I look at the Middle East and I see Central America in the 1980's -- an endless series of half-baked and bloody civil wars with the United States clumsily deciding which group of thugs to support -- but with more severe potential consequences and the added accelerant of religious mania. Our instincts back then were always lousy, and our choices back then were almost always bad. I don't see either the instincts or the choices as having improved very much here. The fact is that nobody knows what to do about Egypt -- or Syria, for that matter -- until the people there decide to stop slaughtering each other. If nobody knows nothing, then the safest course may be to do nothing.

Damn right. We don't need to be in the business of supporting murderous juntas.