The Secretary for War -- c'mon, that's what it is -- has said "all options are on the table" regrding Iran, and has stated, in an almost-yawning aside, that Israel could attack in the spring.

It's a good time to ask:  Anyone else got their hackles up? Anyone loopy on deja vu? Anybody got the bends, come up too fast from the depths, nitrogen bubbling away in their blood?

Anyone here got that swooning, sickly sensation, salmonella on steroids, those pangs shooting straight through you, those icy fingers stabbing right inside you, those waves slamming around in your stomach, all of a sudden, made up of a cold, greasy stew, or whatever it was got poured out of that soup pot, what in hell was it -- soured pea soup?

Today, there's a huge game afoot in Indiana;  also, some football will be played.

The Really Big Game in town, or course, is to crush your opponents, to hurt them bad enough they may never be able to make their goals, to hurt them so badly they will never be able to settle any scores.  That game's about politics.

The real battle of giants and patriots is outside, in the parking lot at The Big Game -- the corporations lined up against the regular, everyday people who try to do what's right and best for themselves and their country.  It's a grudge match, all right -- the mightiest One Percent against all the rest.

The following is an open letter to the French Ambassador to the United States, His Excellency, Francois Delattre:

Dear Mr. Ambassador,

Our countries have a long history together.  And, we Americans are not particularly gracious in granting any nation any gratitude -- or even, any latitude.

(This recalcitrance could be the result of our being a still-adolescent nation, one with inflamed hormones and short attention spans, and a terribly self-centered upbringing.)

Now that we've been at war with the world for some time, it appears we've branched out, moved on to war with ourselves, cut our own throats for a while.

Seems to be all the rage, refusing to be on our own side.  How else to explain all the hurry-scurry to dismantle and strike down anything worker-and-union?  The panic at HQ when the "U" word is uttered -- well, it triggers arrhythmia, gets hearts all a-flutter.

It's getting harder all the time to counsel patience, to urge a happy-medium approach, to advise letting wisdom -- not more folly -- be the quiet adult in the room, not while our reality-thrashed inner child strains to be let loose, screaming wild, left shredding the whole house.

We can totter down this road again, but the trip's pretty worthless.  Scenery's not changed much, last 20 or 30 years.  Road's still strewn with broken bodies, littered with burnt dreams, stacked high with jagged-edged splinters and shards of busted hope, spirit shot from the skies.

The play may already be over.  In fact, it could have been over the moment you were born, before you had a thought in your head, before you learned how to read.  Everything we say, mere window dressing, just so much air we shove around.

This is more meditation on that nature-nurture, chicken-and-egg, which-caused-what business.

Low-intelligence children, it is said, are more likely to hold prejudiced attitudes as adults, according to one study at Brock University in Ontario.  There's more operating here -- and, a cycle, at that.