I just finished a hard autumn's march through Winston Churchill's six-volume World War II history. Despite a certain element of self-congratulation in his style, Churchill was a pretty fair writer. His opinions and editorial priorities, well, they were a bit more of a mixed bag.

For example, the following thirty words are all he spent on the firebombing of Dresden in 1945:

"Throughout January and February our bombers continued to attack, and we made a heavy raid in the latter month on Dresden, then a centre of communications of Germany's Eastern Front."

No mention of the tens of thousands of civilian casualties or the fact that the "raid" didn't actually focus on attacking German communications facilities but on the destruction of the city and the mass killing of non-combatants as a form of psychological warfare, the very sort of crime Churchill repeatedly accused the Germans of committing.

Churchill also spoke frequently and most eloquently about the role of the free press, often calling it the cornerstone of democracy or something similar. He generally followed up such high-minded exhortations with the text of a telegram sent to Roosevelt suggesting ways to use the press for propaganda purposes.

While I'm sure the Right Honorable Winston Spencer Churchill would protest my interpretation, it seems to me that at times his test of a free press was whether or not it agreed with his opinions.

On matters of the press and free dissent, the Right Dishonorable John Ashcroft seems to agree with his fellow conservative from across the pond. Last Thursday, he testified before a Senate committee and told them that the people who were protesting the possible violation of civil rights in various Bush Administration proposals (on military tribunals and other such "anti-terrorism" measures) were giving aid and comfort to "the enemy" and were no better than terrorists themselves.

I've been called lots of things in my time, but until Thursday I'd never been called a terrorist. I wish he'd call me that to my face. I'd stomp the little twerp into the dirt.

In the interest of full disclosure, I'd like to point out that I've got some family history with our current Attorney General. Ashcroft, while governor of Missouri, once screamed at my wife because she asked him a question he didn't want to answer. After the harangue, he refused to answer the question on the grounds that governors don't have to answer questions if they don't want to do so. He took much the same attitude in his testimony on Thursday. Some things never change.

I've always had this theory that his issue with my wife stemmed more from the fact that she is a woman and that she's significantly taller than him than the actual question she asked. When I called him a little twerp, I meant that literally.

But these are cheap insults. I can do better than pick on Ashcroft's jingoistic, misogynistic, demagogic height-challenged attitudes. I mean, nobody's perfect.

Thing is, the guy is a hypocrite. And not your usual "sometimes you gotta do some stuff you don't like because you're not the president and all" Beltway hypocrite. I mean the "if I do this right I'll look really good and maybe the Senate will forget about Ronnie White and confirm me to the Supreme Court" kinda hypocrite.

Those who are able to recall Ashcroft's single term in the Senate know that our current Attorney General was in big tobacco's bag even deeper than Jesse Helms. He spoke most elaborately on the need to protect Americans from the evils of clean lungs that regulation of the tobacco industry would bring. This had nothing to do with the burgeoning Show-Me State brightleaf farms, which don't take up much more land than a couple football fields. No, Ashcroft (who does not smoke, drink or dance) was well-known for his libertarian tendencies. Indeed, when Norman Lear and Phyllis Schlafly united their organizations against the Bush Administration's attacks on civil liberties (never thought you'd see the day, did you?), the most common comment was that Ashcroft would have been on the forefront of the Senate criticism of these proposals. Now he's cashed in his principles in the hopes of appropriating shiny "hero" clothes.

What a little twerp. Winston Churchill would've eaten him for breakfast and asked for seconds. Preferably of that fine Rumsfeld ham. Then he would've walked over to Fleet Street and arranged for favorable "news" coverage of the event. He might have been a tad on the reactionary side, but at least he had some style. Ashcroft and the rest of Bush's cronies prance around our nation's capital surrounded by the odor of long-decaying bad ideas gone rancid.

If the guy wants to call me a terrorist, fine. But if he comes to my door with a passel of INS agents screaming about "La Migra" and asking me where my green card is (so as to get me in one of those military tribunals China is so famous for holding), he'd better back off. Because I'm a certified marksman with the one weapon he seems to fear most.

The pen.

Jon Worley says "Welcome to the Terrordome."