From that ubber-leftist Deutsch rag, Der Spiegel, no less:
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?
And Iraqis can once again get pork. Nope. Not gub'mint handouts & subsidies like U.S. congress critters and their willing accomplices in
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."
What was that again? Who was it that caused all these bloody reprisals out 'religious' convictions? Islamist fundamentalists. And who was it again that put an end to these violent fanatics and their thug reign of terror? Coalition forces.
(Yes, there'll be a quiz.)
According to the quarterly report that the Pentagon issued in mid-June, the number of armed incidents has declined by 70 percent since last summer, bringing it down to 2004 levels -- from about 180 daily incidents to 45. More than 320,000 of the 478,000 soldiers in the Iraqi Army, the report claims, are now capable of fighting without American support, and more than €3.8 billion ($5.9 billion) of Iraq's own reconstruction budget totaling €6.4 billion ($9.9 billion) has already been invested in projects. "The security, political and economic trends in Iraq continue to be positive; however they remain fragile, reversible and uneven," the report concluded.
Is it still violent & dangerous in Baghdad? Yes. 56 civilians were killed by islamic fundamentalist this past week alone. By comparison, the homicide rate in the greater Washington D.C. area for 2007 totaled out at 355. The bloody record for D.C. was 482 in 1991. I guess you could consider that a war zone.
And then there are unexpected allies:
King Abdullah II of Jordan, who was opposed to the US invasion and then voiced his fears of a "Shiite Crescent" developing in Iraq, recently said something astonishing in an interview with the US magazine Newsweek: "I am actually optimistic for the first time on Iraq. It's the first time that I have felt that Iraqis have, as much as they can, bound themselves together into a unity."
The unexpected change of mood benefits Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki. He was long considered weak and was extremely controversial, viewed as a friend of Iran by the Sunnis and as America's lackey by the militant Shiites. But today even the Arab ultra-nationalist and opinion leader Abd al-Bari Atwan, editor-in-chief of the London-based Arabic daily Al-Quds Al-Arabi, concedes that Maliki has shown an "amazing ability to survive in a turbulent country."
CC: all them defeat-o-crats (especially that lying seditious snake, john murtha, who still has not issued one single apology to the Haditha seven.)
TY HA
