Bush folds bad poker hand
Cheney must be fit to be tied. The old war-horse has been itching to invade, or at the very least drop a ton of bombs on Tehran, but it would appear that the pragmatists have won the day and that a further war in the Middle East has been averted.
The new formulation put together by the US and Europe has allowed Ahmadinejad enough room to portray the proceedings as a massive success for the people of Iran.
He wasted no time in telling them.
"International monopolists have been defeated in the face of your resistance and solidarity and have been forced to acknowledge your dignity and greatness," he told an audience in the north-western city of Qazvin.
"The Iranian nation will never hold negotiations about its definite rights with anybody, but we will talk about mutual concerns and solving misunderstandings in the international arena."
The most interesting thing about the whole Iranian debacle has been to watch Bush play this game of poker with the very bad hand that his invasion of Iraq has given him.
In the end, Bush has simply folded. I would love to be generous and imagine that this represents a new political awakening for the Bush regime, that it has finally come to realise the futility of force as a negotiating tool, but I don't believe that to be true.
Bush has folded because he has no other options here. Any militaristic move he made would have further weakened his position, threatening to destabilise Iraq to the point where US and UK forces would be forced, perhaps, to leave.
So now we are going to witness Bush's attempts at diplomacy.
I don't imagine it's going to be very pretty. He'll start off with the same swagger and arrogance typified by that false Texan walk of his. He'll issue further threats and ultimatums.
But, in the end, a deal will be done.
If for no other reason than Bush has no other choice.
Faced with the alternatives, we should be thankful for small mercies.
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