Kevin and Paul, I appreciate your comments -- particularly that you've each been respectful to the other. After reading Paul's response, I've spent considerable time thinking about how best to enter the conversation myself.

First, I should apologize to Paul (and to my other interview victim , Garry) because I wasn't in top form for these interviews, and it shows. One of the places it's most obvious is in the exchange that gave you pause, Kevin. I failed to properly define anarchy, for starters, and to follow up that it seems to me that the reasons so many individuals today are soft and disarmed, as Paul put it, is precisely because of the state's actions. I remain firmly convinced that if there were no state -- and limited interference from outside states (which is the situation in Iraq, and it's compounding, not reducing, the problems there), individuals would quickly see that if the relatively few jackals are to be kept in check, they're the ones who'll need to do so. And most of them will choose to do so. As I've repeatedly said, I'm no student of history, but the little I have studied tells me that giving some people power over others has always led to problems. Hence, my interest in exploring options that don't follow that plan. And that's why I'm an anarchist: it's a solution to the problem that hasn't been fully tested in modern times. I'm willing to be part of that test. But, after considering something something Garry said in his interview, I realized it isn't the form that matters to me so much as the result. If there's some way to get the state out of people's lives that humans haven't yet considered, I'd be willing to give that a shot too.

Paul, your closing comment regarding your despair moved me deeply; I should have picked up on that in our conversation, and I didn't. If I had, I would have proceeded differently. I, too, battle similar demons from time to time; so far I've always found something that keeps me from sinking permanently. And, actually, it's always been several things that I've found, restoring my hope for today as well as tomorrow. To point to one example, the outpouring of support for Walter Bark, which I mentioned in December's column, Peripatetic. I think that next month's interview victim will have some things to contribute, as well. That shouldn't be taken to suggest that I'm trying to change your mind, Paul ... simply that I care about you and it saddens me to think that you've allowed man's institutionalized brutality to man to become what you seem to see as humanity's natural form of interaction.