12/08/2005 10:47:26 am
"The Media Overlook Good News From Iraq." As people in Iraq are bombarded by fanatic terrorists, we in the west are bombarded with images of these horrible events in the media. Of course there are great problems to be overcome in Iraq, but there are also numerous good news from there, which the media simply don?t report - and that would not have taken place without the regime change. Deroy Murdock gives several good examples in an op-ed:

"According to the Brookings Institution?s indispensable Iraq Index, (brookings.edu/iraqindex), on-duty Iraqi security personnel have risen from 125,373 in January to 175,700 today. They fight beside Coalition forces against terrorists and Baathist holdouts. ...

Most Iraqis actually see the overall security situation improving. A July 12 ? 17 Tips Hotline survey of roughly 1,200 Iraqis in Baghdad, Basra, Salah ad-Din, Najaf, Diyala, and Irbil found that 75 percent of respondents believe their security forces are beating anti-government fighters. ...

Some 18,000 pupils will study in rehabilitated classrooms when they go back to school in mid-September. According to U.S. and Iraqi officials, 43 more schools were slated for renovation on August 6. So far, 3,211 schools have been refurbished, and another 773 are being repaired. ...

Iraq?s monthly oil exports have grown from $200 million in June 2003 to $2.5 billion last month. ... These key improvements also help explain why Iraq?s GDP increased from a World Bank estimate of $12.1 billion in 2003 to a projected $21.1 billion in 2004. ...

Internet subscribers have boomed from 4,500 before Iraq?s liberation to 147,076 last March, not counting the additional Iraqis who use Internet cafes. When Saddam Hussein fell, Iraq had 833,000 telephone subscribers. In July, that figure soared 356.4 percent to 3,801,822."