ROPE-A-DOPE OR WIMPING OUT? Writing for National Review Online, John O'Sullivan reassures the increasingly pensive blogosphere -- singling out Glenn Reynolds and Andrew Sullivan by name -- that there is little reason to fear that Bush has gone wobbly on Iraq, if for no other reason that "he will not be reelected if Saddam Hussein is still ruling in Baghdad in 2004."

Andrew Sullivan, in particular, went into paroxysms of alarm last week, over Bush's remark to the German press that " there is no plan to invade" on his desk. But how could Sullivan have failed to notice how that disclaimer was parsed in so obviously a Clintonesqe manner? NRO's John O'Sullivan spells it out for him: "His remark that he has no plan on the table to invade Iraq is doubtless literally true — it is still being constructed in the Pentagon." Feeling calmer, Andrew?