The king is dead; long live the king.

But who? Arafat's funeral is over, and now the business of governing Palestine without him will begin in earnest. With Arafat's passing, there is renewed hope that a peace plan to end the Israeli-Palestinian conflict can be implemented, if the new Palestinian president is less of a hard-liner than Arafat was. But for potential peace negotiations to have any hope of succeeding with the Palestinian people, the new president must be elected fairly, and within 60 days, in accordance with the Palestinian constitution. This according to Martin Indyk, former U.S. Ambassador to Israel, who was interviewed on last night's broadcast of NPR's All Things Considered. But if, as Glenn Reynolds said, the Palestinian authorities can't even organize a funeral, how are they possibly going to organize a fair election, never mind govern the country after that?