Yesterday, Time magazine reported that several months ago, the Bush administration kicked around a plan to use a "covert CIA operation" to fund parties in Iraq that they deemed favorable. The plan was killed when House minority leader Nancy Pelosi found out about it and raised the obvious objections concerning covertly manipulating the elections of a fledgling democracy. You can read the story here.

Admininstration officials say the decision to kill the plan was a "tough call" because they charge that Iran is essentially doing the same thing. My initial reaction to this was "Fantastic! We hold ourselves to no higher standard than that of the women-and-gay-hating mullahs." But, in this instance, we may in fact be lower.

As Juan Cole points out on his blog--and I will now join the rest of the blogging world in declaring that his site is essential reading to anyone hoping to form a somewhat cogent picture of what's happening in Iraq--it's hard to figure out just which presidential candidate Iran would be interested in funding. Check out this analysis, and many more, at www.juancole.com