I'm back in the real world

My "sentence" in Iraq has finished and I'm back in the "real world" of Italy. It didn't take me all that long to get out since I was (for once) in the right place at the right time and was able to get on a medevac flight direct to Germany and not have to wait around with the rest of the unwashed masses for a flight to Kuwait or somewhere else.

I somewhat followed the national "debate" about Iraq and since I'm The Warren's resident Dubai Ports Expert because I've actually been to Dubai, I'm now the resident Iraq expert since I've actually been there. Ergo, all those looser Defeato-cratic senators and congressmen who are having reoccuring wet dreams of Iraq = QUAGMIRE should read The Warren but only if they can accept the truth (since they are libreals, I doubt it). Yes, I'm talking to you Kennedy. Anyway, I have three pieces of ancedotal evidence which will refute their Iraq=QUAGMIRE arguments, but like I said, if they can accept the truth. Now I'm talking to you Murtha (a marine? You? Probably some rear-area, desk pogue).

1) Where I was is also the base from where the flights that take fallen servicemen and women home to the US. These are called "Patriot Flights" and whenever there is one, a base-wide email is sent out to invite members of the military to go down to the airplane and pay their last respects to their fallen comrades. Last year, there was usually one or two a week. This year, there was maybe one a month. Um, I guess in liberal math, less dead soldiers = IRAQI QUAGMIRE!

2) Last time I was in Iraq, we had to wear our helmet and flak jackets numerous times for undetermined lengths of time. This time, we wore them for a lot less and only for a precise period of time of 24 hours, like a training exercise. Again, liberal math, less time armored up = IRAQI QUAGMIRE!

3) The IMMINENT IRAQI CIVIL WAR! When the mosque bombing went down in Samara (just up the road from where I was stationed), we weren't too sure how that would affect us. Well, as I pointed out before, we did nothing different than usual. If you only watched the MSM, you would have thought that the whole country was in flames, but guess what, it wasn't. It was business as usual for me and other than the MSM bringing up the subject EVERY 5 MINUTES, I quickly forgot about it.

Just after the President pointed out that the good that the US is doing in Iraq is going un-reported by the MSM, I was "privileged" to see a report by MSNBC (I think) by one of their station chiefs in Iraq taling about how hard his job was and making excuses about why the good stuff is being reported. The gist of his excuse was that Iraq is a dangerous place (duh!) and for him to go out and see what was going on in Iraq, he had to get all "armored up" and get military escort, etc., therefore, it was much easier for him to sit on his fanny in the safety of his hotel and just parrot what his Iraqi contacts bring him to report. So, the moral of this story is, if you want attention-grabbing headlines that are long on hype and short on truth, listen to the MSM. If you want the truth, you can talk to me or I will direct you to someone else who actually knows what is going on in Iraq.