Rasmussen! The day’s tractations in Strasbourg have been interesting, and I’m sure one day in Peter MacKay’s memoirs (a few chapters after Chapter 5, “Quick! Rent a Dog!”) we’ll read all about them. Two things seem to have happened in the final hour, one public, one private: First, the Americans put word out that they were in “no great hurry” to name a NATO secretary general — which meant there was no way alternatives to Rasmussen could hope for some kind of last-minute, ill-advised, pressure-cooker switch away from the Danish heavy favourite to some dark horse. This was going to get settled the majority’s way, or it would wait — and get settled the majority’s way.