Credit Cards Get Too Much Credit in Dubai

We've all heard about the new Credit Card Act going into effect some day soon.  But that is not what this piece is about.  Nobody really cares about that particular "reform".  Congress really liked the Bank Lobby suggestion that the law go into effect only after every credit card company in North America raised their rates as high as South Dakota would allow.  The banks don't care if the new law banned outright any interest rate increases ever.  Because they've already hit the 49% ceiling allowed by Satan, recently back from Haiti, himself.

No, this post is not about credit cards snarling American budgets.  It is about credit cards tripping up the smartest spies on earth, the Israeli Mossad, while the vacationed on some fake island in Dubai.

This is not to say that those eleven guys who didn't kill Hamas big shot Mahmoud al-Mabhouh in Dubai aren't as smart as the Dubai cops, but the vacation seems to have softened the spies' brains just a little.

Even the Brits are pissed since some identity theft forced them to issue new passports to five men suspected of being in Dubai and England at the same time as the alleged hit.

So, you know Hamas is demanding a full investigation, right?  Not really, since Dubai wants to investigate Hamas for a mole who may have outed al-Mabhouh's location. So surely Hamas is fingering some Israeli or American.  Nope.  Hamas is blaming poor old Mahmoud, who can't defend himself or kidnap anyone anymore.  According to Lords of Gaza, Mahmoud called his family by phone--by phone!--before heading off for Dubai and told them the very hotel where Mossad could find him.  And he booked his travel plans via the internet.  No bulls-eye needed, thank you very much.

Does two nights in Dubai make everyone mushy above the eyebrows?

Anyway, Dubai's top cop claims to have clear evidence that Mossad was involved.  He says that the suspected assassination team used credit cards in the names of the stolen identities to buy their plane tickets.  Damn.  Slam dunk on Palm Frond Island!  The same stolen names were on the credit cards!  The very same names!

Don't look at me.  I don't get it either.

I'm not a spy (no, cyber-stalking Megan Fox is not spying), but if I were a guy traveling on a false passport, I think I'd opt for the Master Card issued me in my professionally faked name?  With 49% interest rates, I'm not using my own damned Citi or BoA Visa, trust me.  If I wouldn't do it, do you seriously think a Mossad agent would use his wife's Discover Card?

So much for Dubai's killer evidence.

So maybe, credit cards don't actually get any extra credit in Dubai's Ocean's-11-Meets-The-Bourne-Identity case after all.  And maybe, just maybe, Dubai Cheif of Police has been in Dubai a little too long.