October 18, 2002 --

BARBRA Streisand and Woody Harrelson should take a deep breath and count to 10 before they spout off again. Both are making fools of themselves as they campaign against American foreign policy and attack President Bush.

Streisand has blundered in her recent manifestos by misspelling words, even the name of fellow Democrat Rep. Dick Gephardt, and misattributing a hackneyed anti-war quote she found on the Internet to William Shakespeare.

In the latest "truth alert" posted on Streisand's Web site - a response to her being dubbed "Baghdad Babs" - the star complains that enemies are "completely misrepresenting Ms. Streisand's deep opposition to the Iranian dictator, Saddam Hussein." The italics are ours. Hussein, of course, is the Iraqi dictator.

As strident and shrill as Streisand is, she is a centrist compared to wacky Woody Harrelson, who wrote an op-ed piece against military action in Iraq in yesterday's Guardian in London, where he's appearing in a stage play.

"This is a racist and imperial war," Harrelson rants. "The warmongers who stole the White House [you can call them 'hawks,' but I would never disparage such a fine bird] have hijacked a nation's grief and turned it into a perpetual war on any non-white country they choose to describe as terrorist."

In making his argument, Harrelson makes the dubious claims that the CIA helped Saddam Hussein to power, and that "George Bush Sr. continued to supply nerve gas and technology to Saddam even after he used it on Iran and then on the Kurds in Iraq."

The former "Cheers" star also parrots the leftie libel that economic sanctions against Iraq have caused the death of 500,000 children.

Harrelson doesn't just criticize. He has big plans. Besides legalizing drugs and cutting the defense budget in half, "I'd shut down the nuclear power plants . . . and make paper and fuel from wheat straw, rice straw and hemp."

The actor also recalls meeting President Clinton at the White House when "Welcome to Saravejo," in which Harrelson starred, was screened.

"Saddam throwing out the weapons inspectors was all over the news and I asked what [Clinton] was going to do," Harrelson wrote. "He said, 'Everybody is telling me to bomb him. All the military are saying, you gotta bomb him. But if even one innocent person died, I couldn't bear it.' Little did I know he was blocking humanitarian aid . . . allowing the deaths of thousands of innocent people."

Clinton's spokesman, Jim Kennedy, told PAGE SIX: "He's wrong about the quote, and he's wrong about the aid."

-- Anonymous, October 18, 2002