SAFIRE SPARKLES: Speculating, as is his wont, about foreign spooks and domestic demons, William Safire often appears to have completely lost his marbles. But here, he gives voice to a coldly rational view of reality.

To those who insist that an American invasion of Iraq cannot be rationalized unless there is also a simultaneous, symmetrical stike in North Korea, consider this from today's New York Times op-ed:

America and its allies will not use our military to take out the Pyongyang gang for the simple reason that North Korea already has the conventional troop strength and artillery power to inflict horrendous casualties on the South (including 40,000 U.S. tripwire troops) as well as in Japan, which Pyongyang will soon be able to reach with nuclear missiles.

That strategic fact of life and death invites the question that coolly consistent sophists love to ask: If we are disinclined to attack the nuclear buildup in North Korea, why are we hot to attack a somewhat less imminent threat of mass destruction from Iraq?

Saddam Hussein is a recent, serial aggressor, while totalitarian North Korea has not launched an invasion in the past half-century. Moreover, the potentially high human cost of wiping out the Korean threat should be an unforgettable lesson to every nation: The world must not allow Iraq to gain the level of destructive power that appeasement and misplaced trust permitted North Korea to achieve.

Meanwhile, Happy Fun Pundit reports -- with a deadpan straight face -- that Ted Kennedy still doesn't get it. Teddy is now concerned with the very real threat to our entire way of life, should recent theories bear out that the fabric of our very universe will collapse in a scant 10 billion years or so. Kennedy (D-Coors) had this to say:

To anyone with a sense of perspective, this new and ominous threat to the entire universe vastly outweighs any partisan concerns about a unilateral invasion of Iraq. Let America be a leader in providing humanitarian aid to those in developing countries affected by the collapse of the universe. Let's take those people of the third world who might otherwise be living under conditions like those found in the trash compactor in 'Star Wars', and build them decent housing --- with really strong walls --- to live through universal collapse with dignity.

Indeed.