"What's going on in Iraq - if this is America, we're in deep shit"

[swag]

Journalist Laura Rozen has blogged some of a recent Rolling Stone piece on Iraq at her site, which is definitely worth a daily visit:

http://www.warandpiece.com/

Excerpts:

Hoping to contain the damage, the Army offers the press a tour of the prison. . . When the bus arrives, the reporters file off and approach a massive expanse of tents, each housing twenty-five prisoners. A soldier screams, "No talking to the detainees!" But as soon as the prisoners catch sight of the press corps, pandemonium erupts. Dressed in rags, the Iraqis press their bodies against double layers of barbed wire. There are hundreds of them: shouting, holding up crude signs or crutches. Several wave prosthetic legs. "Where's the freedom?" they shout in Arabic. "Is this the freedom?" A prisoner with a bullhorn denounces Americans in English: "They've taken away our freedom, our liberty, our rights!" The military's staged press tour has devolved into unscripted chaos.

Farnaz Fassihi of the Wall Street Journal stands frozen. "I feel like I'm in a bad dream," she whispers. "God, what have the Americans done?"
. . .

In the days leading up to the June 30th hand-over . . . several journalists are ambushed on the outskirts of Baghdad. Four more contractors are killed, this time on the road to the airport. In Fallujah, the U.S.-supported Iraqi Brigade is camped outside the city, while inside, insurgents rule. . .

"This is our doing," King says, looking out at the Green Zone across the river from his hotel. He seems unable to believe that his country has created such a disaster. "This isn't America, what's going on in Iraq," he says. "It's not the America I know. This is scary. If this is America, then we're in deep shit."

. . .

Rolling Stone piece:

http://www.rollingstone.com/news/story/_/id/6186837?rnd=1098283669179&has-player=true&version=6.0.12.1040

[mike_c]

1. it IS Amerika, and we are in deep shit....

What's more, most Amerikans are more concerned about Scot Peterson than they are about the crimes being committed in their names around the world. Most are more deeply worried about what "the terra-ists"might be doing than about fascism becoming the face of Amerika.

[pansypoo53219]

2. on radio this am

talking to women, this woman says 'well, there really isn't any difference between the candidates.'
WHAT??? who the fuck got us INTO this mess??
got i hate these uncritical thinking twits.

[Wright Patman]

3. This guy could soon be one of

the "dead Enders" Rummy is always talking about. But he's pretty clever if this is any indication:

David Enders, a twenty-three-year-old freelancer, takes taxis around Baghdad, lives in an unfortified hotel and has many Iraqi friends. Instead of traveling with armed goons, he relies on a much cheaper form of protection: He tells people he's French. "No one wants to kill French people," Enders says. "Plus, they charge you less if they think you're French. My taxi bills have been cut in half."

As to the woman saying there's no difference, in terms of this phony "Global War on Terror," she may be right. I see no indication that Kerry would scale it back at all. If we don't eventually recognize that this is a sham and illusion, the military-industrial complex will spend all of us outside its bubble into penury. There'll be no middle class and certainly no more Social Security or Medicare to speak of.