Demagogue

Condoleezza Rice is taking her first European tour as Secretary of State, and she's carrying Bush's message of freedom and democracy with her (you can tell this is the European press because of the funky British spelling).

"The Saudi regime's human rights behaviour and its behaviour toward its own population is [sic] something to be loathed," she said. "I don't think anybody thinks that the unelected sheikhs who run that regime are a good thing fo reither the Saudi people or for the region."

I don't know if the Europeans are ready to take a tough line, backed up with military force, on the Saudis, but at least Condi is letting them know we stand firm.

Oops. Actually, she didn't mention the Saudi despots. Here's what she really said about one of our partners in the War on Terror and proud member of the Coalition of the Willing.

"The Uzbek regime's human rights behaviour and its behaviour toward its own population is [sic] something to be loathed," she said. "I don't think anybody thinks that the unelected strongman who runs that regime is a good thing for either the Uzbek people or for the region."

Good for her. It's important for the world to see that we are consistent in our principles and do not simply use human rights and democracy as pretexts to attack governments we want to overthrow for other reasons.

Uh-oh. It seems the remarks were once again mistranscribed.

"The Pakistani regime's human rights behaviour and its behaviour toward its own population is [sic] something to be loathed," she said. "I don't think anybody thinks that the unelected general who runs that regime is a good thing for either the Pakistani people or for the region."

It's about time the administration turned its attention to the man Bush famously referred to as "General General" during the 2000 campaign.

Actually, no. You'll never guess who she was really talking about.

"The Iranian regime's human rights behaviour and its behaviour toward its own population is [sic] something to be loathed," she said. "I don't think anybody thinks that the unelected mullahs who run that regime are a good thing for either the Iranian people or for the region."

All right, then. As long as everyone understands that our actions are motivated by concern for Iranians' human rights, bombs away!