The Common Ills: Baghdad governor says 4 Americans arrested

Friday, January 13, 2012

Baghdad governor says 4 Americans arrested

Al Mada is reporting today that 4 Americans -- 2 men, 2 women -- have been arrested in Iraq. They were carrying weapons according to the governor of Baghad, Salah Abdul Razak. They were in a BMW which was stopped at a checkpoint and they were discovered with weapons. They displayed some form of identity badges but they were arrested and our in police custody with the Sixth Brigade conducting the investigation.

In other news, Press TV reports this morning that 35,000 security forces are now being deployed to protect the pilgrims. The question is, since Arbaeen ends tomorrow, and since the pilgrims have been attacked since last weekend, why, only now, are these 35,000 being deployed?

Staying with violence, Reuters reports two police officers in Mosul are injured after attempting to storm a suspect's home when the suspect detonated a bomb killing himself and 2 other people, a Hamman al-Alil roadside bombing claimed the life of 1 police officer and left one more injured, a Baquba roadside bombing injured three Iraqi soldiers and 1 corpse was discovered in Khanaqin.

Earlier we just rolled our eyes as Adnan al-Daini thought to lecture the Iraqis (he's a British citizen who was born in Iraq) by lecturing them -- and it was a lecture -- by quoting European Dead Famous Male to them (was Edmund Burke? who cares it was crap). We just rolled our eyes and moved right on. Now al-Daini is insisting:

The two army personnel were Sunni Muslims from different parts of Iraq. They made the ultimate sacrifice to protect the Shia pilgrims. They acted instinctively to save fellow human beings; Shia or Sunni did not occur to them.
Western media have covered the story of the carnage and other stories of sectarian violence and intolerance in detail, so why ignore the heroism of the soldiers? These brave men are the true representatives of the Iraqi people. Their martyrdom symbolizes the unity of the people in the face of terrorists targeting the innocent, in the name of a warped and insane interpretation of the noble religion of Islam.
With their ultimate sacrifice, the two men have put self-serving Iraqi politicians to shame as they squabble, incapable of thinking or behaving outside their narrow self-interest, and ready to play the sectarian or ethnic card if it helps to consolidate their power base and interests.

We ignored that bulls**t here. It was in the Iraqi newspapers earlier this week and really hit on Wednesday. It was covered by English language outlets yesterday.

We ignored it -- and this may be why media outlets in the US did -- because it's nonsense. Three children were killed yesterday. Because? Their father was Sahwa.

Their father's Sunni. Sunnis are targeted. To make it appear that they aren't, the Baghdad government used two dead Sunnis. Maybe they died as portayed, maybe they felt what they supposedly felt. I have no reason to believe it. I do recall Ronald Reagan's idiotic 'true' story about a pilot who gave his life so that others could live (if the story had been true, there was no witness to it -- the story was false and Reagan got it from a movie, from a really bad movie).

It was before the Parliament, it was lauded by the Baghdad government. Why wasn't it covered? Why would it be? If true, it was politicized. And there are real issues going on. Maybe if Nouri was finding jobs for Sahwa -- instead of having them arrested and killed -- you'd have some news. But you don't have any, you have propaganda. It's not news. Maybe if al-Daini's really quiet, he can hear Edmund Burke explaining that to him?

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