A Charles Kennedy interview in today’s Independent quotes him on his disappointing revision of his party’s stance on the war: “You have to give your moral support to the troops… I still believe diplomacy should have been given more time, but unfortunately that was defeated in Parliament and we have moved on,” he says. I can’t decide whether he’s just a woolly liberal or if it’s simply naive to think any major party could seriously take a more hardline position than that.

The article also mentions William Hague’s “joke” during the parliamentary debate on military action that if the Iraqi army collapsed with the same speed as the Liberal Democrats’ argument, “it will be a very short war”. Apparently Jack Straw called this “one of the greatest parliamentary put-downs of all time”. Nice to see our political representatives at ease and making humorous, intellectual capital of death and destruction.