Iraqi Public Opinion
47 percent of Iraqis surveyed in October said that the country is headed in the right direction (37 percent said it wasn't). That's a higher percentage than last year, when 42 percent of Iraqis thought so (45 percent did not)
Education
Primary-school enrollment has jumped 20 percent over the Saddam years.. In a country where 22 percent of adults never attended school, this is a momentous change. It's also a change going almost entirely unreported by U.S. news organizations. A Lexis-Nexis search for the terms "Iraq" and "school" or "schools" in the last month in the New York Times, The Washington Post, the Boston Globe, the Los Angeles Times and the San Francisco Chronicle turns up 331 articles. None is about schools in Iraq. The terms "Iraq" and "Ministry of Education" show up only four times in the last year. Only one story covered the Iraqi education ministry.
Gross Domestic Product
Iraq's GDP rebounded by an estimated 50 percent in 2004, according to the IMF, mostly due to increased oil revenues. About one-third of Iraqis are unemployed -- an alarming rate -- but this is sigificantly better than two years ago, when half or more of Iraqis were unemployed. A Lexis-Nexis search shows that the terms "Iraq" and "GDP" or "Gross Domestic Product" appeared together in the above papers in just 10 articles in the last month. Only two actually discussed Iraq's GDP.
None of which readers of major American newspapers would know unless they consult other sources.
Political
The Iraqis have held two successful, national, free elections in the past year The first in January, electing an interim parliament; number two on October 15th, ratifying the new Iraqi constitution. And a third will be held -- and will doubtless be even more successful than the first -- on December 15th, choosing the first freely elected parliament under a constitution ratified by the people in any Arab (or Persian) country in the Middle East.
"It is like night and day from 10 months ago in terms of level of participation and political awareness,"
Sunni Arabs, who account for an estimated 20 percent of Iraq's population, held most top positions in the Hussein government but have seen their influence erode significantly since his ouster. They've formed the Iraqi Islamic Party. They say, "Everyone here is excited. The mood and busyness are so much better than before when we just waited to see what would happen," said B.B. Abdul Qadir, an Iraqi Islamic Party official who said his party's goal was to win 60 seats in the 275-seat parliament. "Now we can't wait for the voting to start."
I wrote previously about this saying, "The Sunni Arabs start out determined to oppose Iraqs new Government (perhaps because they thought that a Ba'athist controlled Iraq could re-emerge with the help of al Qaeda and leftists the world over), but as the majority of Iraqis eagerly take part in the democratic process, these home grown Iraqi insurgents end up marginalizing themselves in the political process and waring with their fellow citizens. Now they have a choice. They can continue down this dark path or they can seek a truce with their fellow citizens and particpate in a system of self determination. This is the situation we have created in Iraq."
Security
Perspective denied you by the Democrat Media - General Abizaid: The insurgency is in 4 of 18 provinces, not all 18. You do not hear about the 14 provinces where there is no insurgency and where things are going well. The insurgency in Afghanistan is primarily in Kandahar province (former home of the taliban) and in the mountain region of the Pakistan border. The rest of the country is doing well.
Iraq suicide blasts at lowest level in 7 months
Major General Rich Lynch, top spokesman in Iraq: “In the month of November: only 23 suicide attacks; the lowest we’ve seen in the last seven months, the direct result of the effectiveness of our operations.”
11.5% drop in U.S. fatalities in November
Fatalities dropped from 96 in October to 85 in November, despite the fact that November was the month of the phenomenally successful Operation Steel Curtain in Anbar and Ninawa, driving the terrorists out of their somewhat-less-than-safe houses along the Syrian border.
President Bush - There are now more than 120 Iraqi Army and Police combat battalions actively fighting against the terrorists. Of these, about 80 Iraqi battalions are fighting side-by-side with coalition forces, and about 40 others are taking the lead in the fight. Most of these 40 battalions are controlling their own battle space, and conducting their own operations against the terrorists with some coalition support.... At this moment, over 30 Iraqi Army battalions have assumed primary control of their own areas of responsibility. In Baghdad, Iraqi battalions have taken over major sectors of the capital -- including some of the city's toughest neighborhoods.
We've officially transferred 90 square miles of the Baghdad province to the Iraqis
Over a dozen bases in Iraq have been handed over to the Iraqi government -- including Saddam Hussein's former palace in Tikrit, which has served as the coalition headquarters in one of Iraq's most dangerous regions." The current policy of clear and hold has liberated 28 cities from terrorist control; those cities, including such major urban centers as Fallujah and Ramadi, are now controlled by pro-government Iraqis.
The terrorists and the Baathist bitter-enders have been unable to hold any territory whatsoever. Not only that, they have been unable to get a national front off the ground -- a national front is a unified and cohesive ideology that engages the support of a substantial portion of the population. But the goal of the die-hards (Saddam Hussein back on the throne) is rejected even by the Sunnis; and the terrorists' goal (a Mesopotamian caliphate with Zarqawi ruling the joint) is so terrifying to nearly all Iraqis that even with the very significant number of murders of police and army recruits, they continue to flood in... and more and more are Sunnis.
Democrat National Comittee Chairman Howard Dean December 5th, 2005
Summing up why membership to the Democrat party requires becoming a part of the fantasy based community:
Dean says, The President has made a "permanent commitment to a failed strategy".
Deposed Dictator - Check
Improving Security and Economic conditions - Check
A constitutional democracy in Iraq - DECEMBER 15th 2005!!!
Dean then tells us the Democrats hope for the future of Iraq when he says, "The idea that we're going to win this war is just plain wrong."
Dean then explains that he has no concept of what is involved in fighting a war by saying, "We need to be out of there and take the targets off our troops' back."
How stupid are you if you fail to grasp the basic premise that when soldiers go to war, the enemy puts them in their sights? To remove them as "targets" is to cut and run.
The Vermont abortionist went further, telling us his plans for troop "redeployment". He said that he backed the redeployment of 20,000 troops to Afghanistan and a force in the Middle East to deal with al Qaeda in Iraq leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, but not in Iraq. Wow! Just let him have Iraq, right Dr. Death? Pining for a slaughter that the Khmer Rouge would hail you for?
Sun up, Sun down: LET THE BACK TRACKING BEGIN!
Dean claims his quote "was a little out of context". What's the proper context, Dr. Death? "Quagmire"? That's what your boy, Murtha, is saying! And the Democrat Minority Leader in the House of Representatives, Nancy Pelosi backs his call for "immediate withdrawal" or "redeployment" as the spin goes. But it seems Pelosi doesn't expect the other Democrats in the House to adopt her defeatism. "Pelosi spokesman Brendan Daly said that while Pelosi estimates more than half of House Democrats favor a speedy withdrawal, she will lobby members in today's meeting against adopting this as a caucus position." Underscoring the pure political calculaiton of it all, Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee Chairman Rahm Emanuel (Ill.) and Rep. Steny H. Hoyer (Md.), the second-ranking House Democratic leader, have told colleagues that Pelosi's recent endorsement of a speedy withdrawal, combined with her claim that more than half of House Democrats support her position, could backfire on the party. And just to make sure we've shed sufficient light on the divide between the Democrat "leadership" of Dean, Pelosi, Kerry, and Murtha and the handful of Democrats who recognize the edge of the cliff that the Kos Kidz and Moveondotnever have been been hurridly carrying the Democrat party toward, North Dakota Democat Earl Pomeroy had these kind words to offer the Democrat Comittee Chair: "Well my words to Howard Dean would be simple, shut up. He is not trusted with the senior policy responsibilities, he is the head of a political party, this is not his job, comments like he made are not helpful, they don't reflect views of democrats in congress and you know they just he does not have license at this point to be expressing his personal opinion in that way."
This is what that handful of Democrats is afraid of:
77 percent of Afghans say their country is headed in the right direction Ninety-one percent prefer the current Afghan government to the Taliban regime, and 87 percent call the U.S.-led overthrow of the Taliban good for their country. Osama bin Laden, for his part, is as unpopular as the Taliban; nine in 10 view him unfavorably.
Progress fuels these views: Despite the country’s continued problems, 85 percent of Afghans say living conditions there are better now than they were under the Taliban. Eighty percent cite improved freedom to express political views. And 75 percent say their security from crime and violence has improved as well. After decades of oppression and war, many Afghans see a better life.
Democats other plans for winning, besides "quagmire" and "immediate withdrawal" include: Timetables which aren't actually a plan at all, rather nothing more than a way to hopefully bash Bush at a later date. They also refer to this non-plan as calling for "benchmarks for success". Again, the emphasis is on Bush providing Democrats with a crystal-ball-esque picture of exactly what will happen in the future down to every single IED the enemy uses. They aren't actually offering any suggestions relating to attaining our goals in Iraq. That's because they don't have any. It's never been about constructive critisism when Democrats trash Bush about what's happening in Iraq. It's about scoring political points off of any and all losses we suffer when undertaking a difficult task. Did Democrats expect that we would take out Saddam Hussein and foster a democracy in Iraq without taking these losses? No. They simply chose to benefit from them. It's why they read the names of our dead on the news or plant white crosses and white flags in public view meant to represent them. It's why they even bother to mention the wounded and their suffering. You need no more evidence of their true feelings for our service men and women than to see what they do to the soldiers that don't die or suffer injuries. They bitch about them burning dead enemy bodies, imprisoning their enemies, shooting wounded enemies who are known to play possum, humiliating their enemies, or using "white phosphorus" against their enemies. And for good measure they MAKE UP LIES ABOUT WHAT OUR SOLDIERS DO TO THEIR ENEMIES! Things like inflating the number of Iraqi civilians killed or wounded or refusing to even admit that we don't target such individuals makes our soldiers out to be heartless killers rather than the heros they are! And when Democrats aren't doing that, what are they doing? Tearing down support for the war at home by lying about pre-war intelligence assessments they agreed with, supporting liars like Joe Wilson, and crying over the non-outing of his Langley desk jockey wife. This is the sum of the Democrat contribution to the war in Iraq and the larger War on Terror.
Next Thursday, Iraq will officially become a constitutional democracy. We have suffered losses in order to attain this goal, and we will suffer more before the Iraqis can adequately provide their own security. Our efforts in Iraq will be successful as is evidenced by the progress we've made and our success in Afghanistan. No thanks to the Democrats.
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