[url]http://reason.com/ml/ml092001.html[/url]

A snip from the article:

As Operation Infinite Justice gets underway, the war drums are beating across the land and a
                      battle will surely come, although we know neither when nor what particular form it will take.
                      Only this much is certain: Though our government didn't bring on last week's terrorist attacks
                      and everyone in Washington would certainly give plenty for them not to have occurred, war is a
                      great friend of the state. In such troubled times, people look to the federal government for
                      action and assurance. To get predictions about what we might expect to happen this time
                      around, I checked in with economic historian Robert Higgs, whose book Crisis And Leviathan
                      (1987) insightfully chronicled how national crises in the 20th century consistently helped grow
                      the size and scope of our federal government. Higgs is a senior fellow in political economy at the
                      Independent Institute and editor of the institute's quarterly journal, The Independent Review.