To continue in the Monty Python tradition, let's take a "looksie" at the three IRA members (that means terrorists) on trial in Colombia because they have been accused of training FARC guerillas.

If you saw Monty Python's The Holy Grail, an extremely bawdry piece of mirth making, the Black Knight does battle with King Arthur who proceeds to hack off each limb of the esteemed knight until he is reduced to a torso on the ground all the while protesting his humiliating and life-threatening defeat by exclaiming, "It's only a flesh wound."

Denial has its downside. Here is similar comedy from a court of law in Colombia, the same court and law, I might add, the FARC, ELN, and the IRA would like to see abolished, being that terrorists have nothing to offer but death and, in the event of triumph, tyranny over their subjects.

In the summer of 2001, we traveled to Colombia principally to see the peace process but also to enjoy a holiday," Monaghan told Judge Jairo Acosta. "The charge of training the FARC is a false charge, based on false evidence.

Enjoy a holiday? Don't mind that. It's only a flesh wound. Yet like school children whose dog ate their homework, they dodge the basic reality of their life of violence and death.

The defendants acknowledged Wednesday they traveled on false passports but said persecution for their political involvement in the Irish peace process made that necessary. All denied they were members of the IRA.

Only to be followed immediately in the next paragraph:

Monaghan said that while in the FARC's safe haven, they met with rebels and discussed the prospect of becoming involved in a political system "they see as hostile."

Persecution? Becoming involved in a political system? Not if you don't lay down your weapons and renounce violence entirely. But why quibble? It's pedantic in the extreme to assume the IRA and FARC have no legitimacy simply because members of the IRA, who falsely deny they are IRA, were busily training FARC in the jungles. The Colombian government rightfully dismisses their claim that they are not members of the IRA. After all, it is Colombians who pay for these liars with their blood.Even the lefty Guardian has the scoop on who these men are:

Three Irishmen, two of them convicted IRA members, the other a Sinn Fein activist, were arrested in Bogotá while trying to leave Colombia on 11 August.

Do they concur by sympathetically stating the guerillas perceive the Colombian political system as "hostile"? Maybe that has to do with the fact the political system doesn't care for terrorists or insurrectionists or call them what you will as long as you don't call them "freedom fighters." I know we can also quibble about what kind of democracy Colombia is and can certainly agree that every democratic nation needs improvement. But, these rogues want to destroy consensual government entirely.

Connolly, who lived in Cuba for several years where he served as the Latin American representative for Sinn Fein, the IRA's political wing, said he was invited to Colombia because he speaks Spanish.

He said his interest in Latin America dates back to the 1980s when he spent time working with ex-combatants in Nicaragua and El Salvador.

That doesn't mean they're guilty as charged in a court of law. It simply tells you where their sympathies are. Sandanistas, FARC, and the IRA. And to think there are those who still wonder how glamorous they all are.

Yawn. I tire of this extreme comedy. There's too much blood on it.