The Vanguardia's take on the Iraq situation today is that the US has made it public that it is willing to go it alone and attack Saddam Hussein. Colin Powell, the designated dove in the Administration, the good cop as opposed to Rumsfeld's bad cop, said at the World Economic Forum in Davos that the Americans "will act although others are not ready to join us", that "if Iraq doesn't disarm, it will be disarmed", and that "It is a fact that Iraq has weapons of mass destruction".

Meanwhile, the Social Forum, the Rainbow Festival of the Perenially Indignant in Porto Alegre, Brazil, has kicked off, and though absolutely nothing useful or original will be said or done there, it is getting big coverage in Spain. Lula da Silva said that he wants us to give him some money. He also said "Peace is not a moral obligation, but a rational imperative, and a peaceful solution at the hands of the UN must be found." The Vanguardia's correspondent mentioned that Da Silva talked a lot about poverty and stuff but said nothing concrete in the way of plans to do anything. Lula's pal Hugo Chávez showed up and "was received with enthusiasm" and "harvested support". Chávez claimed that he will introduce the "Tobin tax" "against monetary speculation" in Venezuela, which I calculate ought to deepen Venezuela's crisis regarding currency reserves. He didn't bother mentioning how, when, or with what he is going to do this.

Maybe we could call Castro, Chávez, and Lula the "Axis of Evel Knievel", since they're all like motorcycle stunt riders, either accelerating at full speed towards the jump off the cliff over the Snake River into oblivion (Lula), already well out over the canyon and heading into a steep nosedive (Chávez, who has also lost control of the steering mechanism on his bike), or having crashed straight into the canyon floor when his (red) parachute failed (Castro).