Give John Tierney the Purple Finger

Why is so much comment about Iraq so stupid? Listen to John Tierney in the New York Times

“The critics have not been kind to the prose and the plot, but they miss Saddam's strength. He's a marketer. He is said to have finished the novel just as the war was beginning, when American leaders were fantasizing about their troops' being welcomed as liberators. But Saddam knew enough to give his novel a surefire title for the post-invasion era: "Get Out, You Damned One." It's a naked appeal to xenophobia, an impulse that's far more ancient and widespread than the yearning for democracy that President Bush talked about this week”.

In the January elections more than two hundred political entities registered, tens of thousands stood as candidates, volunteers flooded to help the Independent Commission for Elections in Iraq, manning 600 registry offices and 9,000 voting stations nationwide in the face of threats, car bombs and assassinations. 8.5 of some 13-14 million eligible voters went to the polls. Tierney airbrushes al those joyful dancing Iraqis, purple fingers held aloft, from history it seems. That he does so in the cause of a puff for the enduring power of xenophobia is shameful. Again President Bush is depicted holding the flag for democracy while the liberals giggle in the corner. How depressing. (AJ)