AH HA! How appropriate that I should come across this information on none other than Veteran's Day.....
The statistics on Iraq, in particular Baghdad for September (i.e. the full results of the "surge") are in from the Iraqi Interior, Health and Defense Ministries, and have been confirmed by the UN: Indirect fire attacks (incoming rockets etc) have dropped from 400 per month to 20. IED explosions in the capital have gone from 187 per month to 18. Al Qeda has been completely driven from Baghdad and now remains a problem in only 13% of the country. The number of violence related deaths in September 2006 (across the nation) were 1,400; but in September 2007 it was 290. Between January and the end of September 2006 the total dead was a staggering 27,000, where as during that same period in 2007 the number has dropped to 7,100. The number of bodies sent to the central Baghdad morgue this time last year (September) was between 100 and 150 per day. It now stands at 10 per day with 50% of those deaths occurring due to "normal" circumstances (elderly, car accidents etc), causing UN Secretary General Ban Kahi Moon to announce that September is the lowest month for casualties yet this year; and that the UN is considering establishing a small peace keeping force in Basra (now that the US Marine Core has made it safe for the blue helmeted little darlings). And just to drive home the point, consider this story ...
Taxi driver Ahmed Khalil Baqir used to station himself outside Baghdad's main morgue, waiting for grieving families who went there to claim their relatives’ dead bodies.
"I was totally dependent on them for my living," Baqir, a 44-year-old father of four, said." I never thought about picking up people in the street as I was being hired five to eight times a day by these families. But now it is a waste of time to wait there and these days I wait only for about three hours in the morning and I continue my work picking up passengers in the street.”
Overall violence in Iraq is now down an incredible 77%.
These statistics were compiled by the IRIN - the media wing of the UN's Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs at http://www.irinnews.org/Report.aspx?ReportId=74892, but these numbers and this story can be confirmed at virtually any mainstream news source with a little effort and a few clicks, or by Googling "Iraq violence down."
And that brings me to my next point: WHERE IS ALL THE BREAKING NEWS COVERAGE AND ABOVE THE FOLD HEADLINES??? Shame on the US press core. They went to such great lengths to cover every explosion, every death, every car bomb, every IED, every scrap of information that could serve as an indicator that this front in the war on terror was a catastrophic blunder; but now, when the tide is beginning to turn - a time which I believe history will regard as our turning point - the coverage is noticeably absent. I shouldn't have to descend three to four clicks of the mouse into a news site in order to recover this information. The link for this monumental story on FOX, MSNBC et al should simply be the home page - it is not. And even more shameful is the "however there are still pockets of violence in XYZ" that ends each of these reports. The "positive" aspects during the worst of the violence was not tagged at the end of each of the "negative" reports in months past. In this day and age, especially in a time of war we must be thankful for alternative news sources such as the Internet, blogs, and talk radio. Although I never cite the latter as my news source, more often then not the story that I subsequently research and post on is brought to my attention by AM or Sirius radio. This story was brought to my attention by Rush - which certainly sends a cold shiver up the spine of a certain Bund member - but I think we should give credit where credit is due. Even if you think Limbaugh and his lesser compatriots are nothing more than a never ending series of blowhards pontificating the rantings of a biased moron, you must still admit that there multimillion person reach - for free no less - has been vital in getting out what good news there is in Iraq, which has now hit a critical mass threshold, overtaking the "bad." There may be biased in why they choose to report these things, but not in the numbers they report on - that can be confirmed, and has, and they are due a level of thanks for getting this message - that our troops are doing spectacularly well - out to the masses (in the millions).
But on this Veterans Day let me give thanks to those who most deserve it - the US Military: To every infantry man, to every Airborne Ranger, to every medic, every airman, to every SEAL, Delta, cook and mechanic: THANK YOU. History will not forget your service, and we will not forget your sacrifice.
Sincerely,
The Bund.
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3 comments:
I, too, read the headlines (244 on the Google News page, compared to 2755 concerning Obama's latest Clinton-ripping speech) concerning the UN determinations and successes of the US forces in Iraq over the last 5 months.
I, too, would add my thanks and congratulations to the US service men and women who made it possible.
What I would add is the question of when we are going to hold our current administration accountable for its failures in Iraq? Why has the media ignored the success story? I can guess, but I don't really think Ryan (or any other conservative Bush-supporter) is going to want the attention anyway... it simply begs the question "Why in Christ's good Name did we wait so long to employ the single greatest asset the US Military has in its arsenal... vastly superior numbers of the best trained and equipped troops on the face of the Earth?" When, in the last 100 years... hell, go back 200 years, if you want!... has a simple (or vast) technological advantage been the deciding factor in winning a conflict for the USA? When is the stupidity of a man like Rummy going to be addressed? Or the lack of common sense in the man that hired and then defended his stupidity for 6 years?
FDR (and Truman, by extension) surrounded themselves with the greatest military minds of the age while fighting WWII, and employed their advice, wisdom and experience at every opportunity… and we WON. Johnson and Nixon DIDN’T listen the advice or counsel of their military commanders, and we know the result of Vietnam. Bush senior had, in my opinion, one of the finest war cabinets in American history… and the Gulf War was spectacular success.
In each of these instances, we had the vast preponderance of technological advantage over our enemy, but we didn’t win all of them… and we haven’t been “winning” in Iraq either. We are gaining ground now, I do not deny that at all… but the insurgents (ANY insurgent force) does not need to defeat an army to declare victory. They need only make the effort too costly to continue, as was the case in Vietnam, Somalia, Afghanistan during the Soviet invasion, the American Revolution (at least for the majority of it), Napoleon’s invasion of the Iberian Peninsula… the list goes on.
The insurgents in Iraq have fought a “successful” fight against the US and Coalition Forces to date, in as much as they have tied up vast amounts of US troops, equipment, money and media time, and have soured the American public to the idea of continuing the effort any further. While I hope and pray that this is a trend that is reversible, it is still a “defeat” for the first 4+ years of the effort in my eyes… and that defeat is as much Bush’s fault as any other person that had a hand in planning and executing this conflict.
When do we hear the cry of “Impeach Bush” from BOTH sides of the isle?
Pardon my language Titus, but are you out of your fucking mind? Impeach? That's just stupid and not worthy of your intellect. Not firing Rummy earlier doesn't equate to a 'high crime or mistameanor." It's a mistake. Shall we begin impeaching all office holder's for a mistake in policy?
And, "when will the administration be held accountable ofr their mistakes"? Are you shitting me? EVERY SINGLE bad move this president has made has been highlighted to no end in EVERY SINGLE main stream news source, TV & print. Held accountable? What do you want? Public cuttings of the administration so their blood can pool beneath a chair they're strapped to for all to see on pay-per view? Not held accountable? You sit their on your "stoop" a few weeks back and lament over the fact that you can't get an unbiased account of our war efforts because the media is on a rampage to hate all things Bush, highlighting every "mistake", and then you sit here now and lament that over "when will the media and America at large hold him accounytable" - AMAZING! Isn't the 18 trillion op-eds and TV news accounts about Bush's failures and his 30% approval rating the very definition of holding a public official accountable? Not to mention - the public had a choice 3 years ago to eject Bush and they opted "NO." FINALLY, and I mean FINALLY, clear progress is being made and your beef is "where's the accountability for the bad?" That's not just appualing, that's ignoranT. The reality is that there are two ways to hold a president "accountable" for policy mistakes: with your vote, and with the media's paortrayal of "mistakes" with the subsequent approval ratings falling where they may - in every sense of that definition the PoTUS has been held accountable and to say anything else is to suspend reality. Which you are apparently getting pretty good at.
FR
Do I have to flex some executive Bund authority and BAN sarcasm from these proceedings?
For God’s sake, I KNOW that to hope for an impeachment is dream the impossible dream. He’s done nothing “illegal”… I was making reference to the “criminal” aspect of his ineptitude, bad judgment, and misplaced trust in men and women that did not have the nation’s best interests at heart.
I’d also like to point out that if you expect ME to believe that YOU think the only measure of accountability, short of impeachment, is the media and the vote… you are full of shit. Congress can hold a President accountable by curtailing budgets and allowances, the Supreme Court can over-turn policy as un-Constitutional, the AG can investigate and suspend actions by ANY executive department or agency that it feels is acting above or outside the Law. Since when is the Rule of Law in this land championed SOLEY by the electorate and the media? Kudos to the Washington Post for the “Deep Throat” stories that broke Watergate… but there are very few instances of the media doing a good, or even adequate, job of objectively processing information to the public. I’d rather not think that THAT was one of only TWO means of addressing abuse from the White House, thank you very much.
Were that the case, then ANY second-term PotUS could run completely rampant his last 4 years, correct? Damn the media, and I don’t care what the voters think! Give me a break.
To better make the point I was trying to give in the original post, imagine this: imagine the Surge WORKING! From start to finish, the surge gives us the complete edge in the war on Iraqi insurgents and we pacify the hostile areas, bring peace and stability to the new Democratic regime, the Iraqi people recognize the benefits of republican government in a democratic system and flourish. If the surge has this effect at the pace it is already (seemingly) going at, the fighting could become comparatively insignificant in as little as another 6 months! US deaths down to less than 0.01% of total forces in theater per annum! Civilian deaths recorded at a rate lower than most major American cities!
I would then ask the question… Why did we wait so long? Why wasn’t this included in the planning stages of the initial invasion? Why were the lives, dollars and equipment of the US Armed Forces wasted over the course of the intervening 4 years of the post-invasion occupation? Where does the “buck stop”?
In 1980, the buck stopped at Carter’s desk, and he took complete responsibility for the failed rescue attempt… and people like Ryan continue to mock and deride him because of it. Had the buck stopped at Nixon’s desk in 1972, perhaps the PotUS wouldn’t have been forced to resign in the unmitigated disgrace that he was in 1974. Had the buck stopped at Clinton’s desk in 1995, perhaps he wouldn’t have been impeached in 1998.
I’m not advocating the “what if?” game here… and I am probably not making my point well (too tired). I’m voicing frustration that I am “expected” by people like Ryan and the other neo-cons of America, to support the policies and agendas of an Administration that I feel have failed in the single largest act of foreign policy since the Vietnam war (when measured in lives as well as dollars) from beginning to end (understanding that it isn’t over, of course).
Truth be known, the ONLY facet of the current war in Iraq that I feel morally OBLIGATED to support is the fact that we made a mess in Iraq beginning in March of ‘03, and we MUST clean it up… or face the near certainty that we’ll be there again in 10 to 25 years, risking and loosing more brave American lives all over again. The given reasone de guerre was a load of shit, the manner in which we planned and conducted the initial invasion was flawed at best, the means by which the public was informed of planning and intention was juvenile in the extreme, and the scope of this action (Iraq) as it fits into the broader global view of American foreign policy is so convoluted as to be nearly non-existent in actual fact.
Who answers for that?
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