Thousands return to safer Iraqi capital

Nothing enrages leftists more than a story about American successes:

Cornell Daily Sun, 4 Nov 2007,
Thousands return to safer Iraqi capital
BAGHDAD - In a dramatic turnaround, more than 3,000 Iraqi families driven out of their Baghdad neighborhoods have returned to their homes in the past three months as sectarian violence has dropped, the government said Saturday.

Saad al-Azawi, his wife and four children are among them. They fled to Syria six months ago, leaving behind what had become one of the capital's more dangerous districts — west Baghdad's largely Sunni Khadra region.

The family had been living inside a vicious and bloody turf battle between al-Qaida in Iraq and Mahdi Army militiamen. But Azawi said things began changing, becoming more peaceful, in August when radical anti-American Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr ordered his Mahdi Army fighters to stand down nationwide.

About the same time, the Khadra neighborhood Awakening Council rose up against brutal al-Qaida control — the imposition of its austere interpretation of Islam, along with the murder and torture of those who would not comply.

Similar good tidings from Iraq will increase in the coming months spelling doom to anti-War candidates. Sad to say, I have no doubt that all the Democratic candidates for any office are praying for severe increases in the US military death toll. Stories like the following are just not good news for Democratic defeatists and cowards

BYU News, 1 Nov 2007, U.S. Military Deaths Down in Iraq

The number of deaths per month, however, has started to decrease. In October, coalition deaths in Iraq were down to the lowest levels since March 2006.

"Of course a drop in the number is something that is encouraging and a positive sign," said Rep. Jim Matheson, D-Utah. "I've heard a number of different explanations [for the drop]."

Matheson said the surge is likely part of the reason for the lower number of fatalities, but he also mentioned many other factors, such as less religiously diverse neighborhoods that have probably contributed as well. Most of the sectarian violence in Iraq has been between two competing religious factions -Shiite and Sunni Muslims.

The Associated Press reported the number of coalition deaths for October 2007 to be 36. In September 2007 they reported 65, and in August they reported 84 coalition deaths.

It should be noted that fewer US soldiers die each year in Iraq than died during the peaceful years of Bill Clinton's reign.

Related blogs:

Captains' Quarters,
3 Nov 2007,
When Is Victory An Embarrassment?

The Times of London answers the question in an editorial today -- when one has invested in defeat. The "Petraeus Curve" has exposed defeatists in Britain and the US, and as a result, no one wants to talk about the obvious and significant progress being made in Iraq. Success, it seems, has become too embarrassing for the media and some politicians to acknowledge