Harry’s Place

wow you guys must be pissed for the delete on sight policy :) I will outlive the repression.

train and encourage Iraqi journalists in the basics of free and independent reporting
Who is going to do that then?In fact,how about some evidence that Iraqi journalists need such training?

money to train and encourage Iraqi journalists in the basics of free and independent reporting

Or even US journalists.

– reporting on the misdeeds of US forces and contractors

Indeed. Sometimes the most effective paid pipers play a little off-key.

Wouldn’t it be a better investment for the future of a democratic Iraq to use some of that money to train and encourage Iraqi journalists in the basics of free and independent reporting– even reporting on the misdeeds of US forces and contractors, and corruption and misbehavior within their own government?

Let them spend some of their own fucking money.

If you think that’s a waste, you really need to read Imperial Life In The Emerald City.

I know you lot will be turned off by the use of the word “Imperial”, apt as it is, but Chandrasekaran’s account is jam-packed with examples of incredible, eye-popping official stupidity, unbelieveable corruption and deliberate waste that make this £300m toss-off look like something you’d find in a Christmas cracker*… Essentially, deliberate waste and corruption have been the watchword since day one in Iraq.

Gene’s really at the coo’s tail on this, as my gran would’ve said, although she wasn’t usually talking about multi-billion giveaways to massive corporations and unaccountable clans of twitchy mercenaries.

If you think that western democracies should routinely embark on dumbass, resource-grabbing military adventures - Oops, sorry, I meant “humanitarian interventions” - then that book should be invaluable reading for planning future expeditions.

Thomas Ricks is also very good on the disastrous, ruinous clusterfuck that ensued, and still continues, in the aftermath of the invasion, for those that wish to read about such things. I’d advise anyone with a boner for US-led crusades against evil to check out his work.

*Incidentally, for those who worry about the activities of the baw-faced, prosecution-dodging tosser George Galloway’s fishy financial dealings, the Americans managed to “lose” almost 9 billion dollars of Iraqi money (i.e. oil profits) within two years of their de facto overlordship of Iraq**, most of which is understood to have disappeared into the pockets of private contractors such as Custer Battles and other companies with close ties to the administration in Washington.

One congressman - Chris Van Hollen, I believe - described the congressional testimony of Custer Battles frontman and former Air Force representative Earnest O. Robbins when he appeared before the appropriate oversight committee thus -

“Yeah, I don’t know what I expected him to say… It just shows the contempt they have for us, for the taxpayer, for everything.”

A bit of research shows how right he is.

**Yes, I know, it’s chump-change for governments… But, still, nine billion dollars…

Flying Rodent, it must really piss you off that we’ve won the Iraq war. You must have thought you really had us there for a minute.

It’s always more of a let down when you’re in that position, like a football team that’s 1 up at half time and goes on to lose 2-1.

It’s your money, Gene, but I would have thought it money well spent.

If we want to talk about waste then the extra $100 Billion of pork added to the bailout bill seems a good place to start.

‘Oh, we can’t waste 700 billion so we should add another 100 billion just to make sure everything is okay’

How does that work out?

Flying Rodent, it must really piss you off that we’ve won the Iraq war.

Really? There seems to be rather a lot of shooting, bombing and general mayhem going on there, involving very, very large numbers of American troops and some serious air power. For a war that’s over, it’s looks pretty not-over-at-all, which is kind of the point I’m getting at.

I’m inclined to agree with Mike. Hearts and minds is a vital part of the operation. The most key thing, of course, is to build hospitals and schools and proper drainage and protect the rule of law. But I would have thought that spending money on talking to the Iraqi people might be a good idea.

Not that us Brits really have a right to talk about this, given Brown’s cynical and offensive manoevrings regarding our troop numbers in (well, kinda near) Basra…

I’m inclined to agree with Ben.

Rodent, you know very well that the Sunnis supremacists - the heart of the insugency - have basically conceded defeat. It’s now just a case of how to withdraw the troops in a manner that maintains the democratic institutions. Time to give it up.

Speaking of American politics, i see McCain has sent out Palin to use the Shaun Hannity strategy of bringing up Obama’s past associations. They’re going to go very negative in the home straight.

Gene’s right to question this. It’s only the tip of the iceberg though; the money spent on dubious no bid contracts and the privatisation of war, one of Rumsfeld’s pet projects - to outsource war - is truly mind boggling. Congress just now quietly passed another $600 billion to fund various military projects, but it barely got a mention in the media. It was left to McCain to tentatively question some of this corporate welfare and lack of oversight in the debates; Obama, of course, wouldn’t touch it.

But I would have thought that spending money on talking to the Iraqi people might be a good idea.

The Iraqis don’t need more US statist propaganda. They need resources for their own media. Still, the US is not going anywhere (don’t believe a word of this talk about pulling out of Iraq), so I guess they are just trying to get folk to accept them more.

No, indeed, Benji. I am very much of the view that what the Iraqi people really need is lots of nice western liberals telling them how secular Saddam was and how they should be jolly upset things are worse now than during the Ba’athist dictatorship.

Because, really, what we all have to understand is that that sort of view doesn’t get a look in by comparison with the wall-to-wall pro-American apologias gracing the Western and Middle Eastern media. I can’t believe how much of a free ride the coalition endeavours get from everyone.

Thanks, Benji.

No Ben, I am not suggesting that Democracy Now start a bureau in Iraq either. However, we were all get told that this is about the Iraqis. $300 million in contracts have been handed out to folk in Washington, California, and Virginia.

… encourage Iraqi journalists in the basics of free and independent reporting– even reporting on the misdeeds of US forces and contractors, …

What an arrogant and racist post by Gene to assume that somehow all Iraqi journalists are too demented, corrupted, or illiterate to report independently and freely, and that they are not already reporting the misdeeds of US forces and contractors. All he had to do was peruse the online Iraqi media, see how free they are and how critical they are of the US occupation. But no, for the post-Leftist and the postcolonial, Iraq is a dictatorship run by a cabal from washington with the help of Ahmad Chalabi.

Obviously ignorance of Iraqi media and journalism does not stop Gene from making sweeping racist remarks.

Flying Rodent — I am sure if only Muqtada Sadr could come to power through his heroic band of spiritual self-sacrificing and pious revolutionaries and social workers, then Iraq would be such a utopia - would it not? What a typical leftist idiot deficient in critical thinking.

What an arrogant and racist post by Gene to assume that somehow all Iraqi journalists are too demented, corrupted, or illiterate to report independently and freely, and that they are not already reporting the misdeeds of US forces and contractors.

I assumed no such thing. But after decades of a suppressed media in Iraq, I’m sure there are still some lessons to be learned in how to do investigative reporting. I don’t know if Iraqi universities have journalism schools, but perhaps some of the money could be used to establish or strengthen them.

So the Iraqis can have journalists like ours? Who actively try to undermine all faith in the political system in favour of a nebulous and smug sort of nihilism? Better to let the Iraqis teach national pride and history - we’re not allowed to have national pride in Britain, anymore. It’s somehow not inclusive enough.
If you’d actually bothered to read the WP article, information campaigns like this played a large part in the fightback against AQI, JAM and the Iranian Special Groups. It is not possible to win a struggle against insurgents without psy-ops.

Flying Rodent - go and look at http://www.longwarjournal.org/ This is about the most reliable source of information about the war against Islamist terrorism. Last twenty four hours in Iraq: “Coalition forces captured ten al Qaeda in Iraq operatives in northern and central Iraq. Iraqi forces detained a senior al Qaeda leader and 14 operatives in Mosul. Police captured a senior al Qaeda leader in Wasit province. One Iraqi soldier was killed after two US helicopters collided in Baghdad.”