"Statesmanlike gravitas"

It is at times like these that the Portuguese president should step forward to promote stable government. Instead, Aníbal Cavaco Silva, a former PSD leader and prime minister who was elected president in 2006, has entered into open hostilities with Mr Sócrates. Dragged into an unedifying squabble over supposed attempts by presidential aides to plant newspaper stories about government spying on the presidency, Mr Cavaco Silva seems to have abandoned statesmanlike gravitas in favour of an artificial quarrel.