Jacques Chirac has addressed the French people, saying that France is against the war on Saddam. He also invited France's self to take part in the postwar phase of reconstruction. Dream on, Jacques.

José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero has just announced, in the name of the Spanish Socialist Party, that "today is a black page in the history of the world." Not quite as good as "a day that will live in infamy", but with the same meaning. Zap's comparing this with Pearl Harbor. He continued, "Every bomb is an attack on the principles of democracy." Huh? Exactly how? I thought this was a bunch of democracies dropping bombs on a tyrant and his henchmen. Seems to me that if one is pro-democracy, then one supports the democratic countries, doesn't one, especially if they come into conflict with a dictatorship? He added that Aznar was responsible for the war; Mr. Aznar has played a prominent role, certainly, but calling him responsible for the whole thing is a bit of an overstatement. Zap also demanded an emergency parliamentary debate, which doesn't make sense while 1) we don't know what's going on yet 2) they've been debating all week anyway 3) no vote taken will come to anything because Aznar has an absolute majority in Parliament and all his backbenchers are behind him, 100% of them. In the last secret ballot in Parliament there were no defections. Finally, Zap called upon Aznar to deny the Americans use of Spanish airspace and of American bases inside Spain. This would, of course, be a unilateral (which I thought we were all against) violation of both the NATO treaty and the Spanish-American bilateral agreement (I thought we made a big deal out of observing treaties and keeping agreements) and would break completely with the United States. That would not be very smart. Zap, however, is a clear case of the wheel's turning but the hamster's dead. This guy is dumber than anyone in American politics, even Jesse Ventura or John Warner or Carol Moseley-Braun. Maybe not dumber than that "Beam me up, Scotty" congressman from Ohio, whatever his name was, who got sent to jail. But pretty near as dumb. He can't even read a speech convincingly, much less take questions about it. The Communist leader, Gaspar Llamazares, is a mental giant in comparison.