And You Thought Detroit Was Bad...

Hey everyone, things are getting better in Iraq! NOT!

Baghdad's morgue reported that 1,091 people were killed in the city's daily violence in April, the Iraqi president's office said in a statement Wednesday.

In the upsurge in sectarian violence after the February 22 attack on a Shiite shrine in Samarra, slain bodies have been found almost daily in the capital, many showing signs of being tortured.
[snip]
Meanwhile, the toll from Tuesday night's suicide car bombing in a Shiite neighborhood in Tal Afar rose Wednesday to 20 dead and 37 wounded.

Tal Afar is near the Syrian border, about 45 miles (72 kilometers) west of Mosul, Iraq's third-largest city.

President Bush recently cited Tal Afar as an example of the progress of coalition troops against the insurgency.

U.S. and Iraqi troops had pushed insurgents out of the city in 2004, but Tal Afar's security forces were unable to hold the city.

In September, U.S. and Iraqi troops reclaimed Tal Afar after a monthlong operation.

Violence has persisted there, however. In March, just days after Bush's speech touting the success of Tal Afar, a suicide bomber killed 30 people at an Iraqi army recruiting center outside the city.

Wow. So, you know Detroit, right? Consistently rated one of the most dangerous cities? Shitty pro football team? One of the country's highest murder totals every year? Yeah, that Detroit. Detroit had 385 murders in 2004 (the most recent year covered by official statistics). Baghdad's more than doubled that in a month. Imagine if an American city was that out of control. They'd build a wall around it and not let anyone in or out, except maybe Kurt Russell. So, please, don't give us any more of that "nobody reports the good news from Iraq" bullshit. If 1000 people a month were being murdered in Detroit, nobody would care if they opened another casino in Greektown or the slapped a fresh coat of paint on Cass Tech, either.