Tim writes:

> Point out only the bad parts and gloss over the good.  The fact that life is
> immensely better for the Iraqi people (as described in the previous post) is
> definitely outweighed by the lack of an appeals court.

Your comments suggest that you neither much watch television nor read the
news. There are indeed people in Iraq who feel that their lives are significantly
better now than they were under Hussein, but they tend to be the
well-educated classes: university professors, judges, etc., but they are also very much
the minority.

For most people, life is not "immensely better" now. It is actually a fair
bit harder, more fearful, less secure and less certain than it was under the
strict dictatorship of Hussein. Most people in Iraq, just as in the United
States, concern themselves very little with the politics of their country. Their
primary concerns are law and order, local security, currency stability and a
reliable method of earning a living. If those demands are met, the government can
go about doing pretty much anything it cares to do.

For a great many Iraqis, the world has been turned upside down. What was
certain before is now uncertain and thus a matter of great concern. It's been said
of the Iraqis, just as it has been of the Russians, that it may take a
generation before the people of Iraq fully adapt to the promise of the new situation.

Circumstances in Iraq are getting better, but that process is being achieved
quite slowly and it's not guaranteed to stay that way. Iraq is going to be
dependent on the United States for a great long while to come. It is an enormous
way from becoming a Western liberal democracy; indeed, it's best path may lie
in first becoming a liberal Islamic state, where freedom of religion, speech
and a representative government are guaranteed.

Wirt Atmar

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