Quick! Someone tell the American voters about this news from Iraq.
The story is amazing and the source — the normally anti-American Spiegel (a German magazine) — is equally amazing. According to this story, things in Baghdad are going really well, and the citizens have a renewed sense of well-being and purpose:
There is an unexpected air of normalcy prevailing in Baghdad these days, with consumption flourishing and confidence in the government growing. The progress is astonishing, but can it last?
Pork is available in Baghdad once again. Not just in the Green Zone, where US diplomats can enjoy their spare ribs and Parma ham, but also across the Tigris River, in the real Baghdad, at “Al-Warda” on Karada Street. Bassim Dencha, 32, one of the few Christians remaining in Iraq and the co-owner of Baghdad’s finest supermarket, has developed a supply line from Syria. As a result, he now has frozen pork chops and bratwurst arranged in his freezers, next to boxes of frozen French fries and German Black Forest Cakes. And the customers are buying.
For four years, selling pork or alcohol in Baghdad was a security risk. But the acts of terror committed by Islamist fundamentalists, who once punished such violations of their interpretation of the Koran with attacks on businesses and their owners, have gradually subsided. The supply of imported goods is also relatively secure today, now that roads through the Sunni Triangle are significantly safer than they were only a few months ago.
“It’s worth it again,” says businessman Bassim Dencha. “All we need now is enough electricity to reopen our refrigerated warehouse.”
And on and on, with details of progress and optimism. The story (of course) points to the fragility of this renewal, and has doom and gloom statements about its sustainability, but the story’s general tenor is cautious optimism.
Do you think Harry Reid or Nancy Pelosi or Barack Obama have read this? Do you think they care? How about the New York Times, ABC, NBC, CBS, CNN, MSNBC, Newsweek, Time, etc., ad nauseum? I doubt any of them want to see stories like this published in America between now and November. It will be devastating to their oft repeated message that the Iraq War is unwinnable (since this report allows for the possibility that we won), and that Bush was a horrible, malevolent idiot, whose wrongful conduct taints all Republicans, practically mandating an Obama victory.
Please go to the Spiegel story and email it to your friends. More people should read it and see what they’re missing when they open America’s papers and magazines, or turn on the news channels.