Thomas Friedman gives his take on the UN resolution, with which I mostly agree. The news that the Iraqi Parliament has rejected the UN resolution is, I think, pretty much meaningless. I must say I would not like to be a member of this body – it’s presumably necessary to go through some pretence of debate, and the slightest wrong word could have you delivered to your family in small pieces.
I think it’s virtually certain that Saddam will accept the resolution, but probably with some attempt at a face-saving concession. The US will certainly reject this, and it’s possible that the whole process could go straight to war after 7 days. I think this is unlikely and that the real issue is the declaration required after 30 days.

Meanwhile, I have no idea what to make of this. First, Al-Jazeera produces what is supposed to be a handwritten message from bin Laden, and now an audiotape, assessed by US authorities as ‘probably genuine’. If someone can smuggle a tape recorder into and out of whatever hole bin Laden is hiding in, why not a videocamera ? That would prove he’s alive, which seems to be the object of the exercise. I prefer the hypothesis that someone is producing spurious evidence of bin Laden’s survival and that the US is playing along, either because they’re the ones producing it, or for some other obscure motive. Of course, even if the evidence is spurious, bin Laden could still be alive.