National Buffoon's 'European Vacation'

Coming soon to a theater near you.

"This notion that the United States is getting ready to attack Iran is simply ridiculous," Bush said. "And having said that, all options are on the table."

The audio suggests that there was actually laughter from the press at this. It is kind of funny to try to rule something out and call it ridiculous, and in the next breath say you are considering everything. It could have been a joke, given the sort of humor W. often uses. But in watching the video, I'd say he was being serious. He had his "I'm a serious President" face on, not his "I'm class clown" face.

Bush-ologists in the Parsing Lab have issued this preliminary report: he doesn't want us to believe we are "getting ready," meaning we aren't actively redeploying troops from vital missions elsewhere, as we did when we took Special Forces from Tora Bora to "get ready" for Iraq. (Whether or not we actually are, but he just doesn't want us to know that, remains for future study.)

But are we talking about redeploying them? Are we typing up the orders so they can be ready at the drop of a hat? Well, "all options are on the table."

Wait, haven't I heard that phrase before? Like on April 6, 2002?

He told the world that he would show us that he would not develop weapons of mass destruction and yet, over the past decade, he has refused to do so. And the Prime Minister and I both agree that he needs to prove that he isn't developing weapons of mass destruction.

I explained to the Prime Minister that the policy of my government is the removal of Saddam and that all options are on the table.

Uh-oh.