Here and There, Apr. 9

NPR's Anne Garrels reporting from Baghdad, illustrates the collapse of Saddam's regime with a tale about one of her [former] government minders.

There's a security guy called Mazen Kadem, who was a particularly nasty fellow. This morning he appeared and tried to steal a Mitsubishi owned by the Italian jouranlists here. They managed to catch him and instead of his normally gruff authoritative manner he ended up begging them to let him go. When he finally managed to persuade somebody to drive him home, since he failed to steal the car, he was seen to be tearing up his intelligence agency ID.

Go figure. Oh, and Garrels also mentioned that the Minister of "Information" didn't show up for work today either. Listen to the whole thing.

Wankees Go Home: Even the San Francisco Chronicle admits that many Iraqis are cheering the US military as liberators

For the most part, the Marines were treated as conquering heroes. Young Iraqis put flowers in the pockets of their body armor. Kids begged for money.

There was a lot of smiling and laughing. One Iraqi gave out high-fives to passing Marines and reporters.

There were some American and European "human shields'' at the rally, people who had come to put themselves in harm's way in hopes of stopping the shooting. They chastised the Marines for attacking Iraq and promoting war.
...
Meanwhile, two Iraqis held up a sheet bearing the message: "Go home Human Shields, you U.S. Wankers.''

I wonder how the people of Baghdad would feel about the Chronicle's own Ruth Rosen, whose columns were passionately opposed to the war, on "human rights" grounds. Rosen wrote:

When people ask, as they eventually will, who stood up for human rights ...

Who, indeed? It sure wasn't Ruth Rosen.

UPDATE: Donald Sensing has a screen shot of the Iraqis holding the "Wankers Go Home!" placard

Posted by Stefan Sharkansky at April 09, 2003 02:06 PM