Good News

Good piece in The New Republic making the case for optimism in Iraq -SpinDaddy

" . . . the little-heralded breakthrough the week before Thanksgiving, when Iraq's major Western creditors agreed to forgive 80 percent of Iraq's debt. Yes, that includes those prickly states in "Old Europe," like France and Germany. Imagine if a president-elect Kerry had announced such a breakthrough. It would have made headlines across the globe. But Bush consigliere James Baker pulled it off--and who wants to celebrate him?
And there was an even less-noticed development this past month: the relative silence across Iraq after the devastating coalition assault on Falluja. The military campaign led to the deaths of thousands, including civilians caught in the crossfire, and left much of the city in rubble. It included the awful imagery of a scared U.S. Marine blowing a wounded Iraqi's head off, a scene replayed endlessly on Arab television. Did the rest of Iraq rise up in protest, as happened in the spring during a similar aborted attack on Falluja? Not even close . . ."