space in the first char

when using space (" ") in the first char, you get an error, no matter if using RTL or LTR language

This is the error:
 Traceback (most recent call last):
   File "/home/dor/.xchat2/RTLplo0x.py", line 63, in check_chars
     if word[0].endswith( ":" ): total_left = ( total_left - len( word[0] ) + 1 ) # total_left = itself without "nick:"
 IndexError: list index out of range