Attention, ladies: Democracy needs your panties

Now more than ever. Take ’em off, won’t you? It’s … for the monks.

Activists exasperated at the failure of diplomacy to apply pressure on Burma’s military regime are resorting to a new means of protest against the regime’s recent crackdown: sending female underwear to Burmese embassies.

Embassies in the UK, Thailand, Australia and Singapore have all been targeted by the “Panties for Peace” campaign, co-ordinated by an activist group based in Chiang Mai, Thailand.

The manoeuvre is a calculated insult to the junta and its leader, General Than Shwe. Superstitious junta members believe that any contact with female undergarments – clean or dirty – will sap them of their power, said Jackie Pollack, a member of the Lanna Action for Burma Committee…

So far, hundreds of pairs of pants have been posted, according to another campaigner, Liz Hilton. “One group sent 140 pairs to the Burmese embassy in Geneva,” she said.

Exit question: Will Sullivan and the rest of the anti-“torture” hysterics wring their hands over this the way they did at reports of Gitmo interrogators using femcooties in the form of fake menstrual blood to threaten Muslim detainees? The panty platoon is also targeting its enemies’ beliefs, after all, and the fact that that enemy practices terrorism obviously doesn’t mitigate the heart-achiness of the tactic.