Billboards, Posters Offer Baghdad Hope

[Rose Siding]

Thousands of posters and billboards dot Baghdad with messages of hope for a city of gloom, where residents largely stay home, afraid of the streets, their pain and grief deepening every day amid unending violence.

"No matter how strong the storm, it will go away in the end," declares the message on one poster, with a picture of a worried young woman clasping a boy to her body, her hand protectively placed over his head, her hair fluttering in the wind.

Hundreds of copies of the poster -- and at least one giant one on a billboard -- can be seen throughout the city, pasted on concrete blast walls and outside buildings....

U.S. and Iraqi authorities have long used billboards and posters to get their message out to a public confused by the rapid change that followed Saddam's overthrow. As far back as early 2004, authorities used posters and billboards to rally support for the country's nascent security forces in the midst of a growing Sunni insurgency. The U.S. military at times put up posters with congratulatory messages to Iraqis on religious occasions, trying to counter its image as a foreign occupier.

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/wire/sns-ap-iraq-keeping-hope,1,1028374.story?coll=sns-ap-world-headlines

[GreenPartyVoter]

1. Yeah, THAT makes it all better.

[leftchick]

2. our tax dollars hard at work

on something totally useless again. Well someone is getting rich printing tham up.