As the rest of the world anguishes, certain highly placed figures in the Bush regime exult in the miseries in the Middle East, as Dan Froomkin reports in the "What’s the Motivation?" (Washington Post, Aug. 4).  Essential reading but not for the faint of heart.   Perhaps most chilling is this, from Imad Moustapha, the Syrian ambassador to the United States, excerpted from a Los Angeles
Times op-ed:

Although the media have reported that no contacts have
been made between the two countries over the last three weeks,
administration officials have sent vague signals that this might be
happening through back channels.

But no communication whatsoever
has taken place. U.S. policy remains to ignore the Syrian government.
And it remains fundamentally wrong. . . .

Currently, the White
House doesn’t talk to the democratically elected government of
Palestine. It does not talk to Hezbollah, which has democratically
elected members in the Lebanese parliament and is a member of the
Lebanese coalition government. It does not talk to Iran, and it
certainly does not talk to Syria.

Gone are the days when U.S.
special envoys to the Middle East would spend hours, if not days, with
Syrian officials brainstorming, discussing, negotiating and looking for
creative solutions leading to a compromise or settlement. Instead, this
administration follows the Bolton Doctrine: There is no need to talk to
Syria, because Syria knows what it needs to do. End of the matter.

This is the Syrian Ambassador to the United States, pleading to be allowed a role in halting the present madness.  Moral?   "It’s not always your enemies who get you into the sh*t, and not always your friends who get you out."