Just how evil IS Saddam Hussein? On a scale of one to ten -- is he as evil as, say, Freddie Kreuger? Oscar the Grouch? Cruella Da Ville? The Wicked Witch of the West???? Just how evil IS this guy?

Compared with the other tyrants and despots sponsored by the United States, is he as evil as Chaing Kai Shek and the Dragon Lady? Or our pet-turned-punk, Manuel Noriega? Or what was the name of that guy in Cuba -- before Castro -- who we loved so much? You know, the one who supplied child prostitutes to the Mafia?

Is Hussein as evil as that CIA-sponsored usurper, Pinochet, in Chile, his infamous torture chambers? Or our guys Ferdinand and Emelda Marcos in the Philipines? Or the evil Shah of Iran who we helped to overthrow a perfectly good democracy in Iran? Or the BonTon Macoux in Haiti that we supported because they could turn out cheap childrens' clothes for us?

Is Hussein as evil as that guy in South Korea that we bought and paid for to run shoe sweatshops? And what about Ariel Sharon, the Butcher of Shabra, Shetila and Jenin, who we keep supplied up to his eyeballs with weapons of mass destruction -- made in the USA?

Is Hussein as evil as our guy in Columbia who last year alone assasinated 160 labor leaders on the American dime, including the head of a teachers' union and the head of a nurses' union?

Is he as evil as the guys who ran the death squads in Central America for us, killing off priests and nuns? Or the aparthoid government in South Africa that we determinedly supported for decades? Not to mention the democratic government of the Congo that we overthrew?

Hussein IS evil. No doubt there. (To his credit, before the Gulf War he did sponssor better health care than we have here and Iraq had a really good educational system too. And more dentists! There were 13 dentists for the whole country when the British governed Iraq.) But is Hussein as evil as our guys? The Desert Storm guys who killed 1.5 million Iraqis during the Gulf War -- many of whom were civilians. Many of whom were children.