Perhaps even more alarming than the car bombings that killed more than 200 people yesterday in Baghdad was an attack earlier in the day on the Health Ministry building:

The attack on the ministry headquarters began around midday when three mortar shells hit the main building, Lt. Ali Muhsin of the Iraqi Police told The Associated Press. Gunmen positioned on the upper floors of surrounding buildings then opened fire on the main building, pinning down hundreds of workers inside, ministry officials said. Ministry security guards with assault rifles fired back and managed to keep the insurgents at bay until Iraqi and American troops responded two hours later, the officials said.

Think about that for a minute. It took two hours for American and Iraqi troops just to respond to the siege of a major governmental building in the capital.