November 10, 2002 -- Gerry Adams, the head of Sinn Fein/IRA, was around town last week - basically flipping the bird to America's war on terrorism.

Obscenely, he had a lot of help.

Thursday, he was the guest of honor at a $500-per-plate Sinn Fein fund-raiser at the Sheraton hotel in Manhattan.

And on Friday, he was feted at a reception hosted by New Jersey Gov. Jim McGreevey himself - at the governor's official residence, no less.

Adams' quest for American cash comes on the heels of a Sinn Fein/IRA statement strongly opposing an American-led war in Iraq - and calling on Ireland to refuse America permission to use its airspace and seaports.

No surprise there: Like birds of a feather, terrorists stick together, too.

* Three IRA men, two of them acknowledged Sinn Fein officials, are about to go on trial in Colombia for training FARC terrorists.

* IRA booby-traps were found in the West Bank scant months ago.

* Adams' current visit comes only days after the IRA cut its ties with the international arms-decommissioning body headed by Canadian Gen. John de Chastelain - pulling down one of the main pillars of the Northern Ireland peace process.

* If that weren't bad enough, a year ago the Sinn Fein/IRA newspaper An Phoblacht editorialized that the 9/11 attacks were America's fault.

* The paper has maintained a similarly anti-American stance ever since. More recently, in opposing a possible U.S. war against Iraq, it editorialized: "We already know that George W. Bush is out of his mind, and that he is inclined to make difficulties worse instead of solving them. It seems likely that the Bush authority wants to keep the whole world under control, with the biggest bombs he has."

The paper is entitled to its opinion, to be sure.

But many Irish-Americans - some naively, some just out of romantic foolishness - tend to block out such ugliness. They blind themselves to the simple fact that Sinn Fein/IRA undertakes its "struggle" in alliance with any number of international terrorists. Indeed, PLO and Basque ETA killers are regular attendees at Sinn Fein annual party conferences.

Let there be no misunderstanding on this point: This anti-American, pro-terrorist organization raises enough money here in the United States to make it the best-funded political party in the Irish republic. But it is money that will be paid for in blood somewhere in the world.

The fools and fanatics who regularly send cash to the IRA should be ashamed of themselves. In the end, it's their own business.

But for the governor of a state that lost so many of its sons and daughters on 9/11 to participate in the collection of blood money is beyond grotesque.

Perhaps more to the point, the United States of America has one wholly reliable ally on this troubled, turbulent and dangerous planet: Great Britain.

This is because America and Britain share ideals and goals that are rarely found elsewhere, even among the other western democracies. Neither nation always lives up to these animating principles, of course, and therein lie the roots of the Irish peoples' historic antipathy toward London.

Yet to the extent that the rest of the world embraced Anglo-American values, it would be a better place.

Gerry Adams not only refuses to accept those principles, it has been his life's work to make war on them.

He has earned the disapprobation of civilized people everywhere - and certainly not the hospitality of New York and New Jersey.

-- Anonymous, November 10, 2002