In response to a news story, Tony Snow, Bush's spokesman, denied that Tony Blair was being considered for a position of special representative for the Middle East quartet. So, based on Snow's record for obscuring issues, it must be true.
It would be the final epitaph for a quartet that has already proven to be a quadruple diplomatic paraplegic.
Blair has consistently done whatever Bush wanted him to do. When he took British forces into Iraq, it was with clear knowledge of the ineptitude of the White House but he nursed the fond illusion that his support would give him a hand on the steering wheel - and then he found that runaway trains do not have steering capacity, and no working brakes either.
Not only that, but a train jammed at full throttle with the safeties tied shut. It's a toss-up whether the train will run off the cliff it's headed for or blow up first. Either way, its run will end violently.
Blair has shown consistently that he has no influence with the White House on any important issue and will not even try to influence the Israelis. In the unlikely event that he has a blank cheque from the White House, he could do something useful. But it looks much more like the White House tossing him a diplomatic dime because there are vestigial memories of him doing them an occasional good service.
I think the White House figures 'once a poodle, always a poodle', and/or that they need a scapegoat for yet one more botched policy.
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