by Rod D. Martin
March 17, 2007

Lots of coverage today about the chlorine-laden bombs terrorists detonated in Iraq. But did you catch this, buried beneath the lede in the AP story?

There is a mounting power struggle between insurgents and the growing number of Sunnis who oppose them in Anbar, the center of the Sunni insurgency, which stretches from Baghdad to the borders with Syria, Saudi Arabia and Jordan. The Anbar assaults came three days after Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, a Shiite, traveled there to reach out to Sunni clan chiefs in a bid to undermine tribal support for the insurgency.

No, I bet you didn’t.

Gas attacks will not win al Qaeda or the Saddamites any friends, especially when the gas attacks — reminiscent of those for which Saddam was just put to death — are against fellow Sunnis instead of “foreign” Kurds. There’s a reason the tide is turning toward freedom.

And yet you aren’t hearing about, are you?

You also aren’t hearing that the U.S. casualty rate has dropped 50% since the beginning of the surge. You also aren’t hearing that violence in Baghdad has dropped a whopping 80% since the surge began. You also aren’t hearing that Sadr’s army has disbanded and dispersed. As Bill Luti (Special Assistant to the President and Senior Director for Defense Policy and Strategy) told me the other day, it doesn’t even matter if they stay dispersed: every day they’re gone is a day Iraqis get used to peace and more angry at the very idea of these thugs coming back.

And indeed, most Iraqis are getting used to peace already. As noted here before, the economy is booming, at twice the rate of China’s. The housing market is tremendous, average salaries across the country are up 100%, teacher pay is up 2,700%, schools are bursting at the seams with more going up every day. And in Kurdish northern Iraq, foreign investment is skyrocketing, and European airlines are beginning to offer twice-daily service from points west.

This is not the story you’re hearing. Don’t you wonder why? And doesn’t it make you angry?

Well, don’t sit around and do nothing about it: act!  The left wants you to hear gloom and doom so they can beat Republicans: they couldn’t care less about Iraqis or Afghans or U.S. soldiers so long as their guys win elections. And frankly, we think that’s pretty vile.

So let’s do something about it. You can start by spreading the word. Nobody knows this stuff. But as of now, you do.