MIDDLE EAST AND AFRICA: "Iran's Revolutionary Guards: Showing who's boss; Iran's hard men purge opponents and line their pockets," The Economist, 29 August 2009.

The nastiness only grows: the Guard faction is taking over more and more of the government in the post-election fracas. The mullahs are being marginalized, a goal of Ahmadinejad's all along, I would argue.

Some see only the banishment of opposition parties, but the real putsch here is that the Guards are achieving a hegemony that will make them independently powerful. They simply won't need the illusion of mullah rule.

And please, spare me descriptions of how "nutty" and irrational these guys are. This is a mafia-as-ruling-party and little else--not a new beast and certainly not unfathomable.