A Powerful Blog Entry
Baghdad Burning
… I’ll meet you ’round the bend my friend, where hearts can heal and souls can mend…
Sunday, November 06, 2005
Movies and Dreams…
Riverbend says it all, showing that she and the Iraqi People are No Differant than We and the rest of the American People and All People on this Planet.
I could post up more of her Entry but I find it hard to Separate her thoughts, and writing, without taking the impact of the total reading which within she gives a Graphic Example of what takes place in War!
In this Powerful Entry, as many of hers are, she injects So Much into such a Short Entry. She leaves one Understanding that these are not just her thoughts but the thoughts and feelings of the Majority of Iraqi’s as they would be to others in other Countries after being Invaded, Occupied and Rapidly Destroyed, the People, the Infrastructure, the Society, the Whole Country!
The blockquote above is just the first paragraph of another Powerful Posting, from a little known about Young Lady, in the Country known as Iraq. Please visit her site and read the rest of Movies and Dreams… , it would seem to me to give her Thoughts and Feelings much more Impact, by reading them there!
After visiting Riverbends ‘Baghdad Burning’ Blog HERE is a site that will bring the Destructive Forces of Human’s Inhumanity against fellow Human’s to better focus, just one more of many that are Extremely Graphic in Reality! A Strong Warning though, there are Extremely Graphic Photo’s and Video’s Linked Within, so Prepare!
A Picture or Video is just a Moment in Time of any given day, and there are Many Moments, much of them Destructive in a Day within a War/Conflict. For the Destructive Forces can come at Any Moment of those Many Moments by Any Force Intent on Bringing the Destruction!
You can view a couple of Pages of Photo’s HERE and HERE and a Video HERE
Be Forwarned of Directly Above
These are also Photo’s of those who went through their Many Moments and Now Have No More Moments To Live:
This is a Silent Honor Roll shown on the PBS ‘News Hour’, now Almost Daily, that was started at the Beginning!
As of Today, 11-06-05 there are 51 Pages with 5 ‘Honor Roll’ links per page!
If you take the Time to View ‘ALL’ the Pages/Photo’s and Information Instill This Thought Into Each American Military Face You See, ‘Try and Picture 30, 40, 50, 60 or More Iraqi Faces, Children-Women-Men, Killed for Each Of These Faces You Are Looking At’
Extremely moving Photo Essay of 27 funerals of soldiers killed in Iraq.
U.S. CASUALTY MAP;click on map for interaction site:
A Picture is Worth a Thousand Words
If that is true than
2000 Speaks VOLUMES!!
PS: And while you’re at it, think about 58,000 Plus Faces Of Vietnam
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As Alec Baldwin puts it So Well in his Post, over at Huffington:
Wars, Conflicts, Destruction, Blood Profiteering as long as there are those, as he lists, and others like them in This World! They Must be Recognized Long Before they are able to bring their Wrath on Others!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
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I read Riverbend’s latest post last night and I second jim’s call to read Movies and dreams . . . . For those of us who have loved her writings since she began her blog, her latest is one of her best – and that is saying a lot because there have been so many that were just stunning.
If you haven’t yet found her, bookmark her blog, go through the archives of Baghdad Burning and read it all. It will take you a while. Her first post:
Don’t forget – if you want to read archived entries in chronological order, you have to scroll down and read from the bottom of the page up. And here’s another link – to one of my favorites, about her job and how she lost it: Will work for food
Janet, that if you can pick up the Book of her Postings Baghdad Burning : Girl Blog from Iraq (Paperback)
That was printed up here in the States, for her, by a group through the Feminist Press!
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I don’t even remember now how I stumbled onto Riverbends blog but it was toward the very beginning of her blogging.
I can’t recommend reading her enough. If you don’t read any other blog from Iraq or even about Iraq I would say this is the one to read.
She manages to make her blog personal with tiny details of everyday life for her family yet also give an overview of what is happening in the country, who the major characters are with great clarity and insight. Really an amazing view of what is happening to her country, her family and no doubt her story is echoed by thousands and millions of other across the country.
I’m always by turns angry, sad, discouraged or even at times smile(not often though) at what she has written and can’t really begin to comprehend what our invasion into her country has done to her and her family. Yet she writes so eloquently that I at least have an inkling first hand of the horror, chaos and the steadily declining loss of hope that things are going to get better.
Janet, I know exactly where I stumbled on her writings. It was on buzzflash. I have since kept up with her and even emailed her once. I just know that she is an extra-ordinary person. She has the ability to see into the future and the past at the same time and I love that to the point she makes so much sense in her writings.
…Barbra Streisand
Posted on October 26, 2005
If there was ever a time in history to impeach a President of the United States, it would be now. In my opinion, it is two years too late. We should have done this before the election to spare the country the misjudgment, the incompetence and the malfeasance of this administration. Let us remember that UN weapons inspectors asked for more time to search Iraq for WMDs. Two months into their search, the Director General of the UN’s International Atomic Energy Agency, Mohamed ElBaradei, stated that he found no evidence that Iraq had revived its nuclear weapons program since its elimination in the 1990s. And Saddam Hussein had begun to comply with the administration’s demands. Why would you invade a country if there was still a chance for peace? Shouldn’t war be an absolute last resort? We went to war because we were misled. And we should be angry because of the 2,000 American soldiers and the 200 armed coalition forces that have died. We should be livid because of the 15,000 American soldiers that have been horribly maimed and wounded. We should be disgusted because of the 30,000 innocent Iraqi civilians that have been killed and the 20,000 that are wounded after administration officials claimed that the US was going to liberate the Iraqi people.
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Jim, River Bends letters are somewhat like some of those coming out of VN many years back. (from our side)
She, at the beginning of this war seems optimistic and sustained in her writings, now she seems very forlorn and angry/depressed. Nothing good or family oriented like the beginning was. This is such a shame and loss of a human being for that matter.
That if she Survives what is going on now, and the Ramifications of the Pandora’s Box, we have Unleashed, that she will become a Great Hope for her Country!
As you described, this is a Young Lady who has Grown Well Beyond her Years, in Experiance and Knowledge, and can Put To Words, and I’m Sure Speach, that experiance and Knowledge and a Strong Dose of Common Sense, something Lacking in Far Too Many today!!!!!
thanks jimstaro – i’ve drawn attention to riverbend in diaries and comments on here before, i sometimes get the feeling that she doesnt get the wide audience she deserves – every little helps ….
Thank you for sharing this, Jim.
The photos and narration in the Bitter Fruit slide show are truly haunting. I felt the pain, sorrow and anger searing through the images.
“You can’t measure that waste.” “Where’s the glory?” “Where’s the honor?”
Peace and blessings
Thanks Jim
River bend’s infrequent posts are implicit evidence of how we have failed in Iraq.