Americans have died in Afghanistan, Osama bin Laden is alive or dead – but we don’t know – and Americans can’t stimulate much interest or any huge ratings boost from governmental reform in Afghanistan.

For that matter, I’m not so sure we can create governmental reform in Afghanistan. But regardless, all these things lead to one big shiny conclusion – this war is hardly popular anymore.

Don’t get me wrong, it’s not unpopular. It’s no Vietnam. But it generates little more interest than invading Panama to grab Manuel Noriega, and now it’s been going on for months.

After a few more weeks, people won’t be able to tell the difference between the mountains where bin Laden is allegedly hiding (Tora Bora) and a disease caused by a lack of thiamin (beriberi). There are so many ways we could spite the Taliban. For example, we could finally pass an equal rights amendment, put an end to capital punishment or support religious tolerance. What better ways could we spite them than to show the error of their ways?

Alas, this is still the United States of America, so these things will never happen. Such lucid ideas get rejected like a bad liver transplant.

Our current situation isn’t likely to steam anyone’s turbans either. We’re going to impress the Taliban by taking away people’s civil liberties? Ha! The Taliban’s been doing that since we were funneling arms to Iran.

Furthermore, we aren’t really vilifying large groups of people like we did in such popular wars as World War II and the Cold War. We weren’t even capable of luring the ever-popular enemy, The Soviet Union, into this boring war sequel. Why not? It’s time to use propaganda to win this war.

Our first move along that line is an obvious one. Much like sauerkraut became liberty cabbage during World War II, we ought to eliminate the insidious influence of something created by Arab mathematicians: the number zero.

It’s clearly a villainous plot. Adding it does nothing, subtracting it does nothing, multiplying by it negates things, and dividing by it is impossible. If anything reeks of a nefarious scheme, it’s zero. Now we obviously can’t simply eliminate it, as it holds places quite well. The solution instead is to simply replace it, preferably with “The Symbol.” Thanks to Prince’s resolution to legal battles with Warner Brothers, he’s no longer using the symbol he went by for several years, so it’s available to the public domain. Now’s the time to make it our new zero, which will be called either “The Number” or “The Number of Liberty,” clearly raising the bile of the Taliban.

Our next propaganda will have to come courtesy of the method we used to wear down symbols such as O.J. Simpson, Robert Blake and Gary Condit – the villainous television poll. Nothing brings people out of the woodwork to defend themselves like a really scathing poll. After Osama gets word of a Fox News poll declaring his approval rating to be about zero percent, with a 1 percent margin of error for Bill Maher and John Walker Lindh, he’s sure to come out of his cave to explain his side of the story to Peter Jennings.

The third and most essential thing that needs to happen is a new name for the Northern Alliance.

It’s clear that name is hardly inspiring; it sounds like a company that would be advertising on late night TV – “Come on down to Northern Alliance Plumbing and Heating for a 30 percent discount on your new water cooler.”

If they simply took a lesson from comic books and changed their name to the “Legion of Justice” or the “Vengeance Squadron,” I’d be a lot more OK with their rule in Afghanistan. As is, at least the Taliban had a spooky, mysterious name to it.

With just these changes, I’m sure this war would boost our sagging economy and put spirit back in our troops. Oh, excuse me – our scions of freedom!

Tim Kearns is a senior in political science from Bellevue, Neb.