Side Benefits of Early Hand-Over

Zeyad posts his impressions of the sovereignty hand-over in Iraq. On of the interesting points he mentions in passing:

I thought it was a wise decision to announce the event two days before it was planned so I wasn't much surprised, though some people argue that it spoiled the whole thing. Actually, it took the unguarded Arab media by complete surprise, and I swear I could notice their confusion since it was very obvious that they hadn't yet prepared anything to downplay the significance of the event. [emphasis mine]

Heh. The original intent in making the hand-over early was to short circuit potential terrorists. I guess it short-circuited their apologists as well.