Well, now ... isn't THIS an interesting development?

British ally largely indifferent to U.S. Plight

No tributes, memorials

If British Prime Minister Tony Blair had not been vacationing in the Caribbean yesterday, it seems a safe bet he would have announced to the world that Britain feels deep sympathy for its freshly wounded ally, the United States.

He might have been wrong.

In fact, to judge by the reaction of some Londoners yesterday to Katrina's rising death toll, Britons seem to feel the United States is overdrawn on sympathy.

In an online discussion group set up by The Guardian newspaper, for example, one man sneered that George W. Bush will "blame global warming, or 'ecological terrorism' for this extreme weather event." Another said the disaster will be all the worse because the National Guard, which so often helps in relief operations, "is in Iraq to provide for the comfort of U.S. occupation forces."

And there was much snickering over which wing nut televangelist will attribute the devastation of New Orleans to Genesis 6:13, in which God, about to flood the sinful Earth, tells Noah: "The end of all flesh is come before me ... behold, I will destroy them with the Earth."

Time to start slagging the Brits now, I guess, eh, Pete? Ready ... set ...

AFTERSNARK: You do, of course, appreciate the delicious hypocrisy of various right-wingers, having spent years slagging gays, immigrants, atheists and others and caring not in the least about tens of thousands of dead Iraqi civilians, now seizing the moral high ground and accusing others of an alleged lack of compassion.

It would be funny if it weren't ... nah, it's just plain not funny.