Look at this: "The March 31 public mutilation of four former American soldiers, who were working as civilian contractors in Iraq, emphasizes that there is no end in sight to the raging guerrilla conflict in this Middle Eastern country." "Still no light at the end of the tunnel in Iraq," PINR

It is astonishing how durable the euphemism "contractors" has been for describing the four mercenaries killed and dismembered in Fallujah, Iraq last month.

It has been pointed out several times in major newspapers that this quartet of well-paid assassins were in fact mid-priced muscle for private wannabe war-maker firms. Yet even liberalish sites like PINR cling tenaciously to the euphemism.

But "contractors" sounds so much less, well, mercenary. espacially to the Bush adminstraBetter to leave the gullible back in the good old US of A laboring under the illusion that these gunsels were in Iraq to install hardwood flooring, or pour concrete for swimming pools, put up indirect lighting in new high rise office buildings. They're there to kill bepople who get in the way, or frighten rich traveling salesmen.

This compulsion to misrepresent, disguise, hide -- no matter how transparent the truth may be -- is bald testament to how incapable of telling the truth the Bush administration is, and how willing the general media is to go along with the charade. -- Tom Nadeau