Thread: Iraq/Dinar News. 09/05 to 01/14/07

Originally Posted by YogiBrood

GW: I sense something different in Iraq.... as opposed to much earlier quips he made: The tide turns...

Great inspiration for the outside world and you , the new treasurers of "some" Iraqi Dinars...

YB.

I Believe reality is fixen to really set in too.

Signs of success in Iraq

6/14/2006


By Jeff Jacoby, Globe Columnist | June 14, 2006

WHEN IRAQ'S Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki announced last week that a US air strike had killed terrorist leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, Iraqi reporters burst into cheers and applause. It was a heartwarming -- and to American eyes, unnatural -- show of joy. Most American journalists would think it unseemly to cheer anything said at a press conference, even the news that a sadistic mass murderer had finally met his end.

Important and welcome as Zarqawi's assassination was, it didn't put a dent in the quagmire-of-the-week mindset that depicts the war as a fiasco wrapped in a scandal inside a failure. Typical of the prevailing pessimism was the glum Page One headline in The Washington Post the morning after Maliki's announcement: ``After Zarqawi, No Clear Path In Weary Iraq."

Virtually from day one, the media have reported this war as a litany of gloom and doom. Images of violence and destruction dominate TV coverage. Analysts endlessly second-guess every military and political decision. Allegations of wrongdoing by US soldiers get far more play than tales of their heroism and generosity. No wonder more than half of the public now believes it was a mistake to send troops to Iraq.

Some of this defeatism was inevitable, given the journalistic predisposition for bad news. (``If it bleeds, it leads.") And some of it was a function of the newsroom's left-wing bias -- many journalists oppose the war and revile the Bush administration, and their coverage often reflects that hostility.

But there have also been highly negative assessments of the war from observers who can't be accused of habitual nay saying or Bush-bashing. In a dispiriting piece that appeared on the day Zarqawi's death was announced, New York Times columnist David Brooks wrote that ``in Iraq at the moment . . . savagery seems to be triumphing over decency." There may be no way to win this war without becoming as monstrous and cruel as the terrorists, he suggested, which is why ``most Americans simply want to get away."

Another thoughtful commentator, The Washington Post's David Ignatius, had been even more despairing one day earlier: ``This is an Iraqi nightmare," he wrote, ``and America seems powerless to stop it."

But not everyone is so hopeless.

In the June issue of Commentary, veteran Middle East journalist Amir Taheri describes ``The Real Iraq" as a far more promising place than the horror show of conventional media wisdom. Arriving in the United States after his latest tour of Iraq, Taheri says, he was ``confronted with an image of Iraq that is unrecognizable" -- an image that ``grossly . . . distorts the realities of present-day Iraq."

What are those realities? Drawing on nearly 40 years of observing Iraq first-hand, Taheri points to several leading indicators that he has always found reliable in gauging the country's true condition.

He begins with refugees. In the past, one could always tell that life in Iraq was growing desperate by the long lines of Iraqis trying to escape over the Iranian and Turkish borders. There have been no such scenes since the toppling of Saddam Hussein in 2003. Instead of fleeing the ``nightmare" that Iraq has supposedly become, Iraqi refugees have been returning, more than 1.2 million of them as of last December.

A second indicator is the pilgrim traffic to the Shi'ite shrines in Karbala and Najaf. Those pilgrimages all but dried up after Saddam bloodily crushed a Shi'ite uprising in 1991, and they didn't resume until the arrival of the Americans in 2003. ``In 2005," writes Taheri, ``the holy sites received an estimated 12 million pilgrims, making them the most-visited spots in the entire Muslim world, ahead of both Mecca and Medina."

A third sign: the value of the Iraqi dinar. All but worthless during Saddam's final years, the dinar is today a safe and solid medium of exchange . Related indicators are small-business activity, which is booming, and Iraqi agriculture, which has experienced a revival so remarkable that Iraq now exports food to its neighbors for the first time since the 1950s.

Finally, says Taheri, there is the willingness of Iraqis to speak their minds. Iraqis are very verbal, and ``when they fall silent, life is incontrovertibly becoming hard for them." They aren't silent now. In addition to talk radio, Internet blogs, and lively debate everywhere, ``a vast network of independent media has emerged in Iraq, including over 100 privately owned newspapers and magazines and more than two dozen radio and television stations." Nowhere in the Arab world is freedom of expression more robust.

As Congress embarks on a wide-ranging Iraq debate this week, Taheri's essay is well worth reading. ``Yes, the situation in Iraq today is messy," he writes. ``Births always are. Since when is that a reason to declare a baby unworthy of life?"


Signs of success in Iraq - Source

Iraqi Dinar News Article List

Come on you two! I feel like you're speaking in RIDDLES!

You are saying "YES - SOON" right?

I swear sometimes I have to read Yogi's posts like 5 times to get them to register! lol!

Originally Posted by tiffany

Come on you two! I feel like you're speaking in RIDDLES!

You are saying "YES - SOON" right?

I swear sometimes I have to read Yogi's posts like 5 times to get them to register! lol!

Good morning Tiff,

Boy is that the truth. I just read a post he made siting information on MLMs and after 15 minutes to read the post, a few parts twice, I do not know if he is downplaying MLM or giving it a boost.

I try not post questions to him on his posts I just read and wait to see how people reply that helps me understand what he is saying.

I am getting my dancing shoes out of the closet and dusting them off.

By the sounds of the posts to me, the end of June might be out mark.

Kozmar

Bush 'Inspired' By Iraq Visit

6/14/2006


BAGHDAD, Iraq, June 14, 2006
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
(CBS/AP) President Bush, freshly home from a surprise trip to Baghdad, said Wednesday that he was "inspired" by his visit to "a free and Democratic Iraq."

Speaking at a White House news conference, Mr. Bush said that coalition forces remain on the offensive against insurgents, using intelligence gathered in the aftermath of the killing of top Iraqi terrorist Abu Musab al-Zarqawi.

Of his meeting with newly installed Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, Mr. Bush said, "I saw first hand the strength of his character and his deep determination to succeed."

"Iraqi and coalition forces are still on the offense," Mr. Bush said. He cited raids of suspected terrorist targets. "We got new intelligence from those raids which will enable us to keep the pressure on the foreigners and the local Iraqis who are killing innocent lives," Mr. Bush said.

"We'll seize this moment of opportunity to help the prime minister," he said.

Mr. Bush said he would like to close the prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, but the U.S. is holding "some people that are darned dangerous." He said Guantanamo can't be closed without a plan for what to do with the terror suspects

CBS News White House correspondent Peter Maer reports Mr. Bush is using this session with reporters to deliver a domestic version of the message he took to Iraq: the U.S. won't leave until Iraq can defend itself.

"I am going to do what I think is right. When I tell you these decisions are going to be made by General (George) Casey, I mean it," the president said Tuesday as he flew back from his surprise trip. Casey is the top U.S. general in Iraq.

Mr. Bush has shied away from embracing suggestions from Casey and other military leaders that the U.S. troop strength in Iraq — now about 132,000 — could be whittled to 100,000 by the end of the year. The war has weakened Mr. Bush politically and raised anxieties among Republicans that they will lose seats — and perhaps control — in either the House or Senate in November.

"There's a worry almost to a person that we will leave before they are capable of defending themselves, and I assured them they didn't need to worry," the president said. "I also made it clear that we want to work with their government on a way forward on all fronts."

"They're deeply concerned that the stability provided by our coalition forces will be removed and there will be a vacuum and they're concerned about what goes into the vacuum, and I can understand that concern," he added. "I assured them that we'll keep our commitment. I also made it clear to them that in order for us to keep our commitment, they themselves have to do some hard things, they themselves have to set the agenda."

Slouched in a high-back swivel desk chair in his office on Air Force One, Mr. Bush talked about his 5½ hour visit to Baghdad about a half hour after his departure. Security was extraordinary for the takeoff from Baghdad's airport. Mr. Bush's plane sat in total darkness on the runway and lifted off with no running lights. The plane had not been completely refueled so that it could get up high faster. As a result, a refueling stop was required en route back to Washington and it was nearing dawn Wednesday when it made it back to the White House.

Mr. Bush sat at his v-curved desk in a rumpled white shirt with no tie. Senior aides stood along the wall or sat on a couch in front of him as he chatted with reporters for 36 minutes.

Mr. Bush said it was unrealistic to expect that Iraq could rid itself of violence — the bombings, gunfire and suicide attacks that have become a part of daily life in some cities.

"If the standard is no violence, that's an impossible standard to meet," the president said. "If the standard is a government that is beginning to gain the confidence of the people because they're taking wise action in terms of helping return normalcy, then I believe this government will meet that standard."

Mr. Bush's visit came six days after a U.S. air strike killed al Qaeda terror chief Abu Musab al-Zarqawi and five days after Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki completed his cabinet by naming the ministers of Defense and Interior — events the president's advisers hoped would lead to political progress.

Mr. Bush said he made the surprise trip to Baghdad to size up al-Maliki and members of his cabinet. The president came away with a good impression of al-Maliki and his team, which combines Sunni, Shiite and Kurd officials into a unity government.

"I wanted to hear him talk about his way forward in Iraq," Mr. Bush said. "I wanted to hear whether or not he was stuck in the past or willing to think about the future. I wanted to get a sense of his capacity to prioritize and rally people to achieve objectives. I came away with a very positive impression. He was a serious-minded fellow who recognized there had to be progress in order for the Iraqi people to believe the unity government could make a difference in their lives. He specifically talked about electricity in Baghdad and we talked about the security situation."

Mr. Bush listened to individual cabinet members describe the challenges they face. He referred to them by their jobs — "oil guy," "reconciliation person," "defense minister," "the electricity man," a "lady member of the cabinet" who talked about human rights concerns about coalition forces.

"I came away with the feeling they're plenty capable people," the president said.




Bush 'Inspired' By Iraq Visit - Source

Iraqi Dinar News Article List

]'Operation Foward Together' begins in Iraq

6/14/2006


By QASSIM ABDUL-ZAHRA, Associated Press WriterWed Jun 14, 3:32 AM ET

Iraq's prime minister launched the biggest security crackdown in Baghdad since the U.S.-led invasion, with tens of thousands of security forces deploying throughout the capital on Wednesday and increased checkpoints causing some traffic jams.

The crackdown, which army officials said was dubbed Operation Forward Together, began a day after U.S. President George W. Bush paid a surprise visit to Baghdad, promising continued U.S. support for Iraqis but cautioning them that "the future of the country is in your hands."

An Iraqi army official, who declined to named because he was not authorized to release the information, said two divisions had been deployed in the capital, which would be about 20,000 soldiers, along with some 50,000 Interior Ministry forces.

There were more checkpoints and soldiers on the streets as Iraqis drove to work Wednesday morning, causing traffic to back up in some areas. However, noticeably fewer cars were circulating in the city.

Maj. Gen. Mahdi al-Gharrawi, the commander of public order forces under the Interior Ministry, said his forces had not encountered any resistance to the stepped-up security measures, even in some of the capital's most volatile areas.

"The people are feeling comfortable with the security measures and they are waving to us," al-Gharrawi said. "Until now, no clashes have erupted and no bullets have been fired at us."

Osama Ahmed Salah, a 50-year-old Sunni university professor in western Baghdad, said he hoped authorities would not randomly target the minority sect.

"The security plan operations should not depend on false information and they should not be sectarian or directed against a specific kind of people," he said. "The operations should be well-prepared and they should not be conducted in a way that humiliates citizens."

Security officials said Tuesday that 75,000 Iraqi and multinational forces would be deployed throughout Baghdad, securing roads in and out of the city, establishing more checkpoints, launching raids against insurgent hideouts and calling in airstrikes if necessary.

The operation was the biggest of its kind in Baghdad since the U.S. handed over sovereignty to Iraq in June 2004, al-Gharrawi said Tuesday.

"The terrorists cannot face such power," Iraqi army Brig. Jalil Khalaf said.

Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki also announced plans for an extended curfew and a weapons ban, saying he would show "no mercy" to terrorists six days after al-Qaida in Iraq leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi was killed in a U.S. airstrike northeast of Baghdad. The government did not say how long the crackdown would last.

Bush's visit Tuesday was seen by many as a boost for al-Maliki, who is seeking to build momentum after al-Zarqawi's death and the appointment of defense and interior ministers following weeks of political stalemate.

It got mixed reviews from Iraqis. Radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr planned a demonstration later Wednesday in Baghdad to protest the visit.

But other Iraqis said the visit came at a good time.

"It is truly a surprise visit, but it is a good gesture and a step forward on the path of establishing security and stability," author Abbas al-Rubai said.

Al-Zarqawi's successor, identified by the nom de guerre Abu Hamza al-Muhajer, vowed to defeat "crusaders and Shiites" in Iraq and said "holy warriors" in the country were stronger than ever, according to a Web statement posted Tuesday — the first from the new leader.

Underlining the threat, explosions on Tuesday struck oil-rich Kirkuk, killing at least 16 people. Kirkuk police Brig. Gen. Sarhat Qadir said the attacks in the city 180 miles north of Baghdad were believed to be "a reaction to avenge the killing of al-Zarqawi."

Al-Qaida in Iraq has been increasingly focusing its attacks on Baghdad rather than on U.S. targets in western Iraq. "Baghdad is divided according to geographical area, and we know the al-Qaida leaders in each area," al-Gharrawi said.

Despite the security crackdown, he warned insurgents were likely to step up their attacks.

"We are expecting clashes will erupt in the predominantly Sunni areas," al-Gharrawi told The Associated Press. "The terrorists will escalate their violence especially during the first week as revenge for the killing of al-Zarqawi."

Civilians have also complained of random violence and detentions by Iraqi forces, especially the police, which are widely believed to have been infiltrated by so-called sectarian death squads.

Al-Gharrawi said there were plans for a single uniform to distinguish legitimate forces in the coming days.

"There will be a special uniform with special badges to be put on the vehicles as a sign that it belongs to our forces," he said.

Al-Maliki's plan additionally includes banning personal weapons and implementing a 9 p.m. to 6 a.m. curfew, which hitherto had begun at 11 p.m. The new curfew was expected to begin Friday.

Al-Maliki said in his news conference that the plan "will provide security and confront the terrorism and ... enable Iraqis to live in peace in Baghdad."

"The raids during this plan will be very tough ... because there will be no mercy toward those who show no mercy to our people," he said in a statement.

The Iraqi army launched a similar crackdown dubbed Operation Lightning in May 2005, deploying more than 40,000 Iraqi police and soldiers, backed by American troops and air support. However, violence continued to spike and many Sunnis were alienated by the heavy-handed tactics concentrating on their neighborhoods.

The extended curfew is expected to curtail what few social activities Baghdad's 6 million residents have left — including shopping and buying bread. But those activities were already restricted in many neighborhoods where the streets are not safe at night. People are very likely to shoot strangers on sight after dark, which begins about 9 p.m.

The attacks in Kirkuk began at 7:45 a.m. when a parked car containing a bomb exploded near a police patrol in the city center, killing 10 people, including two policemen, Qadir said. Nine people were wounded.

Some 30 minutes later, guards fired on a suspected suicide car bomber trying to pass through a checkpoint at the Kirkuk police directorate. The car exploded, killing five people, including two policemen, and wounding six, Qadir said.

Another suspected suicide car bomber in Kirkuk tried to hit a Kurdish political office at 8:30 a.m., but guards opened fire on that car, and it exploded, police Col. Taieb Taha said. Three civilians were wounded.

A suicide car bomber targeted a police patrol south of Kirkuk more than an hour later near an institute for the disabled. The explosion killed a driver nearby and wounded six, Qadir said.

At least 26 other violent deaths were reported Tuesday.

Defense Ministry spokesman Maj. Gen. Abdul-Aziz Mohammed said 761 attacks killed 263 civilians and wounded 301 others last week, from Friday to Saturday, while 78 terror suspects were killed and 584 detained.

So far in 2006, at least 3,829 Iraqi civilians and at least 754 Iraqi security forces have been killed in war-related violence. For the same time period, at least 4,577 Iraqi civilians and at least 749 Iraqi security forces have been wounded. These figures are based on AP reports, which may not be complete because the reporting process does not cover the entire country. These numbers do not include insurgents.

There have been at least 335 coalition troop deaths in 2006; of these at least 312 have been U.S. military.

The presence of U.S. troops in Iraq is considered a greater threat to Mideast stability than the current government in Iran, according to a new poll of European and Muslim countries.

The poll found that people in Britain, France, Germany, Spain and Russia rated the presence of troops in Iraq higher than the government in Iran as a threat, according to polling by the Pew Research Center for the People & the Press. Views of U.S. troops in Iraq were even more negative in countries like Indonesia, Egypt, Jordan, Turkey and Pakistan.

___

Associated Press writers Kim Gamel, Patrick Quinn, Sameer N. Yacoub and Qais al-Bashir contributed to this report from Baghdad.


'Operation Foward Together' begins in Iraq - Source

Iraqi Dinar News Article List

Originally Posted by neno

Signs of success in Iraq

6/14/2006


By Jeff Jacoby, Globe Columnist | June 14, 2006

WHEN IRAQ'S Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki announced last week that a US air strike had killed terrorist leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, Iraqi reporters burst into cheers and applause. It was a heartwarming -- and to American eyes, unnatural -- show of joy. Most American journalists would think it unseemly to cheer anything said at a press conference, even the news that a sadistic mass murderer had finally met his end.

Important and welcome as Zarqawi's assassination was, it didn't put a dent in the quagmire-of-the-week mindset that depicts the war as a fiasco wrapped in a scandal inside a failure. Typical of the prevailing pessimism was the glum Page One headline in The Washington Post the morning after Maliki's announcement: ``After Zarqawi, No Clear Path In Weary Iraq."

Virtually from day one, the media have reported this war as a litany of gloom and doom. Images of violence and destruction dominate TV coverage. Analysts endlessly second-guess every military and political decision. Allegations of wrongdoing by US soldiers get far more play than tales of their heroism and generosity. No wonder more than half of the public now believes it was a mistake to send troops to Iraq.

Some of this defeatism was inevitable, given the journalistic predisposition for bad news. (``If it bleeds, it leads.") And some of it was a function of the newsroom's left-wing bias -- many journalists oppose the war and revile the Bush administration, and their coverage often reflects that hostility.

But there have also been highly negative assessments of the war from observers who can't be accused of habitual nay saying or Bush-bashing. In a dispiriting piece that appeared on the day Zarqawi's death was announced, New York Times columnist David Brooks wrote that ``in Iraq at the moment . . . savagery seems to be triumphing over decency." There may be no way to win this war without becoming as monstrous and cruel as the terrorists, he suggested, which is why ``most Americans simply want to get away."

Another thoughtful commentator, The Washington Post's David Ignatius, had been even more despairing one day earlier: ``This is an Iraqi nightmare," he wrote, ``and America seems powerless to stop it."

But not everyone is so hopeless.

In the June issue of Commentary, veteran Middle East journalist Amir Taheri describes ``The Real Iraq" as a far more promising place than the horror show of conventional media wisdom. Arriving in the United States after his latest tour of Iraq, Taheri says, he was ``confronted with an image of Iraq that is unrecognizable" -- an image that ``grossly . . . distorts the realities of present-day Iraq."

What are those realities? Drawing on nearly 40 years of observing Iraq first-hand, Taheri points to several leading indicators that he has always found reliable in gauging the country's true condition.

He begins with refugees. In the past, one could always tell that life in Iraq was growing desperate by the long lines of Iraqis trying to escape over the Iranian and Turkish borders. There have been no such scenes since the toppling of Saddam Hussein in 2003. Instead of fleeing the ``nightmare" that Iraq has supposedly become, Iraqi refugees have been returning, more than 1.2 million of them as of last December.

A second indicator is the pilgrim traffic to the Shi'ite shrines in Karbala and Najaf. Those pilgrimages all but dried up after Saddam bloodily crushed a Shi'ite uprising in 1991, and they didn't resume until the arrival of the Americans in 2003. ``In 2005," writes Taheri, ``the holy sites received an estimated 12 million pilgrims, making them the most-visited spots in the entire Muslim world, ahead of both Mecca and Medina."

A third sign: the value of the Iraqi dinar. All but worthless during Saddam's final years, the dinar is today a safe and solid medium of exchange . Related indicators are small-business activity, which is booming, and Iraqi agriculture, which has experienced a revival so remarkable that Iraq now exports food to its neighbors for the first time since the 1950s.

Finally, says Taheri, there is the willingness of Iraqis to speak their minds. Iraqis are very verbal, and ``when they fall silent, life is incontrovertibly becoming hard for them." They aren't silent now. In addition to talk radio, Internet blogs, and lively debate everywhere, ``a vast network of independent media has emerged in Iraq, including over 100 privately owned newspapers and magazines and more than two dozen radio and television stations." Nowhere in the Arab world is freedom of expression more robust.

As Congress embarks on a wide-ranging Iraq debate this week, Taheri's essay is well worth reading. ``Yes, the situation in Iraq today is messy," he writes. ``Births always are. Since when is that a reason to declare a baby unworthy of life?"


Signs of success in Iraq - Source

Iraqi Dinar News Article List

Great find Neno,

This is the real deal, and the three points indicated in this article says it all. Imagine, would millions be coming back to Iraq if it was as bad as the major press makes it sound? The problem has always been that WE, as in US or outsiders cannot fathom ourselves in the same position, so WE, as in most, cannot understand how Iraqi's really think. For years most peaceful Iraqi's were leaving the country, while the Saddam regime got stronger, and now that things are totally reversing, we never hear about these positive indicators. Iraq is well on its way to a total recovery and I do feel peace will prevail.

Good luck to all, Mike

Neno...Why bother dusting them off? They're just gonna get SAND in them anyway!!!

I am FIGHTING the URGE to place another order from SafeDinar...I know that I will receive them tomorrow...almost like 'instant gratification' for my sickness! lol!

Originally Posted by Offshore-Wealth.com

Great find Neno,

This is the real deal, and the three points indicated in this article says it all. Imagine, would millions be coming back to Iraq if it was as bad as the major press makes it sound? The problem has always been that WE, as in US or outsiders cannot fathom ourselves in the same position, so WE, as in most, cannot understand how Iraqi's really think. For years most peaceful Iraqi's were leaving the country, while the Saddam regime got stronger, and now that things are totally reversing, we never hear about these positive indicators. Iraq is well on its way to a total recovery and I do feel peace will prevail.

Good luck to all, Mike

Sad, but TOTALLY true !

Hearing the same info Mike? I'm like a junkie...can't help it...sorry!

Originally Posted by quietlight

Over the last 4 months I have made a number of purchases of dinar from myfreedinar, with no problems at all. With the negative comments I am now reading about this website on this forum it has made me a bit nervous about whether the dinars I have been sent are the real thing. Does anybody know if there has been any problems with the authenticity of the dinars they send people?

I'm responding to your question because I have also ordered dinar from Free Dinar .... I also ordered the UV lite and checked out the dinar I received...it all
checked out fine... hope that calms your concern so you can enjoy the rest of the ride.