The question that crops up repeatedly when we register our opposition to the Iraq war is: Would you rather then have Saddam Hussein still in power? It's a fair question that deserves a serious answer. Unlike in 1990, when Hussein did have a few admirers, last year he had none. This makes the failure of the American-British alliance to win any significant international support for the war all the more remarkable. It's not that we disliked the dictator less, but we disliked the war option even more.
Say I have a rat in my kitchen. I call in the exterminators. When they are finished, my crockery and glassware are shattered, my kitchen shelves and cupboards are broken, the food in my pantry is poisoned, and even my house is wrecked. If I complain about the cost being too high in relation to the removal of one rat, does that mean I like having a rat in the kitchen?
Hussein is gone, but let's look at the collateral wreckage: