Last night Four Corners iterated the freedom losses the NSW Crime Commission has perpetrated on the citizens of NSW for what sounded like a number of years.

But not a peep from the freedom lovers who relentlessly rant about the terrorists held at Gitmo.

So to answer the following question --

Now that there is a strong chance that we might win/prevail in Iraq I find it almost incomprehensible that Obama supporters are upset that he is backing away from his earlier statements regarding troop withdrawals from Iraq.

His supporters are upset because 'they', the US Leftists are often America haters. Sounds corny, but understanding this answers many questions. Such as why do only the negative aspects of the American Social/Political scene get primarily reported (excluding the Hollywood types who have created their own universe) over, and over, and over again? This is why the news gone quiet over the last four months when the tide started to turn. In addition 80%+ of US journalists are Democrats (Labor). They hate America more than they want democracy to prevail in Iraq.

Really.

Dear Cowboy Joe,

Democrats hate America? Really?

Woodrow Wilson - Democrat.

Franklin D. Roosevelt - Democrat.

John F. Kennedy - Democrat.

Bobby Kennedy - Democrat.

Lyndon B. Johnson - Democrat.

Al Gore - Democrat.

Bill Clinton - Democrat.

Hilary Rodham Clinton - Democrat.

Barack Obama - Democrat.

An impressive list of "haters" wouldn't you say?

You may be interested to know that The Democratic Party is the older
of the two major political parties of the United States, and its played a vital role in the history and politics of the country from
1828 to the present day.

To the best of my knowledge "hatred" was never on the party's
agenda. But economic relief, recovery and reform, were.

What everyone should remember is that Iraq was invaded on the basis of lies. Our own government was an accomplice. Before anyone says 'but we've changed government since', ask yourselves, has much changed since the election. Now we have a PM who mostly tells us what he can't do or that he's done all that he can. I'm sure that if he was PM in 2003, he would have told us that he 'can't avoid jumping in to help the Yanks invade Iraq'. Maybe he would still have withdrawn the troops this year but that's still five years as an invader.

Gibo, why do you keep harping on that we should become a state of the USA? You're having a joke, right?

The story of Getrude Bell gives an insight into the situation at the beginning of Iraq’s formation. Many of the issues faced in Iraq back in 1920 are remarkably similar to what we are seeing today.

For example -“...There's no getting out of the conclusion that we have made an immense failure here. The system must have been far more at fault than anything that I or anyone else suspected. It will have to be fundamentally changed and what that may mean exactly I don't know.
No one knows exactly what they do want, least of all themselves, except that they don't want us.“

A link to some background about her is at -
http://www.nybooks.com/articles/20691

It should also be noted that it was official British policy at the time to deliberately “keep the Middle East destabilised” and that the act of forcing together three distinctively hostile groups under the guise of one nation (Iraq) was part of that policy. Churchill himself wanted to bomb the troublesome Kurds with poison gas but was stopped because of the unsettling effect it could have on the Indian colony, so the West has a sad history in that region and one not easily forgotten.
We are the ones who helped inflict Saddam onto the Iraqis in the first place, after a series of failed and corrupt regimes and it’s pure arrogance to think that we could have bombed freedom into them.

Iran has a similar history and is also largely the result of our meddling and the same pre-war sabre rattling is well under way.

There can't be many people left who still believe it was never about the oil.

Whose interests are we really acting in – ours or theirs?

As for the Four Corners reference, that recent programme on the missing billions and corruption in Iraq was also interesting.

who's this we, white man?

are you writing from falujah? under fire?

or are you another arm-chair warrior, who regards war as rugby with firearms? nobody is winning in iraq, although american oil companies remain hopeful their contracts with maliki government will bring in big dollars. so they should.

don't tell you about the casualties? rag-heads don't count, do they? should i tell you about the destroyed infra-structure? how about the collapse of education and medicine since the usmc brought democracy to the iraqis? don't want to hear about that?

so 'we' might be 'winning'? stick with the sports page, mate.

Some Quotes

>> “After years of mismanagement of the war, many people had grave doubts about whether success in Iraq was possible. In Congress, opposition to the surge from anti-war members was swift and severe. They insisted that Iraq was already lost and that there was nothing left to do but accept our defeat and retreat. In fact, they could not have been more wrong. And had we heeded their calls for retreat, Iraq today would be a country in chaos: a failed state in the heart of the Middle East, overrun by al-Qa'ida and Iran. Instead, conditions in that country have been utterly transformed from those of a year ago, as a consequence of the surge. Whereas, a year ago, al-Qa'ida in Iraq was entrenched in Anbar province and Baghdad, now the forces of Islamist extremism are facing their single greatest and most humiliating defeat since the loss of Afghanistan in 2001.”
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,23046294-7583,00.html

>> “It is beyond dispute, though, that the tide of violence in Iraq has been stemmed”.

>> “Brigadier General Abdul-Karim Khalaf, spokesman for the Iraq Interior Ministry, said the reduction in killings was evidence that the joint US-Iraqi security plan for Baghdad was working.”
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,22701665-2703,00.html

>> “After being forced from its strongholds in the west and centre of Iraq in the past two years, al-Qa'ida's dwindling band of fighters had made a defiant "last stand" in the northern city of Mosul.”

>> “US and Iraqi leaders believe that while it is premature to write off al-Qa'ida in Iraq, the Sunni group has lost control of its last urban base in Mosul, and its remnants have been driven into countryside to the south.”

>> “Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, who has also led a crackdown on the Shia Mahdi Army in Basra and Baghdad in recent months, claimed yesterday that his Government had "defeated" terrorism.”

>> “Iraq is enjoying a surge in oil revenue driven by record crude prices and the highest production levels since Saddam's ouster. The Government expects to earn $73 billion from oil this year if prices remain high.”
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,23978186-15084,00.html