Dueling national security speeches aside - because that’s where they belong - a greater issue has been left unanswered. Even the Pelosi debacle that left Feinstein muttering mostly gibberish on MSNBC yesterday, and Specter calling for transcripts of CIA briefings is beside the point.

Since September 11, 2001 at about 11 a.m., I have been wondering about the answer to one question: what will the U.S. do about the attacks? The incarceration, legal or otherwise, of suspected terrorists, and the subsequent treatment of them remains scenery. Even the ethical question of torture is meaningless - Noam Chomsky already explored our deep, dark past in that, ironically enough in the Asia Times, presumably for lack of a U.S. based publication willing to publish it.

When I heard that Bin Laden was hiding out in caves in the wilderness of Afghanistan, I waited to see Bush deploy thousands of troops armed with flame throwers and grenades, like U.S. troops did on the islands off the coast of Japan in WWII. Instead I watched troops invade Iraq to finish what his father started, and saw the administration out Plame in retaliation for her husband saying there were no WMD’s in Iraq.

But that all is just scenery, and my original question remains. It is like being trapped in Oliver Stone’s “JFK” as Kevin Costner’s character, begging “Ask the damned question!” while wading through the Warren Report. We keep dredging up current filth, while ignoring the fact that we created the monster. Charlie Wilson was our unwitting Shelley, and Bin Laden our Frankenstein - and that question remains unasked and unanswered by our media. Perhaps it will appear in the Asia Times.

We get too caught up in the details and neglect to connect the dots between them. As a child I had been fascinated by puzzles, so this goes against the grain for me. While I love delving into the political process, I easily lose patience with politicians - particularly when they try their hands at playing with smoke and mirrors, like Obama, Cheney, Pelosi, Feinstein and Specter have in this situation. Although it is aimed at senators, I think that Morton Downey, Jr. had the right idea - “A good dog know who the master is. A good senator, if there was one, would know that too!”