How does this square with the fatwa against nuclear weapons reportedly issued by Iran's Ayatollah Ali Khamenei last year (which predictably failed to accrue any media attention in the West)? From the neo-conservative Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI), Feb. 17:

The overwhelming majority of those protesting the notorious Danish cartoons have, of course, never seen them. The same goes for the overwhelming majority of those defending them. Whatever one thinks of them, there is a strong case that newspapers by this point have a responsibility to print them just to let their readers see what is at the center of a global protest wave. But, with depressing predictability, in the US and much of Europe this falls to the ideological conservative press, which then get to smirk and gloat about how the rest of the world is too intimidated by the Muslim menace. A sneering case in point is Human Events, "the National Conservative Weekly," which has all twelve cartoons on its website.

This is—potentially—a breakthrough. Can there be a negotiated settlement to the long-standing problem of Tibet? Or, as some have suggested, will there be new CIA "destabilization operations in Tibet, if there is fresh unrest there following the death of the Dalai Lama, when the Chinese are expected to designate a Dalai Lama of their choice"? From Reuters, Feb. 15:

BEIJING - Envoys of Tibet's spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama, arrived in China on Wednesday for secretive talks on allowing more autonomy for the Buddhist region, Tibet's government-in-exile said.

"Death to Denmark!" Does it get any more surreal than this? From the foreign press on the escalating anti-cartoon protests:

Police clobbered stone-throwing protesters with batons and fired tear gas in the Pakistanian city of Peshawar on Wednesday - Pakistan's third consecutive day of violent protests over the Prophet Muhammad cartoons, witnesses said.

From the London Times, Feb. 12:

The CIA’s top counter-terrorism official was fired last week because he opposed detaining Al-Qaeda suspects in secret prisons abroad, sending them to other countries for interrogation and using forms of torture such as “water boarding

At least it makes the front page of the New York Times. From the Feb. 13 edition:

Years After 2 Afghans Died, Abuse Case Falters

By TIM GOLDEN

FORT BLISS, Tex. In the chronicle of abuses that has emerged from America's fight against terror, there may be no story more jarring than that of the two young men killed at a United States military detention center in Afghanistan in December 2002.

Gee, we sure wish this was getting more headlines! The first paragraph is annoyingly sarcastic (the global protests he refers to, of course, have unfortunately not occurred). But the last paragraph is spot on! Why do so few on the supposed left "get it"? From Nick Cohen in The Observer of Feb. 12:

From AP, Feb. 3:

Guatemala's long-running problem with vigilantes took an unusual turn this week when police arrested seven armed Christian fundamentalists accused of extortion as they distributed religious leaflets and collected money on a local highway.