:
Wed Aug 16 -

Lebanon:
CELEBRITY GROOMING -

Kathy Gannon of the AP uses a slender pretext to continue her hagiography of The Green Helmet, Salam Daher. It appears that she is "grooming" him for a debut in People Magazine or similar venue. This is a man we know almost nothing about. But she is transforming him into a saleable product which AP can pitch to some magazine or other publication. And there's nothing inherently wrong with that because: sunlight is often the best disinfectant. What's the pitch? I guess Daher can be promoted as a kind of Hometown Hero. And maybe he is, for all I know. I'm just a skeptical reader, that's all.

Do you ever watch NBC TV? In Richard Engel's last video report from that neighborhood he indicated that Hizbollah was nearby while he was talking to us on camera, but they didn't want to be photographed. They are present, but not within our field of view. Engel sometimes blogs on the MSNBC website where his reports may also appear.

In other news reports we have been told that an ant can't walk down the street there unless authorized by Hizbollah who, we are informed, appoints, picks or authorizes all the government officials and employees in the area.

And Salam Daher is some sort of government employee, as far as we know.

Can you add 2 and 2?

* * * * *
Meanwhile, Richard North seems to have an army of Swiss Gnomes working for him. He has developed an entire research project on the Qana issue. You may want to bookmark it as a resource.
...