The killing continues. If Civil war between the Shite and Sunni sects is not taking place, what does one call this cycle of violence and revenge? The US is at least partly to blame. Who in their right mind would be so naive as to think a divided Country would suddenly put aside their differences just because an outside power removed their totalitarian government? Unfortunately, the bloodshed will not soon stop. The removal of US forces will only result in more anarchy. The West should have learned a lesson when Yugoslavia self distructed. Tito kept the Country together by sheer force & intimidation. The same situation existed in Iraq with Husein. Shite and Sunni Militias laying down their weapons and supporting the current Iraq Government Coalition is the only way to end the violence. As long as Militias roam freely there will be no peace. Dividing up the Country with each of the three sects controlling their own territory with equal sharing of oil revenues may be the only recourse available.

very sad and upsetting!

How long will take for US President and everyone supporting Iraq's invasion "for the sake of Iraqi people" to aknowledge the daily carnage innocent people is suffering?
How can they say that "things in Iraq are improving" when everyday dozens of Iraqis are massacred?
The worst thing: no matter when allies are to getting out of Iraq, one year or ten, the aftermath will be the same. Iran has stated it clearly, Pax Ahmadinejad is coming.

That is just horrible, to have your brother tortured and killed on the day of your wedding. But hey, as the pro-war folks from the fly-over states say...better to fight the war there than here....right? As long as regular Americans aren't dying, everything is OK, right? Because citizens of other nations are worth less, it would seem.

And to think there are still those who defend the lies and manipulation that lead up to the invasion of Iraq.

I wasn't so hot on invading Afghanistan, thinking it would be a quagmire, but at least our true enemy was there! We should have stuck it out in Afghanistan before even thinking of invading another nation.

Especially a nation that was our best friend...oh...15-20 years ago. Funny how that happens...

It's a horrible world over there, the struggle between the factions trying to take over and or at least cause civil war. It scares me to think how the world will be when My children are grown and they are having childre.
But don't be fooled into thinking there was peace before the US invasion. It just didn't make as many headlines because the regimes in charge and causing most of the violence, also controlled the media. What headlines there were, were sadly not as important to us. Now that our own troops are over there, it is a media frenzy because of our interest and concern. There has been and always be war in the middle east but we need to still support our troops and government to at least try to help some of the innocent. Stories like these bring to light how terrible things are for those caught in the middle, it is terribly tragic. But we must also remember the good taking place. There are people enjoying freedoms they never had before. There are schools and services being provided for people who would otherwise never have been exposed.

It is certainly a tragedy that people are dying in Iraq. However, to put all the blame on the American government is either naive or just plain blame shifting. With few exceptions (which are being prosecuted.) the atrocities that are taking place in Iraq are being committed by the Iraqis themselves. These are in reality thugs and criminals that are posing as freedom fighters and religious combatants. As I see it, the world needs to wake up to the fact that Iraqis have been killing Iraqis for years, and it really doesn't matter whether the United States is there or not. This violence will continue until the regular Iraqi people decide that they have had enough, band together as a nation, and put aside the differences that divide their poor nation. No true revolution or true reform can ever take place when it is not supported by the people it is intended to help. I hear so much about how Iraqis do not want an American presence in their country, and I believe it is their right, as a sovergn nation, to tell America to go home. The question is, what will the Iraqis do about all of the violence in the streets? Iraq, this is YOUR problem to solve. Do you wish to be part of a global world that works toward peace, or will you just let the birthplace of civilization continue to crumble due to the extreme beliefs of a few?

Around October 20, 2002, MSNBC twice carried a news report that a purported telex from the Iraqi embassy in Niamey, Niger to the Iraqi foreign ministry regarding the supply of a uranium component called yellowcake was a forged dpcument. Who forged it and why has never been establshed. An Italian tabloid offered the document refused it as an "obvious forgery." Watch officers on duty throughout the Washington area read the wire service dispatch reporting the forgery.
In the January 2003 State of the Union, President Bush used a slightly edited account of the Iraqi-Niger "connection," citing it as a British intelligence report.
From labelled forgery to the State of the Union? How curious! The forgery is now relabelled as, "We got the intelligence wrong." Wrong is one thing, citing an identified forgery is quite something else.

I don't know about you guys, bu I do enjoy hearing about the war. I enjoy hearing about the shite conflicts, the endless threats to the United States, the continuous political warfare that this war seems to put us in. Death in Iraq was forseen and I do not see what the big deal is. Occupation of a territory where a sense of forced democracy is taking place is the breeding grounds for death and destruction.
As most of us know, the poull out of troops cannot be seen at the end of the tunnel. Beofre my friends come home, I can see the occupation of Iran and possibly North Korea.
Oh yeah, ever think about that large powerful nation above India? They are becoming quite the 'hidden' communist country.

Unfortunately, Bush doesn't give a flip about the Iraqis or the country. All he is doing is buying time, at the expense of the Iraqis, our military, and our treasury, so he can complete his presidency and get the permanent air/military bases and embassy completed. Sure, a free, democratic Iraq would have been icing on the cake, but not required at all. Sadly, he has sacrificed an entire country and it's people for our permanent presence in Iraq. If one thinks that the US will EVER leave Iraq, he is being extremely naive.

It is a civil war. And we are engaged in WWIII. And yes an American{in my opinion} life IS worth more than those of other nations. Sadly I think this will go on for a long time and more American lives will be lost.

"He that would make his own liberty secure must guard even his enemy from oppression; for if he violates this duty he establishes a precedent that will reach to himself."
Thomas Paine

"Our contest is not only whether we ourselves shall be free, but whether there shall be left to mankind an asylum on earth for civil and religious liberty." Samuel Adams

"The God who gave us life, gave us liberty at the same time."
Thomas Jefferson

I've been in Iraq for 14 months now and the one thing I've realized is that most Americans don't care about the cost of freedom if it's not their personal freedom and as long as they don't have to pay for it.

HI its realy sad to know that booy so many good peopple as to die an a daily basis all for what WE i dont know at all.

Our justified preoccupation with how best to untangle ourselves from the war in Iraq has blinded us to the failure of the Bush administration to fight the war on terrorism in the first place. Let us not forget that the successful attack on the World Trade Center happened on G.W. Bush's watch.

Yes, it had a history, but he bought into ignoring the threat as surely as he bought into embracing the war in Iraq.

The Bush political machinery controls the debate. It has so skillfully bombarded us with the argument that it and only it can successfully defend us against the threats posed by terrorists that we have forgotten how we arrived at this historical moment. It is as if the terrorist threat existed during the Clinton years, ceased as soon as Bush took office, and started up again on September 11, 2001. Not so.

The Bush administration was SOGGY ON TERRORISM from the day he took office until that fateful day. How many days was that? Why does the American press in the form of editorials, op-ed articles, letters to the editor, blogs, etc., not blame Mr. Bush for what happened on that dreadful day but praise him instead for wielding a bullhorn a few days later? Are we that hungry for patriotism?

Rather, are we afraid of Mr. Bush? Do we fear the political fallout that a free and independent press will suffer if it criticizes our Constitutionally elected president? Our vice-president.

Their political PR is most successful when we ignore their pre-9/11 failures and credit them instead for successes since that day, successes that any administration could have and would have achieved. Today, like it or not, we are living in a world of G.W. Bush's making.

In his essay "On Self-Reliance," a great American essayist, Ralph Waldo Emerson, said: "An institution is the lengthened shadow of one man." Today, like it or not, we live in the shadow of G.W. Bush.

I am so sorry for all the loss that you, we as Americans and especially the Iraqi people. Why is it that leaders, whether ours or someone else thinks it is ok to kill innocent people to move forward their agenda's. I am sick and tired of all of this. I am tired of hearing mass killings on a daily basis, tears in my eyes when I hear another american soldier has been killed. Who cries for the innocent civilians that die by the 100's each day.
It is a sad and pathetic world we live in and if we as people do not rise up and tell our leaders no more, we will not have a world in 10 years...

Hey Andy...why is an American life worth more? Explain that one to me.

Iraq is in civil war and this incident is another clear example. The overall death count for Iraqis since the "Mission Accomplished" announcement was made is stagering. It is a human catastrophe of great magnitude. There are no safe zones for westerners or Iraqis. There is so much saddness in Iraq. The average Iraqi seeks peace, security and a livlihood for his family. They are scared and don't know which way to turn for safety. Power, greed, corruption, and religious differences have ripped this country apart. The United States and its coalition forces will not be able to put this country back together again.
Kevin /s/
www.theamericancenturians.com

The root cause of tererism is the hatred towards our foreign policy. Invading Iraq has an opposit effect on what the Bush Administration intented. The mistake Bush made will have lasting impact. He probally will be one of the worst presidents in this country, as many people suggested.

I can understand fighting a war in an effort to bring to justice the terroist that cause such devastaion as the 9/11 attack: an eye for an eye. But which eye did Iraq poke out to justify the loss of troops that are equal to the 9/11 numbers now, and how would the victims of 9/11 feel about those troops who have fought in Iraq, lost so much in the name of justice and freedom, while Osama and the true terroist are still roaming free after 5 years. Yes let's remember, that we still have not achived justice for the victims of September 11 2001.

Right on Bork, couldn't agree with you more. It's hard over here with 100% of the media biased in one way or another. People form their opinions based on which news channel they watch. There is, however, a quiet majority who are willing to pay and are "paying" everytime a human life is lost.
God Bless you and others who are making a difference, one person at a time.

When Iraq invaded Kuwait we thought it was a terrible thing. We gladly got involved- at the request of Kuwait. Now WE are the invading country and as a result are seen as a bully by most of the world. A democracy is a government of, by, and for the people. Perhaps the Iraqi people don't truly want a democracy. Because it works for us doesn't mean it will work for them and we have no right to insist they accept it. Maybe their lives are better in some ways but I doubt it is worth wondering if you will live through each day. That really isn't so different than life under Saddam. The killers are different but the end result is the same. There is no end in sight for our troops - AND our tax dollars! The near future looks pretty scary, and not because of the terrorists. We need to get back to concentrating on Afghanistan, where we should have stayed in the first place.

It is a very sad situation we find ourselves in fighting in Iraq. However, the world is better off without Saddam in power. The only way I can see a way of solving the problem is to have a 3 state country. (Kurds, Sunni and Sheites). They should share the oil profits equally and govern themselves independantly. Even then, peace in the middle east will probably never be realized.

Last Monday most Americans, including President Bush, paused to remember those innocent people who died at the hands of radical Ismaic terrorists five years ago on 9/11. But ask yourself, "Where is the eternal memorial, or building on the WTC site to memorilaize those who died five years ago?" And if our president doesn't really care about our own innocent Americans who have died in NYC, then how can he possible care about the innocent Iraqis who are dying each day?

An average of nearly 1,000 Iraqis and other nationalities are dying each week in Iraq. In Baghdad alone, up to 70 corpses - of Iraqis killed by gunfire - are brought to the mortuaries each day alone. But today only 47 bodies were reported killed, so encouraging news? Twenty six bodies were found in the mainly Sunni western part of the capital with the other 21 found in eastern Baghdad’s predominantly Shiite side. Tit for tat. And Bush says Iraq is not experiencing a civil war? Hummm. This past Wednesday was more the norm, with 104 people killed at the hands of Sunnis and Shiites in Baghdad. Sixty-nine died by death squads...and 35 by a car bomb...many more were injured.

And who are remembering these innocents who are dying at a rate far exceeding the worst days of Saddam's rule of Iraq? Does Bush really think he is going to be able to bring the Iraqis freedom? So who really is the despot here - Hussein or Bush? History will tell and the truth will be known if America was truly sincere about the best interest of the people of Iraq.

Until recently, I was an American who lived in Lebanon and therefore learned first hand that the American government, and Bush in particularly, really doesn't really care about the Iraqis, the Lebanese or certainly the Palestinians. We may think we want to bring them democracy but, on an individual level, we don't care very much about them or their lives. "Hey, we liberated them, so they should be grateful to us. If they die now, well, no one said democracy was easy," proclaims our American president.

In the meantime, our president continues to spend well beyond our means to finance a needless war. And we can't afford to remember those who died five years ago at the WTC site? It makes me sick to think how Bush has squanderd our wealth, and our influence around the world. Again, his legacy will speak for itself. May God rescue America from our freefall of formerly being the greatest power on the face of the earth.

If you haven't already, be sure and check out the MSN video earlier this week by one of the most insightful and outspoken journalists our day, Keith Olberman.

In 2000 I worked in a middle eastern country. I worked with well educated Iraqi, Saudi, Syrian, Lebonese, and Iranian people. Yes there were westeners there as well. Many Iraqis said if we go into Iraq or anywhere in the middle east we will have our pockets picked. The US, he said, is to young and naive to understand an area that is the cradle of civilization and has warred and peaced since recorded time began. He was right. A second point was that always I was accorded more respect and hospitality by those from the east than those from the west. Those from the US and England in particular could not wait to stab you if it meant they could get ahead. We need to tend to our own garders before we tell others how to farm. Paul

Most of the middle east is stuck in the middle ages. The more civilized countries are wasting their assets trying to help those people. It's sad on an individual basis, but most of them wish the civilized parts of the world didn't exist. Don't waste your emotions on a situation that logic can't help.

I am touched to see so many comments here that have such deep insight. From the fact that this invasion, and subsequent occupation, was completely unwarranted and unjustified; to the fact that the United States will never completely leave Iraq, it is comforting to know that people can see through the smoke and lies. I lost my childhood friend of thirty-nine years in Iraq and of course I have an exceptionally strong dislike for the Bush administration and the web of deceit they used that cost my friend his life, but I also know that the principles that were used as an excuse to invade Iraq are the same Principles that America was founded upon. We use the term "terrorist" so loosely. America was forged and built using terror. Yes, it is a noble gesture to say that we are securing freedom and democracy for a people who have never enjoyed such but what about the basic issues affecting Americans in America. It would be more than noble to find a way to insure that EVERY American had affordable healthcare. It would be in America’s best interest to insure that every school had textbooks. Instead of pouring billions of dollars into endless misery in Iraq America could certainly make the "American Dream" more attainable for its own citizens. Yes, America has its problems, yet there is no place on earth I'd rather be.