IT’S ROPE-A-DOPE AT THE UN:

The administration’s refusal to supply its opponents with the answers they demanded on their schedule emboldened them. There were anti-war rallies. Democrats in the Senate began finding fault with the president. Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle basically said he feared the administration was making up reasons to go to war.

The administration remained patient, waiting until it was ready to speak. And by doing so, the president and his team also showed once more that they possess an astonishingly high level of strategic and tactical intelligence in dealing with the messy realities of world politics.

Powell’s masterful and inarguable presentation yesterday means the administration has once again outflanked its adversaries and out-argued its opponents – just as it did in September, when Bush went to the United Nations and began the process that led to the unanimous passage of U.N. Resolution 1441.

Via Betsy’s Page.