More good news from Iraq:
Families fled in search of safety Monday as open warfare raged for a fourth day between Shiite militias and armed Sunni men in Tigris River towns north of Baghdad. Militias allied with Iraq’s Shiite-led government held sway in Balad city, forcing out Sunni families and leaving the bodies of slain Sunni men to rot in the streets, according to police, residents and hospital officials.
The Iraqi government deployed still more reinforcements to try to calm the embattled towns and hold open the main roads, Interior Ministry spokesman Abdul Kareem al-Kinani said in the capital. But local police officers accused Shiite-dominated government police forces of working alongside Shiite militias in executing Sunnis and appealed for more help.
The escalating violence in the Tigris River towns in many ways serves as a microcosm of the daily violence roiling Iraq. Sectarian attacks have increased more than tenfold since the start of the year and now claim more than 100 victims a day, according to the Iraqi government.
In response to this, the administration plan has a three-pronged strategy:
1.) Operatives will be dispatched to all cable networks urging the US to stay the course and to point out that the ‘Defeatocrats,’ if elected, will just ‘cut and run’ from Iraq. Additional talking points, if needed, will be that anyone who points out that Iraq is a mess should be tarred as ‘not supporting the troops.’
2.) The blogosphere and right-wing media outlets will engage in a coordinated attack of the media and the Lancet study, proving that not as many people are dying in Iraq as is being reported by the biased liberal media.
3.) Don Rumsfeld will have a press conference persuading reporters that this is a sign we are turning a corner in Iraq.
Jill
You can’t say those Reps don’t have a “plan”!
srv
Boy, I’m getting a little too much validation from the nattering nabobs of negativity here. I can’t handle all this being right, all the time.
Couldn’t we have an onlin wake for Cindy not getting the Nobel Peace Prize?
Mr Furious
Great. Just pretend this was taking place in New York. Midtown is the Green Zone and it is surrounded by ‘Escape From New York’ walls, meanwhile Brooklyn and Queens are in full-scale war.
We’re not even holding Baghdad and the suburbs. What the fuck are we doing there anymore?
Jill
What are we doing there? Assuaging George’s ego.
les
Well, at least there’s no civil war.
Jill
There’s only the after-birth of democracy all over the place.
Pb
So is it a civil war yet, or do we still have to wait for
Robert E. LeeJames Baker to show up and declare that it is?chopper
waddya mean, ‘pretend’?
Paul L.
Civil War all over. But It should not concern you since only Christians are dying.
Boycott Indonesia–Stop Murdering Christians Now!
srv
Er, what do we boycott? The oil they send us?
I clearly remember George saying we’re safer, so I’m not worried. Clearly, whatever is happening in Indonesia is Clintons fault.
demimondian
Hey, Paul? Found those missing bodies in Qana yet?
Really, that’s more important than today’s “let’s make up a new fake outrage and hope that people will believe that it’s real, kids!” act.
Pb
…not since last I checked…
Just because you are apparently not concerned since only Muslims are dying, doesn’t mean that I am not concerned ‘since only Christians are dying’. Asshole. On the plus side, however, we didn’t invade Indonesia and destabilize their country to start that one off…
Oh, and incidentally, if the incidents cited mean that ‘civil war is in the air in Indonesia’, then that would make Iraq way, *way* past mere civil war.
SeesThroughIt
Well, who cares about New York? It’s just a bunch of liberal leftist liberal America-hating liberal commie liberals there–they have it coming! Besides, your example wouldn’t work, anyway, because Ann Coulter said that New Yorkers are too pussy to fight back against terrorists.
The Other Steve
Oh come on John. Be reasonable.
Iraq is a free democracy now, and these people are just expressing their opinion on the direction of the government.
The Other Steve
Wait a minute. Is this outrage all about those Christian terrorists that Indonesia tried and convicted on questionable grounds?
I’m certainly outraged. But I’m surprised that you are, Paul. Weren’t you telling us that those are perfectly legitimate ways for a government to behave to protect itself?
Andrew J. Lazarus
The next six months in Iraq are critical.
Eural
Rove’s October surprise?
Snake Pliskin is going to be dropped in to clean things up.
lard lad
Yeah, Paul, sure. We are appalled by the deaths of hundreds of thousands of innocent Muslims in Iraq, but we care not a fig for the deaths of dozens of innocent Christians in Indonesia.
Because this is an either/or deal, after all. It’s a literal impossibility for us to care about both, and liberals only marshal their concern for cultures and ethnic groups that embody evil, anyhow.
So we’ll reserve our sympathy for the Muslims… because Satan knows how much we lefties love to see Christians die.
What a sad, twisted soul you have, Paul. As big an asshole as you are, I can’t help but feel pity.
The Ghost of Santa Claus
Most of the deaths in Iraq actually occur in America. Serial killers and gangsters from small-town rural Texas and inner-city Detroit alike are famous for transporting the bodies of their victims to Iraq, where they deposit them on the streets and escape criminal liability for their heinous crimes.
One can only pity the law-abiding, peaceful Iraqi citizenry, whose hapless nation is beset by these throngs of international criminals and murderers as a direct result of deals Saddam Hussein set up with major American street gangs (not unlike his deals with Al Qaeda and the Abu Nidal organization). It is the average Iraqi citizen who is held responsible for the villainy of Detroit and east St. Louis.
I approve of this plan, in theory. But I mut warn the Republican leadership of one thing: if they allow harm to come to one hair on the head of Adrienne Barbeau, I’m voting straight-ticket Democrat for the next 30,000 years. I may be dead, but I still vote, and I still wield a great deal of clout in the elven and zombie electoral categories.
He admits it! Someone contact Red State and Free Republic.
Ho, ho, ho, brainy bitches!
DougJ
Clinton’s fault. Remember all those Christians he murdered. Vince Foster was a Christian.
yet another jeff
Yeah, but Bill didn’t kill him, Hillary did. Because they were lovers…and he was going to out her as a lesbian. Which makes Vince a woman…or transexual…which means he couldn’t be a Christian since he was going to hell for his sinful ways and…
Oh, so he had it coming. Never mind.
BlogReeder
Jill:
Finally someone showing some sense around here. You guys can’t handle the truth. The military isn’t some NGO like the red cross. Soldiers shoot people. You can’t handle that. So when you see a story about Iraq using it’s soldiers you go all ga ga when people die. The story John linked to sounds like good news for Iraq. The government is shooting people that have to go. What are they suppose to do with insurgents? Invite them in for coffee? You guys call a battle escalating violence, who can take you seriously?
yet another jeff
Well…goddamn…
BlogReeder…I think we mean the term “escalating violence” as exactly that. Is it the adjective that gets you going? Escalating…increasing…is there a better way to describe it?
I mean, we’ve broken a LOT of eggs…how big is this omelette going to be?
Bruce Moomaw
Hell hath no fury like an honest Republican betrayed.