And this is only the beginning....

BAGHDAD, Iraq -- Explosions shook Iraq's oil ministry this morning, witnesses said, and thick black smoke poured from the heavily guarded compound.

Fire trucks moved about the ministry and U.S. soldiers kept journalists away.

Imad Ahmed, a retired civil servant who lives near the ministry, said he heard five explosions at about 7:30 a.m. There were no reports of casualties in that attack.

The attack occurred minutes after at least three rockets were fired into the Palestine and Sheraton hotels in Baghdad. First indications were that there were no casualties among the large number of Americans and other Westerners who live in the Palestine Hotel, but a CNN report said at least two wounded people had been carried from the Sheraton after the attack.

The hotel attack was potentially the most serious strike on a major target involving foreigners in Baghdad since the Oct. 26 suicide bombing of the International Committee of the Red Cross.

On Thursday, a bomber in Kirkuk blew up a pickup packed with explosives alongside the office of a U.S.-allied political party, killing himself and five other people in the latest extension of resistance attacks into northern and southern Iraq.

The blast culminated a bloody 24-hour spate of bombings, assassinations and shootings across Iraq. Assailants blew up a sport-utility vehicle outside the home of a tribal leader in Ramadi, wounding him and killing at least two other people. In Karbala, three schoolboys were killed in a bomb blast. In Basra, a pro-American political leader was abducted and assassinated, his party said in a statement.[emphasis mine]

And let's not forget the 27 people killed yesterday (including the British consul general) and 450 wounded in Istanbul.

And the twin bombings last Saturday at the Istanbul synagogues that killed at least 20 and wounded 300.

How do President Bush and Prime Minister Blair respond?

LONDON, Nov. 20 —A grim President Bush and Prime Minister Tony Blair pledged defiantly Thursday to continue the fight to combat terror and stabilize Iraq, only hours after two coordinated truck-bomb attacks on British targets in Istanbul. (More here.)

I wish we could force the two of them to duke it out in the streets of Baghdad, mano-a-mano, with Saddam Hussein and Osama bin Laden.

All four deserve to be imprisoned for the devastation they have wrought throughout the world.

In the predictable aftermath of this absurd "war on terror" in Afghanistan and Iraq, everyday citizens like you and me have absolutely no protection against deplorable acts of vengeance like the ones detailed above.

These bombings were utterly predictable outcomes of the U.S. and British actions. While the exact locations and timings remain unknown until it's too late, their inevitability is as predictable as flipping a switch and turning on a light. Maybe more so.

It's time for the U.S. to treat the peoples of the world--all of them--as fellow human beings. Afford them respect, human rights and share the wealth. If instead, we continue to bully those weaker and poorer than us, terrorism is the logical and predictable outcome.

Judging from the hubris of Bush and Blair's past actions and current response, better get used to it.

It makes me so mad.

Latest bombing story here.