The realization came in drips in drabs until it finally broke like a dam. The government was issuing terror alert warnings that were phony. The vice-president was saying things that were demonstrably untrue. The press was calling the resistance in Iraq 'Al-Qaeda'. I had never seen, nor thought possible, that the government would lie so brazenly and that the press would go along with it and even catalyze (or catapult) the propaganda.

Suddenly the country was operating along completely fictional lines...our debates were not real debates...our enemies were not real enemies...our victories were not real victories...

There was one person that never fell asleep...never fell for the dream. Writing on September 12, 2001, Hunter S. Thompson knew already what it would take me and most of the nation 2 or more years to learn.

The towers are gone now, reduced to bloody rubble, along with all hopes for Peace in Our Time, in the United States or any other country. Make no mistake about it: We are At War now -- with somebody -- and we will stay At War with that mysterious Enemy for the rest of our lives.

It will be a Religious War, a sort of Christian Jihad, fueled by religious hatred and led by merciless fanatics on both sides. It will be guerilla warfare on a global scale, with no front lines and no identifiable enemy. Osama bin Laden may be a primitive "figurehead" -- or even dead, for all we know -- but whoever put those All-American jet planes loaded with All-American fuel into the Twin Towers and the Pentagon did it with chilling precision and accuracy. The second one was a dead-on bullseye. Straight into the middle of the skyscraper.

Nothing -- even George Bush's $350 billion "Star Wars" missile defense system -- could have prevented Tuesday's attack, and it cost next to nothing to pull off. Fewer than 20 unarmed Suicide soldiers from some apparently primitive country somewhere on the other side of the world took out the World Trade Center and half the Pentagon with three quick and costless strikes on one day. The efficiency of it was terrifying.

We are going to punish somebody for this attack, but just who or what will be blown to smithereens for it is hard to say. Maybe Afghanistan, maybe Pakistan or Iraq, or possibly all three at once. Who knows? Not even the Generals in what remains of the Pentagon or the New York papers calling for WAR seem to know who did it or where to look for them.

This is going to be a very expensive war, and Victory is not guaranteed -- for anyone, and certainly not for anyone as baffled as George W. Bush. All he knows is that his father started the war a long time ago, and that he, the goofy child-President, has been chosen by Fate and the global Oil industry to finish it Now. He will declare a National Security Emergency and clamp down Hard on Everybody, no matter where they live or why. If the guilty won't hold up their hands and confess, he and the Generals will ferret them out by force.

Good luck. He is in for a profoundly difficult job -- armed as he is with no credible Military Intelligence, no witnesses and only the ghost of Bin Laden to blame for the tragedy.

OK. It is 24 hours later now, and we are not getting much information about the Five Ws of this thing.

The numbers out of the Pentagon are baffling, as if Military Censorship has already been imposed on the media. It is ominous. The only news on TV comes from weeping victims and ignorant speculators.

The lid is on. Loose Lips Sink Ships. Don't say anything that might give aid to The Enemy.

If America has been living in a dream, no one personifies that dream more than Rudolf Guiliani. On 9/10 Giuliani's reign was sputtering to a messy and embarrassing close. The attacks actually canceled the mayoral election to choose his successor. Yet, the events of 9/11 (particularly the scared rabbit behavior of the commander-in-chief) catapulted the mayor of New York into a national hero. And, for the most part, the honor was well deserved. But proving himself under fire didn't change the basic facts about Rudy Giuliani. He was a thug and a crook and without much dispute...a scoundrel. Watching the nation find that out is part of the larger process of watching the nation awake from its collective dream.

We must conquer the fear.