Some good is done.

[mjosparky 4]

This is a letter from Ray Reynolds, a medic in
the Iowa Army National
Guard, serving in Iraq:

As I head off to Baghdad for the final
weeks of my stay in Iraq, I wanted to say thanks to all
of you who did not believe the media. They
have done a very poor job of covering everything
that has happened.
I am sorry that I have not been able to visit all of you
during my two week leave back home. And just so you can rest
at night knowing something is happening in Iraq that is noteworthy,
I thought I would pass this on to you. This is the list of things that has
happened in Iraq recently: (Please share it with your friends and compare
it to the version that your paper is producing.)

* Over 400,000 kids have up-to-date immunizations.
* School attendance is up 80% from levels
before the war.
* Over 1,500 schools have been renovated and
rid of the weapons stored there so education can occur.
* The port of Uhm Qasar was renovated so grain
can be off-loaded from ships faster.
* The country had its first 2 billion barrel export of oil in August.
* Over 4.5 million people have clean drinking water for the first time
ever in Iraq.
* The country now receives 2 times the
electrical power it did before the war.
* 100% of the hospitals are open and fully
staffed, compared to 35% before the war.
* Elections are taking place in every major
city, and city councils are in place.
* Sewer and water lines are installed in every major city.
* Over 60,000 police are patrolling the streets.
* Over 100,000 Iraqi civil defense police are
securing the country.
* Over 80,000 Iraqi soldiers are patrolling the
streets side by side with US soldiers.
* Over 400,000 people have telephones for the
first time ever.
* Students are taught field sanitation and hand
washing techniques to prevent the spread of germs.
* An interim constitution has been signed.
* Girls are allowed to attend school.
* Textbooks that don't mention Saddam are in
the schools for the first time in 30 years.

Don't believe for one second that these people
do not want us there. I have met many, many people from Iraq
that want us there, and in a bad way. They say they will never
see the freedoms we talk about but they hope their children will.
We are doing a good job in Iraq and I challenge
anyone, anywhere to dispute me on these facts.
So If you happen to run into John Kerry, be sure to give him my email
address and send him to Denison, Iowa. This soldier will set him
straight. If you are like me and very disgusted with how this period of
rebuilding has been portrayed, email this to a friend and let them know there are
good things happening.

Ray Reynolds, SFC
Iowa Army National Guard
234th Signal Battalion

My idea of a fair fight is clubbing baby seals

[Unstable 9]

Thank you for posting that. I think we hear too much of the consequences and not enough of the MUCH MUCH more numerous benifits....

=========Shaun ==========

[quade 4]

And . . . was this sent to you personally by the person that wrote it or is this a chain letter?

Edited to add:
Ahhh, widely circulated on the internet.

Commentary available on Snopes.com and OrwellianTimes.Com

quade -
The World's Most Boring Skydiver

[mjosparky 4]

Paul,
OrwellianTimes.com needs to get their fact straight before questioning someone elses.

Quote

Contrary to the information in the email I received, Sgt. Reynolds is not a medic. He does communications work. In fact, the 234th Signal Battalion's "mission is to provide wide area communications support in a theater of operations."[*] Sgt. Reynolds' civilian job is as a police officer.

He is in fact a Medic. All Units have medics including the 234th Signal Battalion.
His civilian job is not as a Police officer but as a FireFighter.

And yes, I did call Mike McKennan in Denison. Sgt. Reynolds is a real person and he wrote that real letter.
Sparky

My idea of a fair fight is clubbing baby seals

[juanesky 0]

Paul,

FYI, in the Orwellian times, it states that last year Unicef provided "25 million" doses of vaccines, while the TOTAL population is close to 25 Mill.

What does it mean to you?

"According to some of the conservatives here, it sounds like it's fine to beat your wide - as long as she had it coming." -Billvon

[Nightingale 0]

um... perhaps they're vaccinating for multiple diseases?

[TheAnvil 0]

I would think so. Think of all the vaccines we get over here: polio, typhoid, hep A/B, measles, etc. Over there, I'd hope they'd get a few more - cholera, yellow fever, small pox, etc.

Vinny the Anvil
Post Traumatic Didn't Make The Lakers Syndrome is REAL
JACKASS POWER!!!!!!

[kallend 2,103]

And Mussolini made the trains run on time.


Tomorrow is the 50th anniversary of the French defeat at Dien Bien Phu. Many French still wonder why the Vietnamese wanted them out, when the French had done so much for the Vietnamese.

Fact is, the US and UK are occupying powers that invaded a sovereign nation under false pretenses. A nation that had not threatened the US or UK, and, according to the CIA, presented no actual threat to the US or UK.

I suspect that in 50 years time, the Iraq war will be looked at in much the same way as we now view the French occupation of Vietnam. A big f**king mistake made by an arrogant nation that led to a quagmire.

...

The only sure way to survive a canopy collision is not to have one.

[gary350 0]

Quote

I suspect that in 50 years time, the Iraq war will be looked at in much the same way as we now view the French occupation of Vietnam. A big f**king mistake made by an arrogant nation that led to a quagmire.

Wrong! About the 50 years part, anyway.

What the Iraqis themselves think:
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/nationworld/2001915405_poll29.html

BAGHDAD, Iraq — A solid majority of Iraqis support an immediate pullout of U.S. troops even in the face of greater danger, and only one in three now believe that the U.S.-led occupation is doing more good than harm, according to a new USA Today/CNN/Gallup Poll.

What Americans think:
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/04/29/politics/29POLL.html?hp

April 29, 2004
Support for War Is Down Sharply, Poll Concludes
By RICHARD W. STEVENSON
and JANET ELDER

Support for the war in Iraq has eroded substantially over the past several months, and Americans are increasingly critical of the way President Bush is handling the conflict, according to the latest New York Times/CBS News Poll.

After initially expressing robust backing for the war, the public is now evenly divided over whether the United States military should stay for as long as it takes to stabilize Iraq or pull out as soon as possible, the poll showed.

Asked whether the United States had done the right thing in taking military action against Iraq, 47 percent of respondents said it had, down from 58 percent a month earlier and 63 percent in December, just after American forces captured Saddam Hussein. Forty-six percent said the United States should have stayed out of Iraq, up from 37 percent last month and 31 percent in December.

The diminished public support for the war did not translate into any significant advantage for Mr. Bush's Democratic challenger, Senator John Kerry of Massachusetts. The poll showed the two men remaining in a statistical dead heat, both in a head-to-head matchup and in a three-way race that included Ralph Nader.

Support for Mr. Bush is stronger in other areas vital to his re-election, including his handling of the threat from terrorism, which won the approval of 60 percent of respondents.

Even so, just short of a year after Mr. Bush stood on the deck of the aircraft carrier Abraham Lincoln last May 1 and proclaimed the end to major combat operations under a banner reading "Mission Accomplished," his approval rating has slid from the high levels it reached during the war.

It now stands at 46 percent, the lowest level of his presidency in The Times/CBS News Poll, down from 71 percent last March and a high of 89 percent just after the terrorist attacks on Sept. 11, 2001.

At this point in his winning re-election race in 1996, President Bill Clinton's approval rating in The New York Times/CBS News Poll was 48 percent.

Mr. Bush's approval rating for his handling of Iraq was 41 percent, down from 49 percent last month and 59 percent in December.

The survey held hints of trouble for Mr. Kerry as he seeks to introduce himself to an electorate that knows relatively little about him. While 55 percent of Mr. Bush's supporters said they strongly favored the president, only 32 percent of Mr. Kerry's supporters strongly favored their candidate.

Sixty-one percent of voters said Mr. Kerry says what he thinks people want to hear, versus 29 percent who said he says what he believes. The Bush campaign has attacked Mr. Kerry for months on that score, portraying him as a flip-flopper with no convictions.

On the same question, 43 percent said Mr. Bush says what people want to hear and 53 percent said he says what he believes.

The poll, conducted from Friday to Tuesday, came during a month that has seen more American soldiers killed in Iraq than in any other month since the invasion 13 months ago. In the days before the poll was conducted, a Web site obtained and publicly released for the first time photographs of soldiers' coffins returning to the United States from Iraq.

"The only thing I think was good was when they got Saddam," said Anna Bartlow, 67, of Tulsa, Okla., a poll respondent who identified herself as a Republican. "That's the only thing that I think they did right, but if they were going to go over there just for him, they should have gotten him and then got out."

Of the Iraqis, Ms. Bartlow said, "Let them fight it out among themselves."

The poll questioned 1,042 people. It has a margin of sampling error of plus or minus three percentage points.

Terry Holt, a spokesman for the Bush campaign, questioned whether the poll accurately reflected public opinion. But, Mr. Holt said, the White House has all along expected the presidential race to be close until the very end.

"There will be tough times in Iraq," Mr. Holt said, "but the key to prevailing and winning the war on terror is steady, determined leadership."

Chad Clanton, a spokesman for Mr. Kerry, said the fact that the race remained essentially tied showed that Mr. Bush's attacks, including an aggressive advertising campaign, had failed to take down Mr. Kerry.

The poll suggested that American attitudes about the war were shifting in response to a daily barrage of disturbing images and news reports. Mr. Bush's advisers have asserted that Americans long ago made up their minds that the war was justified, and that violent flare-ups in Iraq would not hurt the president politically as long as the United States remained committed to creating a stable democracy there.

But the Times/CBS poll appeared to bolster the view of many Democrats that the intensified violence in Iraq would inevitably lead to questions about the wisdom of the war and Mr. Bush's leadership.

Asked whether the results of the war with Iraq were worth the loss of American lives and other costs, 33 percent of respondents said it was worth it. That was down from 37 percent at the beginning of April and 44 percent in December. Fifty-eight percent said it was not worth it, up from 54 percent at the start of the month and 49 percent in December.

At a time when American troops are engaged in fierce battles in Najaf and Falluja, two centers of the Iraqi insurgency, the poll found that 46 percent of Americans thought the United States military should remain in Iraq for as long as it takes to create a stable democracy, even if it takes a long time, and 46 percent said the United States should withdraw as soon as possible.

American perceptions of Iraqis haveH also shifted, the poll found. While 53 percent of Americans in a CBS News poll a year ago saw Iraqis as grateful for getting rid of Mr. Hussein, 38 percent see Iraqis feeling that way now. Forty-eight percent now view the Iraqis as resentful, up from 26 percent a year ago.

But the Iraq developments do not appear to have reshaped the presidential race in any discernible way.

If the election were held today, 46 percent of registered voters would vote for Mr. Kerry and 44 percent for Mr. Bush, the poll found. With Mr. Nader in the race, Mr. Bush would get 43 percent, Mr. Kerry 41 percent and Mr. Nader 5 percent, suggesting that nearly all of Mr. Nader's support comes from voters who would otherwise back the Democrat.

Follow-up interviews with people who took part in the poll suggested that the surge in violence in the past few months had led some Americans who supported the general goal of bringing democracy to Iraq to become more skeptical.

"It appears to me that we're not welcome there, and I don't know if I would have been able to support the invasion of Iraq if I had felt that the Iraqi people didn't welcome us there," said Michael Ryan, 54, of Ashland, Ore., who identified himself as a Democrat.

"I'm under the impression now that Dick Cheney came into office with an agenda for war in Iraq, and that George Bush had the same agenda, and that they were twisting the facts to justify the invasion," he said. "And I feel angry about it because I supported the U.S. invasion."

Violet Adams, 66, of Delta, Colo., who identified herself as a Republican, said she thought the United States would have to maintain a presence in the Middle East for a decade as part of the broader effort to confront Islamic terrorism.

"We either take them in their territory, on their turf, and keep them there, or we let them scatter all over the world and start their little cells, and then we'll all be living like Israel," Ms. Adams said.

Nick Dente, 46, of Fort Lauderdale, Fla., who identified himself as an independent, said he had not been a supporter of Mr. Bush but was open to backing him depending on how he conducted the fight against terrorism. In going to war with Iraq, Mr. Dente said, Mr. Bush took that fight in the wrong direction.

"I believe we've gotten sidetracked from finding Al Qaeda," he said.

Fred Backus contributed reporting for this article.

[tcnelson 1]

i guess we should have saddam, the unwitting victim, watch your kids next weekend.

"Don't talk to me like that assface...I don't work for you yet." - Fletch
NBFT, Deseoso Rodriguez RB#1329

[kallend 2,103]

Quote

i guess we should have saddam, the unwitting victim, watch your kids next weekend.

You mean the guy the US armed and supported during the 1980's, while he was gassing Iranians and Kurds?

...

The only sure way to survive a canopy collision is not to have one.

[rickjump1 0]

Quote

Tomorrow is the 50th anniversary of the French defeat at Dien Bien Phu. Many French still wonder why the Vietnamese wanted them out, when the French had done so much for the Vietnamese......

The French had been in Indochina for decades as colonists. They had no plans to ever leave. In Iraq, hopefully we and our allies can lead the people to self- government and then leave. The place may blow up, but we gave them a chance.

Do your part for global warming: ban beans and hold all popcorn farts.

• Quote

[kmcguffee 0]

Quote

according to the CIA, presented no actual threat to the US or UK

When did they say this? I think you are taking a statement out of context.

"Any fool can criticize, condemn and complain and most fools do." Ben Franklin

[mjosparky 4]

Quote

"Any fool can criticize, condemn and complain and most fools do." Ben Franklin

That is a great saying....and brings certain people to mind. Always condemning, never anything good to say.
Sparky

My idea of a fair fight is clubbing baby seals

[quade 4]

I was just showing the two most obvious points of view on this particular letter.

My -guess- is that there is actually more here than meets the eye.

There's definately precident to be suspicious of letters to editors, et al from US troops.

As you may or may not recall, there was a bruhaha about half a year ago where some commanding officer took it upon himself to have his troops sign letters that were sent to their hometown newspapers -- that the commanding officer wrote. All the letters were identical, but signed by different soldiers. BBC story

I'm certainly not saying that's the case here, but when shenanigans like that happen it brings a certain amount of suspicion about the motives of legitimately written, yet widely circulated, letters.

quade -
The World's Most Boring Skydiver

[Muenkel 0]

Quote

"Any fool can criticize, condemn and complain and most fools do." Ben Franklin

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------


That is a great saying....and brings certain people to mind. Always condemning, never anything good to say.

And what a sad way to live your life. People like that deserve our pity.

_________________________________________
Chris

[andrewstewart 0]

Quote

Quote

"Any fool can criticize, condemn and complain and most fools do." Ben Franklin

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------


That is a great saying....and brings certain people to mind. Always condemning, never anything good to say.

And what a sad way to live your life. People like that deserve our pity.

But what you've said is itself condescending, thereby making your statement inherently self-contradictory. By your own logic, you deserve "our" pity.

[b1jercat 0]

Wait he's got a brain injury and does deserve our pity.

[quade 4]

Ok, that can stop right now.

That's about as personal of an attack as it gets.

quade -
The World's Most Boring Skydiver

[Muenkel 0]

Quote

But what you've said is itself condescending, thereby making your statement inherently self-contradictory. By your own logic, you deserve "our" pity.

What I said was in general. You don't think people who only see the negative and rarely the positive, have a sad outlook on life? The saying "If you have nothing good to say, say nothing at all." comes to mind.

_________________________________________
Chris

[b1jercat 0]

What a load of crap.

[mjosparky 4]

Quote

What a load of crap.

And I take it you have a lot of experience with loads of crap?

My idea of a fair fight is clubbing baby seals

[jakee 1,557]

Quote

The saying "If you have nothing good to say, say nothing at all." comes to mind.

Maybe if you don't like someones cooking then yes, but when you're talking about political affairs of this magnitude don't you have a duty to speak up when you dont agree with whats happening?
Sure 'any fool can criticize' but then 'any sheep can agree'.

Do you want to have an ideagasm?

[Skyrad 0]

Quote

* Girls are allowed to attend school.

They always were.

When an author is too meticulous about his style, you may presume that his mind is frivolous and his content flimsy.
Lucius Annaeus Seneca

[mjosparky 4]

Quote

Quote

* Girls are allowed to attend school.

They always were.

You have been and know this for a fact, right?

My idea of a fair fight is clubbing baby seals