Orange clashes with my red, white, and blue

The terrorist threat level gets upgraded to Orange. What does this mean for average citizens? Continue about your daily routine while feeling more paranoid, so you’ll feel better about declaring war on Iraq. Bah.

Why is war such a boolean thing? Is there nothing short of war that can take Saddam Hussein’s toys away from him, since he won’t play nice? Why can’t the UN just say: “Since you guys are apparently hiding things from our inspectors, we’re going to start ‘inspecting’ sites by targeting them with bombs. We’ll let you know which ones, so you can evacuate your people, but anything leaving the buildings other than people on foot will be destroyed.”?

I find the “regime change” rhetoric particularly hypocritical. Why should Iraq get special treatment? It’s not like Saddam Hussein has a monopoly on barbaric behavior toward his own people. (The answer seems to be “because Iraq has vast oil reserves, and other countries run by harsh dictators don’t.” Harrumph.)