Imagine this. …

It’s August 11, 2001, and a report surfaces that Attorney General John Ashcroft has just ordered the FBI to arrest four Arab nationals living here in America. They have committed no crime, unless you consider going to strip clubs a crime. Standing at the podium at the Justice Department, Mr. Ashcroft presents a story that sounds, even to hard-core supporters, pretty fantastic.

These Arabs, he tells us, are at flight schools here in the United States, using our liberal immigration laws to learn how to fly large commercial jetliners, which they plan to commandeer with box-cutters and crash into skyscrapers. They come not from refugee hellholes but are all college graduates from upper middle class homes – hardly the downtrodden lot, we are constantly told, that turns to terrorism because there’s nothing else available. Their ringleader, Mohammed Atta, is the son of an Egyptian lawyer. They are all here legally. And here’s the icing on the cake: The attorney general learned all of this from wiretaps. Can you just imagine the investigative articles that will soon follow on the front page of the New York Times? Can you hear the sarcasm in Maureen Dowd’s column on the following day directed not toward the Arabs but the attorney general … and, of course, the president?

I’ve been wondering about all this lately, as I watch the Times continue what appears to be a vendetta against the White House for its post-September 11 pursuit of terrorists. Over the weekend, President Bush countered in his own defense: “I think most Americans understand the need to find out what the enemy’s thinking and that’s what we’re doing.” I sure hope he’s right. I hope it’s most Americans. Perhaps I need to spend more time in the interior of the country to regain his optimism and less time reading the Times and talking to my neighbors.

It’s not, of course, just the Times and my neighbors who seem to lack a dose of common sense these days. I went to see the film, “Syriana,” last week. In the dark of the Cineplex, I learned, once again, that the true villain in the world is really the American government. It’s a renegade government that targets moderate Arab leaders for assassination in order to preserve the status quo for rich Texas oilmen. By the way, if you haven’t seen the film, you will also learn that Islamic terrorists are not educated Arabs from Saudi Arabia/Jordan/Egypt, but simply dirt poor Pakistanis who really want to do good … but are misguided because they have nowhere else to turn. That’s Hollywood’s geopolitical lesson for us all.

And as I walk out of the theater onto Broadway, I wonder where this started in my babyboom generation … this concept that all evil in the world emanates from Washington. Whether it comes from the editorial board of large newspapers or their better-looking counterparts in Los Angeles, we owe a lot to these folks. They have unselfishly taken on the mantle of watchdog for this out-of-control government that will go astray at every turn possible, unless monitored very, very closely. Kind of like those good souls at the ACLU who have kept the Constitution intact since 1920 (amazing it survived for the previous 144 years on its own).

Look, I can grasp my friends’ concerns about presidential powers and secret wiretaps. We all lived through the excesses of the Nixon administration. I heard David Gergen on television recently saying it’s an easy leap, once a president has these powers, to cross that legal line and start meddling in matters that are unrelated to the original reason those powers were instituted. Mr. Gergen was there in the Nixon White House and saw how that line was crossed.

But what does that government do when it is threatened by extraordinary evil … as it was on December 7, 1941 … or from Nazi Germany … or Stalinist Russia … or September 11, 2001? In the first three examples, its citizens and leaders were able to grasp the extent of the danger and do what was necessary to preserve our country. But with the latter event, from what I hear and read and see on the screen, I’m not so sure Americans still have this ability. Less than five years after the worst act of terrorism ever committed within our shores, a lot of the people tell me the real fear emanates not from Osama bin Laden but George W. Bush … or conservatives who want to “Christianize” America. The real terror is not Islamic fundamentalism but the Republican Party, neo-cons, Halliburton or our own government, take your pick.

You can actually make a cogent, even intellectual argument that it is in this country’s interest to protect civil liberties above all else. You can argue that we should never use torture to get information … ever. You can say its wrong to hold Al Qaeda fighters in Guantanamo or in Egypt without all the legalities afforded to every American citizen. You can even argue that the president should never be allowed to okay wiretaps without a court order that may take up to two days to acquire. You can argue all of this because it is our heritage or because it may bring us back to that high moral standing the Europeans say they miss about us. You can even argue that it may be the right thing to do.

But you should also be honest enough to realize that another attack on this country, using a newer, more fantastic method than the last time … one we haven’t even thought of … may kill more than 3,000 Americans next time. And without all the information we have at our disposal, we will be defenseless.

You choose. But you can’t have it both ways.

Mr. Kozak is a writer who lives in New York.