http://in3www.epfl.ch/~schaffne/glibc-configure-apple-as.patch
http://sources.redhat.com/ml/crossgcc/2004-02/msg00151.html

The following makes it possible to configure glibc-2.3.2 on Mac OS X,
where the assembler but doesn't understand the --version flag.

Fixes the symptom
checking whether ld is GNU ld... no
checking for /usr/libexec/gcc/darwin/ppc/as... /usr/libexec/gcc/darwin/ppc/as
checking version of /usr/libexec/gcc/darwin/ppc/as...
<PAUSES HERE AND JUST SITS THERE DOING NOTHING>

NOTE:  This patch should apparently be pushed upstream so we don't need to
keep adding it here.

--- glibc-2.3.2/configure~	Wed Feb 26 09:20:48 2003
+++ glibc-2.3.2/configure	Fri Feb 27 13:12:53 2004
@@ -4524,7 +4524,7 @@
   # Found it, now check the version.
   { echo "$as_me:$LINENO: checking version of $AS" >&5
 echo $ECHO_N "checking version of $AS... $ECHO_C" >&6; }
-  ac_prog_version=`$AS --version 2>&1 | sed -n 's/^.*GNU assembler.* \([0-9]*\.[0-9.]*\).*$/\1/p'`
+  ac_prog_version=`$AS -v </dev/null 2>&1 | sed -n 's/^.*GNU assembler.* \([0-9]*\.[0-9.]*\).*$/\1/p'`
   case $ac_prog_version in
     '') ac_prog_version="v. ?.??, bad"; ac_verc_fail=yes;;
     2.1[3-9]*)