Like Greenspan, but marginally less destructive

I’ve held off on the Jericho jail storming because I was hoping for more clarity from the US and Britain over what the alleged security concerns were that they’re claiming led them to withdraw their monitors. You do have to wonder what American policy towards Palestine is now, or if there is one. I had thought the US was trying to get Abbas to seize unconstitutional powers and run a parallel administration, but this move, before Hamas has even formed a government, just undermines Abbas’s standing, so I’m thinking the current idea is to support Israel in wrecking the PA, declaring it a failed state (which was always likely when the pop quiz was written by Likud), and with a great pretense of regret, supporting Israel intervening in whatever ways Israel feels like intervening.

In Israel, they consider the raid to be a wag-the-dog election stunt by Olmert.

In the rev-up to the Iraq invasion, we were flooded with dodgy dossiers and UN Power Point presentations chock full of made-up evidence about Iraqi weaponry and perfidy (yes, I just used “chock full” and “perfidy” in a single sentence; live with it). The Bushies have learned their lesson and no longer cite anything resembling evidence when making accusations, as we’ve noted with accusations that Iran is sneaking IEDs and Revolutionary Guards into Iraq. Condi on Wednesday (well, it was in Australia; with the time difference it could have been tomorrow or last week or next August or the Mesozoic) called Iran the “central banker of terrorism”. They give out free toasters for every account your cell opens. Evil toasters!