Iraqi government declares state of emergency in Baghdad

Reality in Iraq is not always what it seems. Sometimes it's worse. Consider that highly sensitive cable sent from Ambassador Khalilzad to Secretary Rice, the one WaPo recently acquired and made public, the one that says that Iraqis who work for the U.S. in the Green Zone live in constant fear of being found out, the one that references abductions and ethnic cleansing.

Well, reality in Baghdad now includes a state of emergency and a curfew, as the AP reports here:

Iraq's government clamped a state of emergency on Baghdad and ordered everyone off the streets Friday after U.S. and Iraqi forces battled insurgents armed with rocket-propelled grenades, hand grenades and rifles near the heavily fortified Green Zone.

This state of emergency will "continue for an indefinite period". It includes "a renewed prohibition on carrying weapons and [gives] Iraqi security forces broader arrest powers".

As Carla of Preemptive Karma puts it, "[t]he most tightly watched city in Iraq is barely under control". (See also Steve Soto at The Left Coaster and Michael Signer at Democracy Arsenal.)

But, hey, what's a state of emergency? What's a curfew? Just a number, maybe some sort of meaningless benchmark. Isn't that right, Tony Snow?

I'm sure everything's going superbly well over there. At least that's what the mouthpieces of delusion want us to believe.