LET’S TAKE A LOOK AT IRAQ
Michelle Malkin’s post; MYTHS OF IRAQ, is a good read. She asks us to take a look at the photo milblog by Lainey Poche, HHC 256 Bde. She also has a link to this Ralph Peters exclusive at Real Clear Politics.
During a recent visit to Baghdad, I saw an enormous failure. On the part of our media. The reality in the streets, day after day, bore little resemblance to the sensational claims of civil war and disaster in the headlines.
No one with first-hand experience of Iraq would claim the country’s in rosy condition, but the situation on the ground is considerably more promising than the American public has been led to believe. Lurid exaggerations and instant myths obscure real, if difficult, progress.I left Baghdad more optimistic than I was before this visit. While cynicism, political bias and the pressure of a 24/7 news cycle accelerate a race to the bottom in reporting, there are good reasons to be soberly hopeful about Iraq’s future.
March 14, 2006 - 02:26 PM on March 14th, 2006
The liberal left-wing news meia are only interested in selling their wretched paers and magazines after all IF IT BLEEDS IT LEADS:mad:
March 14, 2006 - 07:41 PM on March 14th, 2006
don’t look, “do and, do it right”, “the old way”, you know like world war two, one u.s. troop dead 500 enemies of freedom dead, do it right and the Muslim will never attack us, do it wrong, and you are dead. fight or die, what do you want:?:
March 14, 2006 - 08:09 PM on March 14th, 2006
by the way, if you think by killing your enemies is evil think on this, what if bin laden wins this war, what do you think will happen to you? and understand one fact I HATE BUSH:roll: But i don’t want his job, with people that live in this non nation of total fools:sad:
To:bin laden, if i was running this game you and all your people would be dead, do you understand little brown brother:?: And your low life people should be thinking god for bush and business, if you know what i mean.
beat your enemy down and keep him in hell. Rome Empire 1st century A.D It worked real well in that part of the world
ops:
March 15, 2006 - 04:31 PM on March 15th, 2006
A good indicator is to watch the value of the Iraqi Dinar as compared to the American dollar. Exchange rate is a decent indication of the economic viability of a country. The value of the Iraqi Dinar has slowly been falling in value for the last three years. Based on that reality, I trust what I’m seeing in the “liberal media”. If the value of the Dinar was going up, and the news kept reporting failures, I’d know that something was fishy.
..Chuck..
P.S. Shortly before the first Gulf war, an Iraqi Dinar was worth about $3.20(US). As of today, it takes 1476 Iraqi Dinars to equal one US dollar. For about $700, you too can be an Iraqi millionaire. If the value goes back up to pre-Gulf war levels, you’ll be worth $3.2 million dollars (US).
March 18, 2006 - 12:06 AM on March 18th, 2006
Chuck I do like your analogy unfortunately it’s flawed. Have you ever seen the movie “Sneakers”? In it Ben Kingsley’s character tells Robert Redford’s character about how perception effects reality. His example is that if you tell enough people long enough that a bank is financially shaky, enough people will withdraw their money that it will become shaky. This is essentially what caused the banking collapse that lead to the Great Depression. Even banks that would’ve otherwise been sound were forced into insolvency by the panicking depositors. Investors rarely want to invest in a country that has a substandard infrastructure, a history of graft, and has guerrillas running amok. Lack of foreign capital resulting from the years of corruption and the oil for food program has caused the dinar to drop. Thank you for the currency exchange information. I may have to invest in Iraqi Dinars. $1000 U.S. dollars spent on dinars and allowed to sit there until after the terrorists are quelled and the Iraqi oil starts flowing freely again, should net me at least million US Dollars. Sounds like a good investment to me.
The absolute BEST indication of what’s going on there is the reenlistment rates. Soldiers do not have to reenlist. If the situation was as bad as the main stream media is portraying it, the reenlistment rate wouldn’t be the highest in history. Nor would the desertion rate be the lowest despite the media reports to the contrary. The truth is desertions are down from the rates before the war. Modern soldiers are neither conscripts nor ill educated idiots (unless you count the poor quality of the liberal run schools.) You simply can’t get into the military if you don’t have at least a GED. Convicted felons are almost always told thanks but no thanks. (There are exceptions for people who made dumb mistakes but it almost takes an act of God to get a waiver.) We haven’t had a draft in over 30 years. The people who serve in our military are there because they WANT to be there. Too bad John Murtha doesn’t have the gumption to get up off his ass and fly over there before making comments about the troops. It amazes me that while Joe Lieberman who has been there multiple times can say one thing about the situation and have his credibility challenged and Murtha who hasn’t been there at all says another thing and is immediately an expert. Murtha hasn’t seen a war zone since BEFORE Operation Desert Storm. Even the people who have fought in both say this one is so different that it hardly seems the same place.