Article

2008-03-17 Iraq

5 years after Iraq's 'liberation,' there are worms in the water

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Posted by Seafarious 2008-03-17 00:00|| || Front Page|| [10 views ] Top

#1 Trash collection is so sporadic that residents tie up their garbage in plastic bags and fling them onto a reeking pile at the end of the street. Electricity is mainly from a private generator, and water shortages have forced Abdel Hussein to shower at a public bathhouse in another neighborhood.

Then they need to start a compost heap! Perhaps we should do a special printing of the new earth catalog for them so they can learn basic back to the earth principles.

Posted by 3dc 2008-03-17 00:42|| 2008-03-17 00:42|| Front Page Top

#2 Improved services might have come more promptly if your friends and neighbors hadn't been blowing up infrastructure and workers for 4-1/2 years.

Posted by Bobby 2008-03-17 06:43|| 2008-03-17 06:43|| Front Page Top

#3 I fail to see how the implied criticism of the US is legitimate. If they would quit murdering each other and fix the damned pipes they'd have water.

Posted by Solomon Throlugum5323 2008-03-17 07:54|| 2008-03-17 07:54|| Front Page Top

#4 Water shortages are because of Saddam's complete lack of maintenance of his crumbling water supply, added to a civil war fomented by AQ, added to corruption and killings. We are only just now getting into these areas to fix it.

Plus, the garbage situation is the same as in any third world nation that you visit. There is a reason disease and parasites are plentiful in those countries, and it ain't from some zionist, halburtonbushhitler plot.

Maybe if this guy went over there to actually help fix the problem, rather than fling his hate-poo like a retarded monkey some shit would actually get done faster.

Posted by DarthVader">DarthVader 2008-03-17 08:00|| 2008-03-17 08:00|| Front Page Top

#5 Trash piling up because no one collects it? Sounds like NYC during a strike!

Posted by Rob Crawford">Rob Crawford 2008-03-17 08:00|| 2008-03-17 08:00|| Front Page Top

#6 Considering the deferred maintenance on most of the US infrastructure, we shouldn't be so judgmental. Even cities like San Diego have crumbling 100 year old sewer systems that occasionally result in floods of raw sewage dumping into the bay. Bridges all over the country date to the WPA of the 30's and older. Electric infrastructure is teetering on a knife edge as witness the rolling blackouts in California a few years back. We haven't built a refinery in 30+ years. And the sad thing is that our governments, state, local, and federal, refuse to even contemplate what will be required to fix the problems and in many cases exacerbate them through stupid, albeit nice sounding politically, actions.

Posted by RWV 2008-03-17 08:44|| 2008-03-17 08:44|| Front Page Top

#7 What did we find during March-April 2003? No electricity (except Baghdad), no potable water, mountains of garbage.

The truth is that muslims will never be thankful to infidels and will blame all their problems on us. It's a grave mistake to lift a finger to help them in any way. It's either isolate them and let them rot or war, with the second option being the only safe course.

Posted by ed 2008-03-17 08:46|| 2008-03-17 08:46|| Front Page Top

#8 #6 Considering the ~~cancelled~~ deferred maintenance on most of the US infrastructure........

We must think globally, global infrastructure investment, er, huh, etc.

Posted by Besoeker 2008-03-17 09:03|| 2008-03-17 09:03|| Front Page Top

#9 Chart of Iraq electricity production by year:
http://www.indexmundi.com/g/g.aspx?c=iz&v=79

This is not an American problem by cause or responsibility. Iraq needs more power plants, but it will not get them until the violence declines and the government gets its act together. Same with trash collection, etc. Muslims need to stop fighting Muslims. Don't hold your breath.

Posted by Darrell 2008-03-17 10:10|| 2008-03-17 10:10|| Front Page Top

#10 I tried posting a article yesterday comparing conditions in Iraq to conditions today.

Simple facts:
The number of Iraqis with potable water and access to a sewage system has nearly doubled since March 2003.
The number of telephones has increased more than 10 fold.
The availability of electricity in the countryside has more than doubled.
The GDP per capita has nearly doubled.

What these reporters like to forget is that Iraq was a horribly poor place under Saddam (the real GDP per capita fell 75% during his rule). Only a minority of people had access to clean drinking water and sewage treatment.

The real story of Iraq is that its economic growth rate has approached mainland China, and this is despite the security situation. This growth has been accomplished largely be getting out of the way of the individual Iraqis and letting them use their intelligence and energy to better themselves.

As the security situation improves you're going to see the economy explode.

Al

Posted by Frozen Al 2008-03-17 11:00|| 2008-03-17 11:00|| Front Page Top

#11 Iraq currently has more power production than they have ever had. The difference is that more of it is being distributed to the countryside that rarely had any electric power when Saddam was in charge, most was diverted to Baghdad ... or else.

There's more water treatment in more places than there was before, too.

As for trash pickup, from what I understand most of the trash trucks were blown up from being used as bombs.

Posted by crosspatch 2008-03-17 11:09|| 2008-03-17 11:09|| Front Page Top

#12 Something interesting in the electrical production stats. These are all national figures. What they omit is all the local production. Individual generators and neighborhood co-ops are quite common.

Given all the problems with national production and the national grid (at one point the international spot price for copper was dropping due to the amount of looted Iraqi transmission cables on the market) local production is a good solution for many Iraqis. A good example of the market solving problems that government cannot.

Local production also means that the typical Iraqi has far greater access to electrical power than the national stats would suggest.

Posted by Iblis 2008-03-17 13:17|| 2008-03-17 13:17|| Front Page Top

#13 how about doing olike a lot f ppl in NEW Orleans shoud do( not all some) fix some of the shit yourse;lf and quit sitting at the cafes all damn day. they sounds fucking lazy too me

Posted by sinse 2008-03-17 16:56|| 2008-03-17 16:56|| Front Page Top

#14 I read as much as I could stand, Gawd what a whine-fest.

Posted by Redneck Jim">Redneck Jim 2008-03-17 17:17|| 2008-03-17 17:17|| Front Page Top

#15 Fifty five years after independence and twenty years after Saddam coming in power they still had worms in water.

Posted by JFM">JFM 2008-03-17 19:22|| 2008-03-17 19:22|| Front Page Top

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