Some things don’t seem to change. Five years after I wrote this column in the form of a news dispatch, it seems more relevant than ever:

WASHINGTON -- There were unconfirmed reports yesterday that the United States is not the center of the world.

The White House had no immediate comment on the reports, which set off a firestorm of controversy in the nation’s capital. Speaking on background, a high-ranking official at the State Department discounted the possibility that the reports would turn out to be true. “If that were the case,” he said, “don’t you think we would have known about it a long time ago?”

On Capitol Hill, leaders of both parties were quick to rebut the assertion. “That certain news organizations would run with such a poorly sourced and obviously slanted story tells us that the liberal media are still up to their old tricks, despite the current crisis,” a GOP lawmaker fumed. A prominent Democrat, also speaking on condition of anonymity, said that classified briefings to congressional intelligence panels had disproved such claims long ago.

To whom it may concern,

BANGKOK, Thailand -- After staging a bloodless, right-wing coup to expand their political and economic control, Thailand's U.S.-trained military has been unable to crush Muslim guerrillas in the south, resulting in hundreds of Buddhists fleeing in fear.

In one of the world's worst Islamist insurgencies outside of Iraq, Thailand's southern separatists are using the strategy of Afghanistan's Taliban who torch government schools, and the horrific tactic of Baghdad's beheadings -- resulting in dozens of burnt schools and more than 25 decapitated victims since 2004.

Enjoying small but spectacular victories on almost a daily basis, southern Islamist guerrillas have kept their leaders, and organizations, anonymous to avoid arrest.

"This land must be separated between Muslims and the non-believers. This land must be liberated, and an Islamic system must be its foundation," warned a leaflet distributed in the south, which the military showed reporters.

"This is a land of war that is no different from Palestine and Afghanistan," it said, tightening a demand for a separate homeland.

When Colin Powell endorsed the Iraq Study Group report during his Dec. 17 appearance on “Face the Nation,” it was another curtain call for a tragic farce.

Four years ago, “moderates” like Powell were making the invasion of Iraq possible. Now, in the guise of speaking truth to power, Powell and ISG co-chairs James Baker and Lee Hamilton are refueling the U.S. war effort by depicting it as a problem of strategy and management.

But the U.S. war effort is a problem of lies and slaughter.

The Baker-Hamilton report stakes out a position for managerial changes that dodge the fundamental immorality of the war effort. And President Bush shows every sign of rejecting the report’s call for scaling down that effort.

Meanwhile, most people in the United States favor military disengagement. According to a new Wall Street Journal / NBC News poll, “Seven in 10 say they want the new Congress to pressure the White House to begin bringing troops home within six months.”

The nationwide survey came after the Baker-Hamilton report arrived with great -- and delusional -- expectations. In big bold red

What illegitimate secrets lie hidden behind the word "classified"?

"The government is stalling us," Marguerite Hiken of the Military Law Task Force told me. "They're going to be embarrassed and they're scared to death of war crimes charges."

Could it be that some high-level secrets are that tawdry? Could it be that war is waged - not fought, but set into motion - by, well . . . cowards, who feel themselves entitled to protection from the consequences of their decisions? If so, I'm in favor of an anti-smoking-style campaign that deglamorizes militarism by showing the wizards behind the curtain in full CYA scramble.