Idle threat of the week

During a week when much of the Northern Hemisphere decamped for the sun of the beach or the shade of the mountains, the hard working diplomats of the world were burning the midnight oil over at Turtle Bay. This dedication paid off big time when UN Security Council Resolution 1701 emerged as The Idle Threat of the Week.

The resolution took the coveted crown by threatening to disarm or remove Hezbollah from Southern Lebanon. Due to some sneaky and precarious language it took a great deal of parsing before our judges were able make the award official by determining the resolution actually said anything at all.

1701 claims the defanging of Hezbollah will be the job of the Lebanese army, backed by 15,000 United Nation Peacekeepers likely led by the French. Our panel of judges were surprised to learn this is the same Lebanese army last seen literally running and hiding when their country was attacked, and the same French whose military history can be politely described as "bumbling."

Of course, if the resolution had called for the deployment of a 30,000 strong force tasked to perch in observation towers and only come down when village girls in need of a good ravaging are spotted, the threat would have been deemed quite valid.

And some other person or document would have won Idle Threat of the Week for August 8 -14.