Cooler, more refreshed heads will prevail.

A wise (and ridiculously good looking) man once said, "When life gives you lemons make lemonade" - oh, that was me a few posts ago. Go figure. Anyway, back to the point at hand.

For the past several decades, few peoples have received more lemons than the Palestinians. It is their time to make lemonade. Condoleezza Rice is in the region this weekend to pursue steps toward peace between the Israelis and the Palestinians. The immediate issue to attend to - barriers and roadblocks.

Israel has used these as a way of restricting movement of the Palestinians. The thought is that with restricted movement there will be fewer opportunities for Palestinian militants/freedom fighters to carry out attacks on Israel. It also has the secondary effect of crippling the Palestinian economy - which, in turn, is supposed to put pressure on the Palestinian fighters to cease their operations.

Presently only 44 of the previously agreed upon 61 barriers have been removed. The Palestinian view is that the removal of these has been of minimal benefit to their people. Of course, the Israelis are hesitant to remove the remaining barriers lest the attacks on their people continue. So the question at present is how to ease the plight of the Palestinians and maintain security of the Israelis. The answer to this is lemonade - literally.

Given the state of the Palestinian economy it makes sense to use a western free market capitalist model. So I suggest that, with start up capital from the Israelis, the Palestinians start at the beginning of the process - with lemonade stands. Everyone in the west is familiar with this as an entry point to capitalism and all of its splendor. If it's good enough for us, then gosh darn it, it's good enough for them. The Palestinian economy would benefit from the newly created jobs and the people of the region would benefit from the pleasure of enjoying one of the most tasty and refreshing beverages known to man. What would be in it for the Israelis? The long lines formed by the patrons would create a natural barrier to unimpeded movement. They could then remove the remaining 17 "barriers" with the knowledge that they have effectively lost nothing. Maybe they could even enjoy a glass or two themselves. Mmmm. Yummy!!

Of course there is the technology barrier to consider. But I'm willing to bet that an enterprising Palestinian 8 year old could figure out a way to utilize RPGs (rocket propelled grenades) for the extraction process. Perhaps we could even send some of our more successful lemonade stand operators to coach the budding entrepreneurs. I smell franchising opportunities!