Libya

Obviously its excellent news. And I look forward to the day when the US, UK, France, Russia, China, Israel, and everyone else will similarly renounce weapons of mass destruction. It's also a victory for Blair's quiet diplomacy, rather than Bush's swaggering bullying (which is working so well on North Korea, isn't it?).

Of course, it also tears the carpet out from under those who felt the war on Iraq was necessary because sanctions and weapons inspections could never work. Whiskey Bar has an excellent post on this, and the Orwellian line-change that it requires. Which, from the look of it, is already being implemented by our friends on the Right. What was "appeasement" for Saddam is now being praised as a "fantastic foreign policy triumph" when applied to Ghadafi. But then, consistency has never really been the Right's strongpoint, has it?

Meanwhile, those who were dumb enough to fall for the human rights rhetoric over Iraq are about to see how much Bush and Blair really care about torture, terror, and police states. It's back to "business as usual"; Libya's human rights abuses will be ignored because they gave way on WMDs. You were fools, you were used, and now all that you care about will be discarded like wet kleenex, until it is convenient to use you again. OTOH, we already knew that from the US/UK's treatment of Uzbekistan, didn't we?