""The Bush administration, with all its talk of transforming the Middle East, is reverting to usual U.S. form: a patchwork policy of constant crisis management, all in the name of the 'stability' the neo-conservatives professed to hate," said U.S.-based Lebanese commentator As'ad AbuKhalil. "These exorbitant arms sales should be read as a last-ditch effort by the Bush administration to keep matters stable for the tyrannies of the region and to reward those who stood with him in his unending wars," said AbuKhalil, who teaches at California State University." (thanks Amina)