value of local production. But the payoff also includes a restrained federal executive, restrained corporate executive, etc.

Localism reduces the negative fallout of elite decisions forced on the people. Today the negative fallout is well understood to have reached catastrophic proportions. All sectors are generally affected but just looking at the energy sector we see decades of energy gluttony where the waste (acculumated in both conversion and consumption) is well beyond 90%.

But it's even worst than one might first imagine. Not only are Americans wasting 90+% of energy, but the economic activity driven by that very small fraction of utilized energy is itself over 90% wasted. The implications are stark. When the people decide to make the change, they will realize today's prosperity on 15 hour work weeks and 1/100 of the energy input. This is achieved by cutting out 90% of the military activity, 90% of the litigation, 90% of the healthcare overhead, 90% of the pharmaceuticals, 90% of the transport sector activity, 90% of the agricultural activity (this includes petrochemicals and heavy machinery) and 90% of the academics, retail, food processing, advertising/marketing, entertainment, consumer electronics, housing/building, heavy industry, finance, and the civic sectors.

Take a nice long vacation, US citizen, for the sake of the biosphere and humanity, and do your necessary business with your neighborhood small farmers, craftsmen, and merchants (and keep your taxable income below the threshold).

You hire Kristol, the biggest warmonger going, and then lecture us about Bush? Editor, heal thyself!

"The country and much of the world was rightly and profoundly frightened by the single-minded hatred and ingenuity displayed by this new enemy. But there is no excuse for how President Bush and his advisers panicked - how they forgot that it is their responsibility to protect American lives and American ideals, that there really is no safety for Americans or their country when those ideals are sacrificed."

Huh? What American ideals? Terrorism began here in 1492. The worst genocide in the world in the last five hundred years continues on American soil today. Clearly after five hundred years of genocide, America values genocide. Religious Dominion results in genocide and remains a center piece of American values today. Bush is merely exporting time tested American values. Racist beliefs are a core American value. Racist genocide is as American as apple pie. It is the source of American wealth. It looks like the New York Times has not yet accepted American Indians as people, instead, they are just like animals in the woods, to be hunted and extinguished with no overt recognition.

The hiring of Bill Krystol is in preparation for an all out assault on the Democrats in the coming elections.

As for the article, two major points are missing:
1. mea culpa,
2. impeachment.

Kind of pales in comparison to attacking your own country and killing 3000 people to get support for Wars of Aggression that kills another 4000 Americans and over 1 million Iraqi/Afghan civilians. But hey, too many critters on the planet, so what the hey.

I think this is partly about discrediting the CIA, not that they need any help, and partly a diversion. Probably there are plans to outsource the CIA functions to Blackwater. I see we are giving them a big contract to fight the War on Drugs in Afghanistan. Ha ha ha. Thats moving into CIA's territory. No drugs, not enough money to fund the black ops. Too many skeletons in the CIA closet so the leaders may want to do some house cleaning.

"Out of panic and ideology..."

Panic my eye. If 9/11 wasn't an inside job, I'm going to go out into a cornfield and swing a baseball bat, secure in the knowledge that very soon a stadium will spring up around me and I'll be hitting the winning home run in the seventh game of the world series.

Yeah, nice editorial. It should be subtittled "Hedging our bets." So the NYT now grows a national conscience? Yeah, whatever. Where was that conscience when (S)Election 2000 illegally put these criminals into office? Where was that conscience when Judith Miller spun her tall tales that precipitated the Iraq invasion/occupation? Where was the NYT when (S)Election 2004 returned these criminals to power, aided, we now discover by the NYT killing stories detrimental to cheney*/bush*? And unfortunately, the list of the Old Grey Lady's journalisted collaboration with cheney*/bush* continues. Sorry NYT, too little and too late.

raster wrote: cheney*/bush* was not voted into power a second time–at least not legitimately so.

No arguments there. The point of my contribution is that the 45% or so Americans that did vote for Bush in 2004 are criminals. If not guilty of complicity in international and federal crimes, guilty of lacking intelligence and common sense.

Colleen, you have it exactly right.

So many Americans pass their time enjoying the riches their successive governments bring to them at the expense of the rest of the world, and then complain about how sad they are for all those oppressed people.

Where are the guts of the country?

Nice editorial. Mr. Average Joe American's response? "Sound's like democrat party talking points..But yeh, Bush sucks!"
Like a home-owner who leaves piles of trash in the back yard and then complains about a rat problem, the American People will cling to their ignorance, er, "innocence".Believe me, I know.I work with them every day.I have predicted almost all of Bush's hundreds of crimes before they happened.It has never occured to them that I couldn't possibly predict his actions unless I knew his motives.In spite of being right, I'm seen as a "conspiracy theororist".Only three years ago (I keep a diary) most Americans thought that torture was okay, that America had a "right" to empire and that middle east oil was "ours".Probably half still do.
Kristol??Has he ever been right about ANYTHING? Why not appoint a rapist to a womens shelter? I mean, there's two sides to everything, right?

Not only did the NYT editors not look into the mirror, but they blame the whole debacle on Bush and his advisors and let everyone else off the hook. But we now know that the ostensibly centrist Democratic leadership, a fortiori Pelosi and Rockefeller, suborned, misprisoned, aided, abetted and connived at these horrific abuses of basic constitutional and human rights. To this day they steadfastly refuse to repeal the congressionally granted impunity, , to restore our rights, to hold open hearings, or to hold the guilty accountable. The Democratic presidential candidates and the vast majority of the media are similarly hypocritical and craven. Hitler and Stalin, admittedly far more brutal than Bush, could not have gotten their way without the support of their subordinates and acquiescence of most of the population, and it is the same in the US today.

I don't know why the NYT is picking on BushCo. The real criminals are those that voted BushCo into power a second time.

WTF: cheney*/bush* was not voted into power a second time--at least not legitimately so. In (S)Election 2000 Florida was an electoral sewer. In (S)Election 2004 Ohio added to the stench. But you are somewhat correct, the American public allowed the electoral deception and corruption not only once, but twice. And again, where was the New York Times for both? It didn't take an idiot to see the danger of allowing cheney*/bush* anywhere near the seat of power. It also didn't take an idiot to see something was very wrong in both Florida and Ohio. Try as it may, the NYT will never be able to wash the stench of collaboration off of their hands.

What a fantastic article.....until I came to the last paragraph: "We can only hope that this time, unlike 2004, American voters will have the wisdom to grant the awesome powers of the presidency to someone who has the integrity.....".

WHAT????? The writer's IQ must be examined. But wait, it is NYT, the handmaiden of status quo.

Thanks to the two party duopoly and sellout to big money, it does not matter who "we elect" as the president. More precisely "we" do not elect anyone - the MSM, the establishment, the big money, they do (unless as the last pony trick it is the supreme court).

Of course it would be an entirely different story if "we" could elect Dennis Kucinich as the President. But as I already said "we" do not elect anyone.

I like the content of above column except that the carefully worded indictment of George W. Bush has cleverly omitted any culpability by the Republican party. I suggest that the entire piece be re-written with George Bush's name omitted, and where his name is used, insert "Republican Party." Yes, Bush is a low functioning puppet frat boy who has disgraced this country. But the Repulican Party, that "Greed club" populated with despicable despots, hiding their insecurity and inhumanity behind the fortunes they've acquired illegally, immorally, and unethically, is the real villian. Our country will only be fit for honest men when the last conservative has been strangled with the entrails of the last republican.

"We can only hope that this time, unlike 2004, American voters will have the wisdom to grant the awesome powers of the Presidency to someone who has the integrity, principle and decency to use them honorably. Then when we look in the mirror as a nation, we will see, once again, the reflection of the United States of America."

Now that's chutzpah.

We can only hope that this time, unlike 2004, American voters will not be denied year-old information on illegal NSA spying, withheld by the so-called "paper of record"- on the request of George Bush until AFTER the election where he squeaked by on voter suppression and VOLUNTARY NEWS SUPPRESSION BY THE NYT.

We can only hope that Americans will not entrust the awesome powers of the Fourth Estate to these traitorous collaborators in the coming year.

Fool us once, er twice, er three times - Oh never mind!

(Thank God Common Dreams doesn't have video posts.)
HA!

And Another Thing: We don't elect our Presidents.

It is no small embarrassment that in our great 'democracy' we are now shown up by countries like Iraq, Pakistan & Kenya. They all are having difficulties with conducting fair elections, as we are in the US. But they all actually elect their Presidents & Prime Ministers by DIRECT ELECTION, which we are still not trusted to do here in the land of freedom.

Note the utter lack of the term "Electoral College" in the media since about Dec. '04. We still have to put up with the shame of Electile Dysfunction. However this remnant of the 18th Century skews the '08 election, we will only hear about it and how it should be abolished for about 4-5 weeks AFTER the polls close next November. Then the issue will be put back in cold storage for another 47 months.

One simple question : Why is NYT still in business ? Compared to the citizens of many other countries , Americans are notoriously malleable and truant when voting with a ballot . Voting with a wallet is considered to be an un-America activity.

That's why NYC and the rest of MSM are not only still in businesas but hansomely so.

In reading this well-written Editorial that documents much of the felonies, war-crimes, and constitutional destruction by Bush & Cheney, Inc. (that the world has observed), I could not wait to get to the conclusion: impeachment is due & necessary to bring the ship back on course and not let precedent settle, prevail, and, become future policy.

Pssssssssss ..... the tire went flat... big-time.

If all that is listed in this Editorial does not constitute "high crimes and misdemeanors", please explain why in a future Editorial. Explain why these leaders will not be held accountable for their illegal, immoral, unethical, and, unconstitutional behavior that we all know has happened.

If big brother steals from the cookie jar and gets away, might not little brother who is watching do the same?

Henry M.
Boston, MA

What does the New York Times see when it looks in the mirror?

It can be argued, that we have President Bush and not President Kerry, because of the New York Times.

It can be argued, that Judith's lies about Iraq helped enable the Iraq war, because of the New York Times.

This would be a wonderful editorial, however the newspapers' history of duplicity, and it's recent hiring of Kristol, render this editorial as nothing more than a two-faced attempt at protecting it's own image.

Hiring a neo-con while decrying the neo-cons is a cute trick, a new approach of shticking it to the sheep, but Judith is gone and the people are no longer fools.

Ramsay