Abdication

His bicycle is probably all that's left after the defence cuts.

Once Leader of the Free World

An interesting point from Daniel Foster at the Corner on Mr David Cameron taking the lead in enforcing a no-fly zone over Libya, starting with this quote from the Times:

British forces could soon be directly involved in the battle against Colonel Gaddafi after David Cameron announced that the UK would help enforce a no-fly zone designed to prevent the Libyan leader using jet fighters against his own people. The Prime Minister became the first Western leader to publicly commit to the no-fly zone in a statement to Parliament which marked a potentially significant escalation in the crisis after the imposition of sanctions and an arms embargo by the UN Security Council.

The signifigace of this, Foster points out,  is that Mr Cameron is doing the leading while Mr Barack Hussein Obama sits on the sidelines and dithers.

A couple of interesting points about this.  First, it's good to see Mr Cameron finally standing on his hind legs and acting like a prime minister.  I suspect that the shade of Lord Palmerston appeared at the foot of his bed last night screaming and clanking his chains.  Of course, now that Mr Cameron has effectively emasculated Britain's forces, I hardly think sending a pair of hang gliders and a duck punt is going to do much good.

The second point is more dismaying.  Mr Obama holding back and letting Mr Cameron take the lead is a frightening echo of how Mr Clinton let Mr Blair carry the can in the Balkans.  In that dismal little episode, Mr Clinton thought he was being very clever by making it look like he was making NATO tend to its own back yard while letting Mr Blair take all the heat.  Unfortunately, it just made the United States look weak, indecisive, and an easy target.  Soon American embassy's were being bombed in Africa, the USS Cole was attacked, and the Twin Towers fell.

Stand by for the other shoe to drop.