I've just returned to my office from the final, Northern California, stop on the US tour of Spirit of America in support of the Friends of Democracy project being mounted by the blogging brothers of Iraq the Model. About forty in all attended the get together at the Garden Court Hotel, including soon-to-be-ex-SJ Merc columnist Dan Gillmor, fellow VC blogger Jeff Nolan, Silicon Valley Redneck, Renee Blodgett and Vinod of the eponymous blog. Also some of Roger Simon's regular commenters who, alerted by his blog, had driven up to three hours to attend (Update: see comments). Quite a few attendees were simply Spirit of America contributors, wondering how all these people already knew each other, even though they didn't recognize each other's faces.
Dan introduced Spirit of America founder Jim Hake, Omar and Mohammed, and Marine LTC Al Burghard, who was one of the first to work with Spirit of America when he was posted in Al Anbar province. Jim reviewed a number of previous SoA projects, and passed it over to the brothers - Mohammed took the lead - to describe the next projects in which they will participate. Mohammed talked about the Friends of Democracy project which the brothers have helped catalyze with Spirit of America's support. The Arabic blogging project has already been much discussed - a new detail is the hope to have enough bloggers and tools in place by the Iraqi elections at the end of January to live blog them nationwide. With the MSM reporters mostly hiding in Baghdad, this would be a guaranteed scoop for the Iraqi blogosphere. (And yes, there is something you can do to help out.)
More important than bypassing the MSM will be the effects within Iraq. As Mohammed put it (from my notes):I am Iraqi. I can express myself - I can tell my own story. It's hard for people to be alone. If you can see others that share the same thoughts and dreams, you are stronger.For the Iraqi people to be able to witness to themselves, as well as the rest of the us, will be a world changing event. Omar pointed out that although the rest of the Arabic world has had access to the Internet for some years, there are now more blogs from Iraq than all the rest combined, even having to struggle with English only tools. This is a people who will raise their voices, given the means.
It being Silicon Valley, some of the Q&A concerned the Iraqi economy. Whereupon it developed that Omar can speak with authority about the benefits of exchange rate stability, and relative activity in the public and private sectors of Iraq. The educational program for Iraqi dentists must be wide ranging indeed - media pioneers, political organizers, economic analysts - what's next? In all seriousness, and as others have said, these are intelligent but ordinary guys, with enormous determination. That's something we will all need in the next few years, and they are an inspiration. Bon voyage, friends. Win it.
re: exchange rate stability --
I was also pretty surprised by Omar's sophistication here - I'd venture that most lay Americans can't even begin to explain the relationship b/t currency stability and capital stock. Now granted, most of us have never really had to care about this in our day to day lives. BUT, it was still impressive that Omar actually used the proper, economic terms to describe the phenomena and assigned it the proper weight. Impressive.
'Twas good meeting all of you!
Agree Tim. This was a fabulous event with an important message. Here's my account of the day.
http://www.downtheavenue.com/2004/12/on_peace_doing_.html
Note the passion and tone of the Iraqi voices. Some of the more 'traditional' media don't get the importance and relevance of this. What's not to get? Spread the word on this. It's a noble and important thing to get these guys the tools they need. I can't wait to hear about their progress.
Renee
Hi Tim -
I'm the "regular commenter" at Roger L. Simon who drove 3+ hours. Please permit a small correction: As far as I know, Roger did not mention the Palo Alto gathering on his blog. Can't speak for the others but I received my invitation from Spirit of America.
What a privilege and delight to meet these men. I long have believed that Iraq is the key that turns the lock that opens the door in the Middle East. Failure can't be an option. And with the likes of Omar, Mohammed and Ali, Jim Hake and LTC Burghard on our side, why would it be.
I urge everyone to support Spirit of America to the extent possible.
Nice work! But why throw 'bows at the media? Over 50 reporters have died in Iraq already.
'cause many of them do their level best to undermine our will to fight?
That's your opinion, but you also accused them of cowardice, a charge that I don't think is warranted. In any case, it's the U.S. government's responsibility to create a safe and secure environment, both legally and morally.
The media is very nuanced and multi-faceted. They are deserving of praise in many cases, but they shouldn't be above criticism, right praktike?
Praktike,
The "cowardice" charge stems from the fact that many do their "reporting" from a Baghdad hotel - without informing readers of this fact.
With that said, there were a number of embeds (and still are) during the recent offensive, and some reporters are venturing beyond Baghdad on their own.
So, it's unfair to tag the entire MSM with cowardice. Though it does fit some.
I frankly care a heck of a lot more what the Iraqis themselves have to say than self-anointed MSM intermediaries. We'll see how many of the latter get out and do their exit polling come Jan. 31.
Re security, yes, we have an obligation to do the heavy lifting until the ING are tough enough to own all the streets. But ultimately the Iraqis must own that too, unless you think we should be sticking around indefinitely, and I doubt that was your point.
"The "cowardice" charge stems from the fact that many do their "reporting" from a Baghdad hotel - without informing readers of this fact."
Maybe that's true in some cases, but the major outlets' datelines say Baghdad and their stringers are credited. Plus, you're sitting in your comfy chair in front of your computer and criticizing a bunch of people for being a little reticent about getting their heads chopped off? You know that there are many reports of the bad guys have been casing their hotels, and paying off the reception people to inform on when they leave, right? But really ... let's name names. Which reporters do you think are doing a bad job, and why?
"I frankly care a heck of a lot more what the Iraqis themselves have to say than self-anointed MSM intermediaries. We'll see how many of the latter get out and do their exit polling come Jan. 31."
Okay. So you deny the very need for a media? What Iraqi blogs do you read? Do you assert that they give you a complete picture of the situation? Do stringers count as Iraqis? How about Iraqis quoted in newspaper stories? Are they Iraqis, or have their quotes been somehow filtered?
You people are so absurd sometimes. I think the Fadhil brothers are great, and I've given money to SoA several times, but have some perspective ...
I expressed a personal preference, Praktike. Expanding it into a global statment was your work.
I can well understand the desire of reporters to keep their current (physical) stature. Iraqis run those risks every day, perforce. So they go places and see things outsiders will not, and get more honest opinions. The brothers specifically talked about the difficulty of either pollsters or reporters getting straight answers. As for quotes in newspapers - don't be absurb, of course they are filtered.
As to which Iraqi blogs I follow, you could read my blogroll: Zeyad, ITM, AYS, Alaa (Messopotamian), plus occasional orbits by Sarmad, Sam @ Hammorabi, Nabil, Ferid, Najma, and some samples of the kvetching of Riverbend and the Jarrars for that bitter Ba'athist aftertaste. Plus Fayrouz and sometimes Ihath as bicultural bridges. It's certainly not representative - they all write English and have Internet access - but then neither is a nonstop diet of carbombs. And yes, I'd rather chuck the entire NYT's Iraq coverage than them. How about you?
I read all of those except Riverbend (doesn't post often enough for me to bother). I depend on Iraqblogcount to introduce me to new ones. There's another good Mosul blogger (in addition to Najma) that I check in on occasionally. I like the Kurdish bloggers a lot - Kurdo and Dilnareen and Kardox are my faves. But if you want a 360 degree perspective, you'd have to read things like albasrah.net. Every once in a while I peek in on what the bad guys are saying out of sheer curiousity, but I can't take very much of it.
(Continuing the digression from the central topic of the post)
In addition to the Iraqi blogs you've mentioned I read (or at least check) something in the vicinity of 100 blogs or so in putting together the Carnival of the Liberated every week for Dean Esmay. If you haven't read them you might consider Diary from Baghdad and Glimpse of Iraq + Iraqi Letter to America (they're two distinct blogs written by the same guy). The Great Iraq is also handy for translations of Ba'athist proclamations.
It was a pleasure to meet many of you at SoA's Palo Alto event this week. The media problem is with the editors here, not the reporters there. The editors here are telling the reporters the kind of things they want covered, and they're screening content before it's published.
Marine LTC Burghard called the media coverage of Iraq sordid. He said SoA is saving lives. What he didn't say is what he and all of us can easily deduce. They are killing American soldiers and Iraqis when they promote terrorist impact, when they pump up terrorist confidence. Sordid? It's murder and treason.
Now comes the most important question. Who are these soulless creeps of editors, and what are they after?
They gain when there is a weaker U.S. government. They gain when there is a weaker Iraq which struggles. Some people gain through disturbance, deterioration, chaos. Look at history's recent examples. The 1910-1960's Communist movements, slaughtering tens of millions of people. There was renewed momentum in the 1930's Depression and the 1960's protest movements. Look at who rose in wealth and power as a result of those movements, exploiting the rightful causes of the needy for their own personal gain. Their children are today's media editors.
Given their heritage and behavior about Iraq, one must dare to ask, "If such people knew about 9/11 in advance, would they have told?"
Clay, I didn't notice you there. I probably no longer recognize your face; it's been a long time. That means that there were at least four Stanford MBAs in the room, including Jim Hake, Morgan White, and me. We do give back to the world that has been so good to us!
Back to the main topic: What a great event! I wish that every American of every political stripe could meet with Mohammed, Omar, Jim, and Col. Burghard and hear what they have to say.
I didn't get your last name, Jim. Thanks for remembering mine - the family name is hard to forget. But I couldn't agree more with you. Also, John Moragne was there, Jim's housemate when we were at the GSB. He graduated from the 2-3 years after us. Jim and I were class of '83.
Let's keep spreading the word for SoA