Posted on 09/22/2008 1:10:28 AM PDT by Tennessean4Bush
BAGHDAD — At first, I didn’t recognize the place.
On Karada Mariam, a street that runs over the Tigris River toward the Green Zone, the Serwan and the Zamboor, two kebab places blown up by suicide bombers in 2006, were crammed with customers. Farther up the street was Pizza Napoli, the Italian place shut down in 2006; it, too, was open for business. And I’d forgotten altogether about Abu Nashwan’s Wine Shop, boarded up when the black-suited militiamen of the Mahdi Army had threatened to kill its owners. There it was, flung open to the world.
Two years ago, when I last stayed in Baghdad, Karada Mariam was like the whole of the city: shuttered, shattered, broken and dead.
Abu Nawas Park — I didn’t recognize that, either. By the time I had left the country in August 2006, the two-mile stretch of riverside park was a grim, spooky, deserted place, a symbol for the dying city that Baghdad had become.
These days, the same park is filled with people: families with children, women in jeans, women walking alone. Even the nighttime, when Iraqis used to cower inside their homes, no longer scares them. I can hear their laughter wafting from the park. At sundown the other day, I had to weave my way through perhaps 2,000 people. It was an astonishing, beautiful scene — impossible, incomprehensible, only months ago.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
ping for later
If you can read this, thank a teacher. If you can read this in English, thank a soldier.
no thanks to the democrats
no thanks to Ron Paul or Chuck Hagel
Baghdag -— Ping
And if you are blessed enough to be able to witness with your own eyes what this reporter is relating, thank a soldier as well.
I've been putting it on here for a few months now. The transformation is amazing. It is awe-inspiring. This is a normal big city now with busy streets, crowded markets, parks and restaurants. The look of fear and weariness so prevalent on the Iraqis' faces a couple of years ago has been replaced with expressions of cheerfulness and renewed vigor.
And I believe it's just going to keep getting better.
Dexter Filkins, he’s promoting the “war is nearly done” story.
I tend to agree with him, even if he is selling a book.
Iraq ping.
Wow, Obama did all that with one brief visit? Amazing!
I hope you didn’t pay for the paper.
Wonderful to read; I pray for the Iraqi’s because of what they’ve lived through and hope for their future. Of course NYT has to be stupified instead of logically grateful to our awesome troops! 2ndDivision, thanks for the reminder to be thankful for my teachers; it’s definitely much more on my mind to be grateful to our troops on a daily basis but reading gives me freedom to not rely on the drive-by media for info, that’s for sure.
jveritas called this early.
"You're either with us or you are with the terrorists."
So did I. On several occassions, starting four years ago. I was flamed by a lot of FReepers for it, and not one of them has been big enough to admit he or she was wrong.
It just kind of goes to show the character of people who are quick to flame.
So did I. On several occassions, starting four years ago. I was flamed by a lot of FReepers for it, and not one of them has been big enough to admit he or she was wrong.jveritas called this early.
It just kind of goes to show the character of people who are quick to flame.
With all due respect, I called it right after the invasion - but that was before 2006, when it began to look to serious commentators like things were unravelling. jveritas called the success of the surge early.
With all due respect, you probably never saw my frequent posts on the unreported progress as it was being made here and my assessments of same.
It's OK, though. I have plenty of validation around FR.
Thanks for all you've done and reported here!
Yes you do!
.
Since you are on the ground there, I usually look for your posts on the subject.
Honest observers are a treasure for those who value accurate information.
Gotta apply the translator here.
Back in Iraq, The Times and the MSM are Jarred by Their Growing Inability to Use the Iraq War for Political Purposes
That's more like it!
Even the liberal media cannot deny our VICTORY no matter how they try. At the end they have to admit it even when they hate to do so.
What do you mean by this?
They are likely among those who called me names and said I was living in a fantasy world a few years ago when I was predicting peace, victory and the democracy taking hold. There were those who scoffed when I said the surge would work well before it began.
I wish I could remember who those FReepers were...but maybe this is a good way to find out. I think I've spotted one. LOL
How often we were blasted with lies of "Iraqis are incompatible with Democracy" and "Iraqis can only be governed by force" or tales of how Al Qaeda had "unlimited" numbers of recruits for their war in Iraq.
Soon the criticism will *shift* from the old "the war is lost" line ... to something like "the victory cost too much."
Because those who opposed doing the right thing, be it the Democrats on the Left or the Buchanon/Barr/Hagel/Ron Paul groupies on the Right...aren't going to stand for admitting that they were ever wrong.
They are intolerant and incapable of admitting their own failures, even as they pretended that our endeavor in Iraq had itself "failed."
Iraq is won!
We've lost 3 good soldiers in Iraq to hostile fire in this entire month. American cities can lose that many policemen in that time or less, and the press isn't calling our cities "at war" much less "lost."
So Al Qaeda has lost Iraq as a base. No more safe haven.
Moreover, Saddam Hussein is no longer a threat to regional stability there.
Nor has Iran conquered its neighbor.
Excellent post.
There's a personality type, that when you are talking about an experience that happened to you, will tell you what really happened.
Yes, I remember you were trashed a few times for hanging in there as well.
We knew it was going to work even when the sound of bombs going off was the norm. Those days seem somewhat like a bad dream now, but I do remember them very clearly.
I just chatted with an Iraqi shop owner who is a friend earlier this afternoon and he was exulting at how much better things are now. He is excited about Eid-al-Fitr this year because he says it is the first one in a while that there is peace and they can really get serious about celebrating.
Some of my Iraqi co-workers are planning trips to see family in various areas of the country (such as Ramadi, Erbil and Basra) for the first time in a few years because they finally feel it is safe enough to do so.
LOL - I even had people telling me I was dead wrong and posting links from the WaPo and NYT to prove it. Any laugh was appreciated back in those days, though and that's exactly what I derived from comments like that.
Oh, and there was the one who told me my "vision" was "skewed" because I was here. I really cracked up at that one.
And if you can read it on the internet, thank Al Gore.
Thank you for your on the ground reports and the work you do, Allegra.
I have never had any doubts about the goodness of our troops and the value of spreading freedom throughout the world. It is a noble profession and I thank God for people like you.
Sounds like the sort of name Raymond Chandler would have given to a milquetoast.....
"I don't know how a man like Dexter Filkins could end up with a dame like her.... I watched as they moved through the crowd. Marian was a force of nature: the crowd parted before her. Dexter followed along, trying to look like he was leading the way. He reminded me of one of those little monkeys at the zoo that clings to his mother's back."
Yeah, but I notice you're still looking for that perfect pair of socks.
you probably never saw my frequent posts on the unreported progress as it was being made here and my assessments of same.
I didn't mean to imply that jveritas was the only one - I guess that since he was known for his efforts to translate the cashe of documents the US government had acquired from Saddam's intelligence agency, I instantly put great store in his opinion. So that, for me personally, jveritas was "fustest with the mostest" in assuring me that in fact the surge had succeded decisively.
Memo to NYT: That’s because we won.
And you lost.
What-evah. ;-)
This is my quest.
I knew the surge was really working back when the media stopped talking about Iraq. They were smugly happy to report on the country back when it looked like Iraq was falling apart. But lately, stories about Iraq have gotten rarer and rarer.
I remember I'd be home on R&R during those days and see the news and think "Oh, my gosh...things have gotten so much worse in the short time I've been away!"
Then I'd realize I was listening to the media. I would come back here and things would be no worse at all. But that was when I recognized just how badly the media was distorting things and how easy it was for people to fall into their trap.
Thanks Tennessean4Bush.
Thanks for the ping. It’s truly outstanding news.
And to think...that Bush held on even with all the odds against him ( the MSM, the DEms, the Traitors of our Fifth Column, etc.).
I am thrilled that we did not succomb. The only sad note I feel is that Bush, Petraeus and our fine noble warriors will not get celebratory credit as they all deserve.
When McCain/Palin win, THAT will be my validation.
It is really sad that President Bush and our brave troops will not get the celebratory credit that they deserve for achieving this immense VICTORY in Iraq. However I am absolutely sure that history will give them full credit for this VICTORY 10 or 15 years from now and we as nation will be eternally grateful for them.
Agreed.
Praise God for these wonderful results!
The correct answer is "yes." It amazes me the lengths to which many in the MSM still stubbornly go in order to refuse to admit the reality of victory. The quagmire narrative has failed and they cling to it like drowning men to straws.
At this point it isn't a matter of blaming Bush for the war anymore, but it is a matter of insisting that the war had to fail because it ran contrary to the internationalist paradigm of collective (hold your laughter) security. One British commentator grandiloquently repeated the party line over the weekend that the Iraq war had forever cost American foreign policy its credibility. Better look again, son.
LOL!!! You gotta give the guy his props!
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