According to
the BBC the Iraqi government has declared a total curfew - no pedestrians, no traffic - in Baghdad until Sunday.
"The government has decided to enforce a curfew on vehicles and individuals starting from Friday evening until 0600 on Sunday morning (0200 GMT)," the message said.
An unidentified official at the interior ministry told the Associated Press news agency that "intelligence information on the security situation" had made the announcement necessary.
Well, sure - it's possible someone finally noticed that there was a civil war raging everywhere in the country, and that being outdoors could potentially be unhealthy.
Snark aside - the BBC is also reporting the Woodward book (diaried exhaustively here already.)
And last week there was also posted an op ed by foreign affairs veteran John Simpson which concludes:
Last year, President George W Bush said he would accept nothing less than complete victory in Iraq. For many months, as the situation there deteriorated even further, he went quiet about his promise.
But earlier this month, before the fifth anniversary of the attack on the twin towers, he repeated it.
That presumably had more to do with American politics than with the situation in Iraq.
But the latest crop of figures indicate that complete victory for the US, whatever that might mean, is now out of the question.
And all this with an election just weeks away, and Woodward's book due on Monday.
Is it too optimistic to wonder if yesterday's torture fiasco isn't the start of something, but the sagging and limp end of the political disaster we've all had to live through?
[Update]
Rumours of a coup, according to NBC. See comments for details.