Close to half of Iraqis are unemployed.
Iraqis must keep away from their "liberators," the Americans, because they are all too often killed by American troops afraid of anyone who gets too close to them.
Everything is expensive.
Malnutrition and infant mortality are still disturbingly high.
Baghdad has only 5.8 hours of electricity each day.
Iraq is producing 700,000 barrels a day less than before the invasion.
There is less water, less sewage control, and less gas at gasoline stations than before the invasion.
People are terrified of the enormous rise in criminal activity.
Even though most Iraqis are still happy that Saddam Hussein is gone, there is an abiding anger at the American "liberators" and what they have and have not done in the last three years.
[Thanks to a story filed by John Simpson, BBC World Affairs Editor, on his first trip back to Iraq since 1991.]
*************************
George Bush's comments on the third anniversary. So much that he left unsaid that the American people, not to mention the American troops, need to hear from him. He is letting all of us down as he buries his head deeper and deeper.
***************************
The former Iraqi Interim Prime Minister Iyad Allawi said yesterday:
We are losing each day as an average 50 to 60 people throughout the country, if not more - if this is not civil war, then God knows what civil war is.
******************************
According to Iraq Body Count, On 1 March 2006, it put the total number of civilian dead at 31,599 to 35,712 and the number of police dead at 1,914. The number of civilian dead is more than 5,000 higher than in February, partly because data from the Baghdad morgue for 2005 has been included.
********************************
Retired US Army Major General Paul Eaton, who was in charge of training Iraqi military forces from 2003 to 2004, described Mr Rumsfeld as "incompetent" and urged him to resign.
6 comments:
You're either for the unemployment and stark conditions or you're with the insurgents damn it!
You're either for the unemployment and stark conditions or you're with the insurgents damn it!
oops... Sorry.
What in God's name did that mean?
Rumsfeld incompetent? I'm not so sure about that. I think he's doing exactly what he means to do and that is worse, isn't it.
The unfortunate thing is that there ar probably plenty of people who would answer yes to that question. I'm sure it's less than ever before, but I still think there are too many people with their heads up their butts to actually see that things are a very huge mess over there.
And on a side note: 5.8 hours of electricity? On the news earlier today, they were saying 8 hours of electricity. I wonder which number is more accurate.
I remember when one of my friends trying to justify the invasion to me by saying we were using Iraq as flypaper to kill terrorists.
I still remember vividly the sense of complete dissappointment that my friend could say or think such a thing. I politely reminded him that such a plan, even were it true, would be morally reprehensible because we'd be doing that at the expense of the Iraqi people.
Post a Comment