Major Major Major Major
The Chaldean Bishop of Baghdad accuses western media of sitting on the good news:
Bishop [Andraos] Abouna, a Chaldean Catholic, told the Catholic Herald in London that the situation in Iraq is steadily improving rather than descending into a morass resembling the Vietnam War, as often depicted by media outlets.
"It's getting better but still there are many problems," Bishop Abouna said. "The first problem is that they need security, then they need water and electricity -- and all these things are getting better."
Funny factor: In Arabic, the honorific for a priest is "Abouna," so before His Eminence was elevated to the bishopric, he was known as "Father Father."
[I wrote about the challenges facing the Chaldeans way back when.]
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Glenn is grinding an axe, and he's not very convincing. Virginia Postrel has a much more sensible take:
http://www.dynamist.com/weblog/archives/000533.html
You shouldn't make fun of people with double names. It isn't funny. It isn't funny.
Do Ghali's friends call him Boutros or Boutros Boutros?
Glenn Reynolds wrote extensively on this subject several days ago. Acording to him, the press is skewing coverage negatively for several reasons: they don't tend to leave Baghdad, which is in much worse shape than the rest of the country, the press always tends to consider bad news to be "news" while good news is just "normal", they are still using their old ministry of information handlers, and they are harboring resentments about being so wrong about how the war would go....
Those who actually travel to Iraq (such as a recent contigent of Democratic congressmen) come away stunned at how divergent reality is from the impression provided in the media.
Knock it off.
-Reuben Boutmje Boutmje and Wang Zhi Zhi.