Slate's Tom Scocca reminds us that the west's willingness to rescue pro-democracy protesters from brutal, murderous middle-eastern despots is highly selective. If you're rebelling against a dictator who's been a thorn in America's side, you get airstrikes and UN resolutions; if you're rebelling against tyrants who are forthcoming with their oil or ports, you're lucky if the Secretary of State will bestir herself for a round of finger-wagging as your comrades are coldly murdered in the streets.

The helpful thing, if you're overwhelmed by so much news going on at once, is that Bahrain is roughly the same story as Libya–only instead of pro-democracy protesters being murdered by a terrorist-sponsoring monster of a dictator who has been on America's enemies list for ages, the pro-democracy protesters are being murdered by a government that is America's very own dear ally. And where Qaddafi brought in foreign mercenaries for support, King Hamad bin Isa al-Khalifa of Bahrain brought in troops from our even more vital ally, Saudi Arabia…

So basically, take all those proud feelings about the United States standing up for freedom and human rights in Libya and turn them inside out, and vomit into them. That's Bahrain.