Comments on: Building Democracy, One Warlord at a Time

By: Michael

Michael — Wed, 26 Mar 2008 15:50:15 +0000

Sure, Zobaie is anti-al-Qaeda, but I’ll bet that Saddam Hussein would have been, too, if we’d paid him enough.

Saddam was already anti-Al-Qaeda, being on their hit list and all for promoting a secular society.

He supported other terrorists, mostly Palestinian, but not Al Qaeda. Not all terrorists are the same, and supporting one group doesn't mean another isn't trying to kill you.

By: tequila

tequila — Wed, 26 Mar 2008 12:51:57 +0000

So we got rid of an ugly Sunni-run dictatorship that oppressed its own people and replaced it with ...

By: Richard Gardner

Richard Gardner — Wed, 26 Mar 2008 06:44:59 +0000

I'm not so sure after reading the Michael Totten columns on Fallujah, particularly on its jails (not prisons). But yes, the average American doesn't have any connection to Fallujah, and probably considers the inhabitants savages/barbarians if they even consider them at all. (Not true, but most do not follow this - Afghanistan and Pakistan, OTOH, I consider they have lots of barbarians)

In the city’s overcrowded, Iraqi-run jail, located inside a compound that also houses a U.S. military base and U.S. police advisers, detainees were beaten with iron rods, according to the current warden.

Um, the Americans should be telling the Iraqi's how to run their country, micromanaging like Jimmy Crater? Guilt by locality? Jeffrry Dahmer was in Milwaukee, so everyone there is a freak?

You expect micromanagement.