colours

The Great Union Flag—the Cross of St. George, the Cross of St. Andrew, and the Cross of St. Patrick—for England, Scotland, and (Northern) Ireland.

This particular flag is the Queen's Colour for the British Army Light Infantry—a banner that is especially fitting today, in memory of those murdered and maimed in London. For whether the guilty are alien to Britain, or seeking to undermine her from within, make no mistake: this was an act of war.

Let's just win this thing.

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More: Christopher Hitchens has the quote du jour.

Europe is steadily becoming a part of the civil war that is roiling the Islamic world, and it will require all our cultural ingenuity to ensure that the criminals who shattered London's peace at rush hour this morning are not the ones who dictate the pace and rhythm of events from now on.

"our cultural ingenuity": it greatly worries me that, at this difficult time, our leadership consists of the such duds as Blair. Or, in your case, Bush. And my point is not politically partisan: Kerry and Gore also struck me as duds. It would be idle to ask for a Churchill, but a Reagan, Thatcher, Ike, or Harry Truman would surely be comforting.