Just a few days after raising a big, red banner reading "ENEMIES OF FREEDOM," terrorists attacking Iraq face another string of defeats:
Iraqi security forces have arrested the "most lethal" top lieutenant of Al Qaeda's leader in Iraq — a man allegedly behind most of the car bombings in Baghdad since the U.S.-led invasion, including the 2003 assault on U.N. headquarters that killed 22 people, the prime minister's office said Monday....Authorities also announced Monday that Iraqi security forces had arrested a man described as the chief of al-Zarqawi's propaganda operations. And in the northern city of Mosul, Iraqi forces seized one of al-Zarqawi's weapons suppliers.
As if that weren't enough, Iraq's Shiites reminded observers that they are the bane of theocratic authoritarians.
POLITICS AND THE NEWS: A nod to the Associated Press for reporting these stories more or less directly. Cleveland's premier AM news station's ABC affiliate couldn't help propagandizing after announcing the terrorist capture, claiming, "it should be good news for the Iraqi government, which is trying to convince voters that it will be safe enough to vote." Seeing as how turnout promises to be near eighty percent of the population, Baghdad is succeeding.
MORE: Rich Lowry comments. Smash rightly thinks Zarqawi should commission a tombstone, since he's already dug his own grave.