Doug,

I believe we could detect a few differences between a highly tense international negotiating situation, as present, and the situation you describe.

Sometimes the use of intelligent statesmanship requires as much courage as tackling an armed psycho, it just takes a lot longer, as a rule.

The difference is whether the guy on the other end can be pinned down into dialogue or whether he is already in attack mode.

Hussein's scramble for nukes sounds like a fast move toward attack mode, if it is as described by recent claims. But he is also backpedaling. Bobert's proposal is based on the window of opportunity still present before he draws that weapon.

They are not the same situation. Blair is offering to report on Iraq's armamentum with current Intel reports. I'll be interested to see what he comes up with. The evidence presented to date is sketchy at best, although the unspecified order for specialized aluminum tubes used in processing radioactives is interesting and might be substantive.

Why can't these guys spill the dope on which they are basing their alarums?

Sigh....

A