Fact checking

At least one news organization doesn't just take what the military doles out to them as gospel. McClatchy does some fact checking:

BAGHDAD — Despite U.S. claims that violence is down in the Iraqi capital, U.S. military officers are offering a bleak picture of Iraq's future, saying they've yet to see any signs of reconciliation between Sunni and Shiite Muslims despite the drop in violence.

Without reconciliation, the military officers say, any decline in violence will be temporary and bloodshed could return to previous levels as soon as the U.S. military cuts back its campaign against insurgent attacks.

That downbeat assessment comes despite a buildup of U.S. troops that began five months ago today and has seen U.S. casualties reach the highest sustained levels since the United States invaded Iraq nearly four and a half years ago.

...And while top U.S. officials insist that 50 percent of the capital is now under effective U.S. or government control, compared with 8 percent in February, statistics indicate that the improvement in violence is at best mixed.

U.S. officials say the number of civilian casualties in the capital is down 50 percent. But U.S. officials declined to provide specific numbers, and statistics gathered by McClatchy Newspapers don't support the claim. The number of car bombings in July actually was 5 percent higher than the number recorded last December, according to the McClatchy statistics, and the number of civilians killed in explosions is about the same.

Of course, outside of Baghdad things look pretty bleak too. The suicide bombings last night in northern Iraq have killed more than 200 even though the U.S. military puts the number at around 60.

Why anyone believes anything the military tells them these days is beyond me.

And then there are our friendly "things are going great over there" war supporters, Michael O’Hanlon and Ken Pollack, whose entire "fact finding" trip to Iraq was based on an itinerary given to them by the military command. That's a bit like letting Qaddafi take you on a guided fact finding tour of Libya.