Here are two fascinating stories about women and their slowly changing roles in the Islamic political world. Well, fascinating but sadly rather thin. I'd like to see a lot more reporting on the topic.

Meanwhile, it's a bit distressing that the interim Iraqi ministries simply lost upwards of $9 billion over an eight-month period last year. Whoops! Hey, this is the sort of thing that quickly erodes popular support for that fuzzy post-election national-unity feeling—and if anyone can tell me how "freedom on the march" will solve the problem, I'd like to hear it.