Michele Catalano publishes some positive messages on the turnover from Iraqi bloggers.
Oliver Willis switches in and out of narrative and basically says all those Iraqi bloggers could be Bush plants. There is debate about whether this is a position he holds (mostly due to wording issues). Evidently the phrase “seriously though” is supposed to indicate that the previous paragraphs were some sort of snark…
Michele follows up with a thoughful essay.
I was following the back and forth to this point, then I ventured into the comments. That’s were all hell breaks loose. Exhibit A – Pandagon, where a commenters ask for then post the DNS registration information for ASV. That’s sooooo not relevant… (Note if it disappears that’s a good thing).
Update: Pandagon says:
I fear Iraqis able to access the internet and blog in perfect English might not represent the average man on the street.
Yeah I always thought that Salam Pax guy was a fake… Oh, maybe that’s not who he meant…
It did disappear as soon as I was made aware of it. There’s no excuse for posting bloggers personal information and it’s site policy to take it down immediately.
By the way, calling somebody a fake and calling them unrepresentative of the populace at large are very different things. Erasing the distinction serves no purpose for your argument…
What the hell? Thank you for pointing that out, Kevin. And thank you for taking it down, Ezra.
What is the point of posting someone’s info, if not to be threatening against them? I don’t get it.
Michele: FYI… you could go to Whois and put your information on the Private Registration list… it will then list alternative information in the Whois public database.
I have to agree with Ezra. I am glad there are some Iraqi’s with an optimistic viewpoint and some grattitude for my tax dollars spent, but the polls would indicate that the posters are in a VERY small minority. Nevertheless, it is relatively irrelevant in the bigger picture, Iraq is a country on the brink of chaos, and the the important thing is that we do all we can to fix that. Based on our track record in Afghanistan, I am skeptical, but I have high hopes.
And if you’ll remember, Salam Pax got a mighty big f-you from bloggers like James Lileks and Instapundit when he didn’t thank great white father effusively enough for his “liberation”.
And rightfully so–complaining that AC isn’t working 24/7 or that the removal of an entrenched thuggish regime didn’t go as smoothly as a Duluth PTA meeting is fairly unseemly given the sacrifices made on his behalf–even if he does’t/didn’t see it.