Why won't this count?!

I must be missing something simple, can someone tell me why this script WILL NOT count upward? It's as though it simply ignores the $rem variable! The feed is from a page called login.php, and it passes the $auth variable and the $rem variable. For some reason, though, this ALWAYS outputs "Attempt 2 of 3." Li'l help?

Thanks,
-Adam

$password = "password1";
if (!isset($rem)) {
$rem = "2";
}
else {
$rem++;
}

if (!isset($auth))
{
echo "<font color=red>Attempt $rem of 3...</font>n";
echo "<form method=post action=authorize.php>n";
echo "Please enter a password <input type=password maxsize=100 name=auth>n";
echo "<p>";
echo "<input type=submit value="Enter">n";
echo "</form>";
echo "<p><p>";
}
elseif ($auth != $password) {
echo "<font color=red>Attempt $rem of 3...</font>n";
echo "<form method=post action=authorize.php>n";
echo "Please enter a password <input type=password maxsize=100 name=auth>n";
echo "<p>";
echo "<input type=submit value="Enter">n";
echo "</form>";
echo "<p><p>";
}
else {
//do this stuff...
}
?>

Well, the first thing I would do is check the register_globals value in your php.ini. If it is set to off, you are not going to see that $rem variable. In fact, are you seeing that $auth variable? What I would do is move over to using $HTTP_POST_VARS to address those two variables. It is much more secure any how. Right now as it stands, anyone can fake the $rem value in your script by simply changing its value in the URL.