Updated: Rotten Reporting Again (About Those 650 Thou Dead in Iraq)

Iraq, Journalism, Media, The Zeitgeist, War

The Associates Press (via Rational Report) reports that:

A “controversial new study contends that nearly 655,000 Iraqis have died in the three-year-old conflict in Iraq—more than 10 times higher than other independent estimates of the toll.”

Dubya and his Oh-What-A-Wonderful-War contingent dispute these figures. And so they should.

The latest Lancet report has never claimed 655,000 civilian deaths total, but rather that, “An estimated 655,000 more Iraqis have died as a consequence of the March 2003 military invasion of Iraq than would have been expected in a non-conflict situation.”

What we have here, once again, is rotten reporting. When the first Lancet report appeared two year ago, mainstream press also fudged the facts. I think I was the only writer who made the necessary distinctions. I explained:

“In the final days of Saddam’s reign of terror, i.e., in the 15 months preceding the invasion, the primary causes of death in Iraq were natural: heart attack, stroke and chronic illness. Since Iraq became another neocon object lesson, the primary cause of death has been violence, according to the report.
Since March 2003, Iraqis have suffered from an excess of deaths, if you will. As Dr. Les Roberts, author of the study, told BBC News, ‘About 100,000 excess deaths, or more, have happened since the 2003 invasion of Iraq.’
According to the study, “The relative risk, the risk of deaths from any cause was two-and-a-half times higher for Iraqi civilians after the 2003 invasion than in the preceding 15 months. But ‘the risk of death by violence for civilians in Iraq is now 58 times higher than before the U.S.-led invasion.”

Update: My thanks to Bob Murphy and Sean Mercer for demanding further clarification: My point is non-ideological; I’d simply like to see accurate reporting. The 650,000 figure would include deaths due to a greater incidence of heart attacks, cancer, strokes, stress and displacement-related deaths, deaths associated with a lack of health care and potable water, etc. Thus, silly journalists build doubt into the report because they give the impression that this many people died directly because of the war. Rather, the figure represents both direct and indirect casualties of the invasion, which is why it’s believable.

It goes without saying that the report is a criminal indictment of the invasion. If not for the invasion, the leading cause of death in Iraqi would still be natural, as it was during Saddam’s suzerainty.

Axis of Illogic

Bush, Iran, Iraq, Islam, Politics

Don’t forget that at the time Bush was preparing to invade Iraq, he was giving North Korea room to maneuver freely on the axis of evil. While Iraqi palm dates were being subjected to strict trade embargoes, North Korean Scud missiles were allowed to safely reach their destinations: the jammed-with-Jihadist nations of Pakistan, Syria, Egypt, Iran, Libya and Yemen.

In 2002, a North Korean vessel was not allegedly—but actually—apprehended in the Arabian Sea, carrying 15 well-concealed Scud missiles. At the time of its invasion, Iraq was suspected of hiding a total of 60 Scud-variant missiles. While Bush was revving up for war with Iraq, North Koreans were sailing the seas in search for markets for the equivalent of a fourth of the entire Iraqi arsenal.

You see, North Korea didn’t and apparently doesn’t sell missiles to Al-Qaida. While Iraq might have. That’s an important distinction.

The weapons inspectors, who were criss-crossing Iraq before the invasion, were not allowed to finish their uneventful task (Bush threw them out so he could invade). At the same time, Bush exempted North Korea’s Yongbyon research base from inspections, but not before bribing the North Koreans with $95m.

So long as you understand that North Korea’s belligerence is ultimately all Clinton’s fault.

Conservatives for Commies & Crime (Taki on South Africa)

Crime, Israeli-Palestinian Conflict, Justice, Middle East, Old Right, Paleoconservatism, Race, South-Africa

Taki is an American-Conservative columnist. In his October 9, 2006 offering, Taki emphasized the need to talk with terrorists, Hamas, for one. He then praised the new dispensation in my old home, South Africa, RIP, as “the greatest triumph of chatter over machine-gun clatter”:

“It’s not perfect, and crime is at an all-time high in South-African cities, but at least the massacres are a thing of the past and life goes on much better than before.”

Decades of brutal, Apartheid-generated repression saw no more than a few thousand Africans perish as a direct result of police brutality. A horrible injustice, indubitably, but nothing like the blood that flows freely in city streets and soaks the soil in rural areas nowadays. In the democratic South-Africa, thousands of people perish by violence every few months.

During Apartheid, crime was not a serious issue, because the regime didn’t allow Africans to kill and rape with abandon, as they are now doing. Africans suffered indignities, but not that much violence. Unless one made a point of clashing with the authorities, one’s life was secure. Ask African women and children how they are faring under freedom. In the good old days, they caught and hung men who raped babies as a salve for AIDS. Now the police (mainly African) don’t bother looking for them. Such is the collapse of law and order that the conviction rate is a measly 2.96%.

So violent is the “free” South Africa that the equally free and democratic ANC government issued an official blackout (or shall I say whiteout) of national crime statistics. When these are divulged, officials prefer to use difficult-to-understand ratios. In many instances, data have been doctored.

Government sources claim there were 21,553 murders in 2002 (population 44.6 million). In comparison, the “high crime” United States (population 288.2 million) suffered 16,110 murders in 2002. The Mail & Guardian estimates that between January 2000 and March 2003 there were almost 48,000 murders in South-Africa. The most recent crime report I was able to find is this one, which estimates that between April 2004 and March 2005 there were 18,793 murders and 55,114 rapes (and by rape we don’t mean what American women consider rape: waking up the next morning after a romp between the sheets with a hangover and some regrets).

In the “democratic” South-Africa, you cannot start a business without employing an African, even if you can’t find one fit for the job. You have to hire someone black, and pay him a mandated salary, benefits and all.

The ethnic cleansing of Boer farmers and their families via slaughter and torture continues apace. You can read here how “attackers slashed an elderly farmer’s Achilles tendons, mutilated him, and left him 2km from his farmhouse in the bush to keep him from interfering with their murder rampage. Then, they murdered his wife.”

Or of the murder of “78-year-old Kobus van Tonder on the farm Merino near Vrede,” and “his 68-year-old wife, Charlotte.” They were both stabbed to death in their farm house. For Taki’s edification, there’s a report here of how “four men put an elderly farmer’s wife through four hours of torture, burning her feet with a candle, hitting her with a hammer and stabbing her in the legs.” There’s more, if you can stand it.

It’s not a good time to bring up the South-African success story. My mother recently departed for that cesspool to help my sister and her partner mend their lives after my sister’s partner was attacked by five African thugs. She was leaving her posh office building when the cowards surrounded her. Five men against a waif of a woman. They had jumped the walls—a permanent fixture in liberated SA. The African guard—another useless ubiquity—had barricaded himself in his cubicle and was cowering under the table.

Par for the course in such situations is for the woman to be driven to a remote location, raped and murdered. She is never seen again. The criminals go scot-free. But in this instance, the car, an otherwise-reliable vehicle, failed to start. My sister’s partner managed to escape, but not before she was hit on the head with a firearm, resulting in neurological damage. The lives of good people ruined by rubbish.

Some time ago, my youngest brother and his family (wife and new baby) were attacked in their suburban fortress at 2:00am, also by a gang of Africans. The alarm was bypassed. Luckily they escaped with their lives. In my father’s upmarket neighborhood, another dad was shot point-blank in front of his little girls, as he exited his car to open the garage gates. He begged the savages to take all his possessions and spare his life. Their loot? A cell phone and some cash. Two of my husband’s ex-colleagues are dead, so far; one shot in broad daylight as he left his girlfriend’s apartment. Also for a cell phone.

Conservatives for Commies & Crime

Crime, Israeli-Palestinian Conflict, Justice, Middle East, Old Right, Race, South-Africa

Taki is an American-Conservative columnist. In his October 9 offering, Taki emphasized the need to talk with terrorists, Hamas, for one. He then praised the new dispensation in my old home, South Africa, RIP, as “the greatest triumph of chatter over machine-gun clatter”:

“It’s not perfect, and crime is at an all-time high in South-African cities, but at least the massacres are a thing of the past and life goes on much better than before.”

Decades of brutal, Apartheid-generated repression saw no more than a few thousand Africans perish as a direct result of police brutality. A horrible injustice, indubitably, but nothing like the blood that flows freely in city streets and soaks the soil in rural areas nowadays. In the democratic South-Africa, thousands of people perish by violence every few months.

During Apartheid, crime was not a serious issue, because the regime didn’t allow Africans to kill and rape with abandon, as they are now doing. Africans suffered indignities, but not that much violence. Unless one made a point of clashing with the authorities, one’s life was secure. Ask African women and children how they are faring under freedom. In the good old days, they caught and hung men who raped babies as a salve for AIDS. Now the police (mainly African) don’t bother looking for them. Such is the collapse of law and order that the conviction rate is a measly 2.96%.

So violent is the “free” South Africa that the equally free and democratic ANC government issued an official blackout (or shall I say whiteout) of national crime statistics. When these are divulged, officials prefer to use difficult-to-understand ratios. In many instances, data have been doctored.

Government sources claim there were 21,553 murders in 2002 (population 44.6 million). In comparison, the “high crime” United States (population 288.2 million) suffered 16,110 murders in 2002. The Mail & Guardian estimates that between January 2000 and March 2003 there were almost 48,000 murders in South-Africa. The most recent crime report I was able to find is this one, which estimates that between April 2004 and March 2005 there were 18,793 murders and 55,114 rapes (and by rape we don’t mean what American women consider rape: waking up the next morning after a romp between the sheets with a hangover and some regrets).

In the “democratic” South-Africa, you cannot start a business without employing an African, even if you can’t find one fit for the job. You have to hire someone black, and pay him a mandated salary, benefits and all.

The ethnic cleansing of Boer farmers and their families via slaughter and torture continues apace. You can read here how “attackers slashed an elderly farmer’s Achilles tendons, mutilated him, and left him 2km from his farmhouse in the bush to keep him from interfering with their murder rampage. Then, they murdered his wife.”

Or of the murder of “78-year-old Kobus van Tonder on the farm Merino near Vrede,” and “his 68-year-old wife, Charlotte.” They were both stabbed to death in their farm house. For Taki’s edification, there’s a report here of how “four men put an elderly farmer’s wife through four hours of torture, burning her feet with a candle, hitting her with a hammer and stabbing her in the legs.” There’s more, if you can stand it.

It’s not a good time to bring up the South-African success story. My mother recently departed for that cesspool to help my sister and her partner mend their lives after my sister’s partner was attacked by five African thugs. She was leaving her posh office building when the cowards surrounded her. Five men against a waif of a woman. They had jumped the walls—a permanent fixture in liberated SA. The African guard—another useless ubiquity—had barricaded himself in his cubicle and was cowering under the table.

Par for the course in such situations is for the woman to be driven to a remote location, raped and murdered. She is never seen again. The criminals go scot-free. But in this instance, the car, an otherwise-reliable vehicle, failed to start. My sister’s partner managed to escape, but not before she was hit on the head with a firearm, resulting in neurological damage. The lives of good people ruined by rubbish.

Some time ago, my youngest brother and his family (wife and new baby) were attacked in their suburban fortress at 2:00am, also by a gang of Africans. The alarm was bypassed. Luckily they escaped with their lives. In my father’s upmarket neighborhood, another dad was shot point-blank in front of his little girls, as he exited his car to open the garage gates. He begged the savages to take all his possessions and spare his life. Their loot? A cell phone and some cash. Two of my husband’s ex-colleagues are dead, so far; one shot in broad daylight as he left his girlfriend’s apartment. Also for a cell phone.