TV3 is reporting that, at a press conference this morning, Zap said that he would not call an early general election (his term runs out in March 2008), and added that he wanted the PP to help "shoulder the burden." Mr. Zapatero, I think the PP already told you what you'd have to do if you wanted to convince them that you now believed in fighting ETA for real. You've only done one of those things so far, jailing De Juana Chaos. You have a few more policy and personnel changes to make. Rajoy is absolutely right on this issue. He doesn't trust you, and I don't either. You've made so many errors dealing with ETA already.

One thing. If I were Rajoy, my bit of collaboration would be not calling for a new election, on the grounds that terrorism had already succeeded in changing Spain's ruling party once, and taking down the Socialists now would be giving terrorists another success. The responsible thing for the PP to do is just let Zap hang himself. Why give him a push when he'll fall without one?