starting right now, 4 p.m. EDT or EDST, whatever they call it now. He's on live on DC's channel 4, a commercial station. I'm sure he's on C-span too.

Seems like a nice guy.

WOW! He was great.....

Channel 4 broke away at 4:30, and since I'm much too cheap for cable, that was the end of that for me.

Good speaker, warm reception, standing ovations, etc. Still a politician, which means you can pick the logic apart. So what else is new?

I'm ticked that PBS didn't carry the show live, but it does kiddies programming on weekday afternoons.

Blair's a speaker who makes the most in his delivery with his sense of conviction. And unlike our current president, he actually engages in substantive discussions on the issues.

None of that makes the positions he takes any less lethal or right, or lessen his responsibility to come clean over what they knew and when they knew it, no matter how the yellowcake flops in the oven.

But he sure does put into relief the enormous difference the combined power of intellect and emotion can bring to politics. Lest anyone get the idea that he is only about principles, he was equally friendly with Clinton and Bush.

Perhaps what will ultimately make the difference in the outcome of what happens to him vs Bush re: Iraq is not the substantial differences in intellectual rigor and wit, but the differences between the British and American populace. Americans prefer to be more ignorant of detail and more taken by appearances and repetitive messages, and the British more interested in integrity and accountability.

It's almost like we've Traded Spaces and we're the ones trusting in the Benevolent King, while they are practicing a bracing, "untidy" democracy.

*Sigh* I wish we had a President who could deliver a speech like Tony Blair. Instead, we have "our intelligence is darn good!"

The reviews are in:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/artic...-2003Jul17.html

Hope he enjoyed the accolades. Now tha they've found that British scientist dead -- the guy whose tips supposedly "exposed" the lies and/or faulty intelligence behind Britain's entry into the war -- Mr Blair is gonna have a rough week ahead in his home country.

He's on his way to Japan now.