Vacation In Iraq anyone?

Our pal CMAR II, the author of Cry Me A Riverbend II and a precious contributor at IBC,Iraqi Bloggers Central, IBC, just published another interesting article on the risk of being killed in Iraq and what picture we are getting from the news media.

For those not aware of IBC, Jeff, a colorful New Yorker has been following the bloggers in Iraq and the Middle East at IBC since May 2004.

Vacation in Iraq

From this article by Alicia Colon.


Where would you rather vacation? Iraq or New Orleans the summer before Hurricane Katrina. Statistically, your life would be twice as much at risk riding the St. Charles Steet trolley last June than you would be walking down a street in downtown Baghdad.

According to Rep. Steve King of Iowa, the following are the FBI statistics for violent deaths per 100,000 people in various countries and U.S. cities from 2004-2005:

Columbia ----------------------- 61.7
New Orleans (before Katrina) -- 53.1
South Africa -------------------- 49.6
Washington, DC ---------------- 45.9
Baltimore ---------------------- 37.7
Atlanta ------------------------- 34.9
Jamiaca ------------------------ 32.4
Venezuela ---------------------- 31.6
Iraq --------------------------- 25.71

Taking these numbers as given, one can still argue that Iraq is not New Orleans or South Africa or that socialist paradise Venezuela. In most of these locales (Columbia is a bit different) violent death tends to occur among criminals and over personal disputes of family members. In Iraq, the deaths are frequently targeted at people trying to improve their lives, or believing the wrong thing about the Imams, or for being born to the wrong ethnic group, or coming from another country, or for working for the government or a newspaper. In short, Iraq is a war-zone and these other places are not.

But that cuts both ways. Iraq is a war-zone. It has nit-minded crocodiles...athiests in religious clothing...crossing the border for no purpose but to explode themselves among strangers. And like many Muslim-majority countries today, it has adherants to a mutant concept of Islam (both Sunni and Shi'a, from Basrah to Mosul) who see it as God's directive to kill anyone --especially women or anyone perceived as vulnerable-- who doesn't worship and live exactly as the mutant adherants want...

Diane