'Cause we soft spoken, doesn't mean that we've forgotten, your booty smell rotten

Way too much is going on the Middle East this week; Ariel Sharon close to death, the Israelis killed UN peacekeepers in what Kofi "Don't call me Boutros. Boutros." Annan called a "deliberate" attack, and, of course, the biggest news to the people of the USA: an American is wading into the mess.

So Condi's over there, using very un Bush-like measured language; smiling with the Lebanese, yukking it up with Kofi Annan, haggling prices with Ehud Ohlmert... The reality is: what threats can we make and the follow through with? None. Are we going to let the Israelis run wild into Lebanon? Probably not. And we're certainly not going to make them sit on their hands. And both sides know that.

It's not Condi's fault, either. We're in a bad place, and one that couldn't have been fixed by political angling or negotiations. We are in an untangleable alliance with Israel, just or unjust, in a fight that will never end in a handshake or document signing. Clinton had the arrogance to think that he could solve the Mideast crisis in less than one year on the job; it seems that Bush realizes that he, and all of his successors after him, will never be able to solve it. So best to keep up appearances, make his judgements privately, and focus on the real enemy: Gay foster parents.