A couple friends were visiting on Christmas day, and asked me what I thought of the French riots, now that they were over and we had a little perspective. I replied that I wasn’t at all sure that they were over, just that they weren’t being reported much any more. Turns out I was right, if this report is correct.

It’s simply become part of the media background now, and is no longer news, any more than gang murders in the inner cities. In fact, if there weren’t such a need to continue to make Iraq look like an irremediable, unmitigated ongoing disaster for a hated Republican administration, the occasional terrorist bombings there wouldn’t (and shouldn’t) any longer be news either.