At 9:20 a.m. EST, the photo does not appear to be showing me a U.S. Army corporal named Ben.

That key word you jumped was "by."

McGehee, please read the caption more carefully. Permit me to highlight the relevant section.

U.S. Army photo by Cpl. Ben Washburn

See, it says the photo is by Ben, not of Ben.

As for the article itself, all I can say is Praise Ye The Lord!

Absolutely beautiful... Iraq was and *is* multi-religious and multi-ethnic. The followers of John the Baptists have followers in Iraq, who remain respected and loved by their countrymen. The Kurds respect to Yezidis to the point of putting *their* symbol on the Kurdish flags. Syriac Christians and a small community of Alawites (if memory serves) also are in Iraq. Turkomen, Persian, Azeri... these communities inside Iraq were not at war with each other and all attempts by AQI, JaM and Iran to stir ethnic conflict has brought forth, instead, hatred of the killers.

It is that civil history that has shown up time and time again in Iraq to prove the dectrators of that Nation false in assertion that ethnic or religious civil war would be *easy* to start. Quite the opposite as it was outsiders bringing strife to those communities that had done the killing and incited hatred. That is why our foreign policy outlook failed there and continues to be misunderstood by those wishing oversimplification. Iraq is the cross-roads from Europe to the Far East, from Africa to Asia, it is a place where many settled from different lands over time to make home by the two, fertile rivers. It is the hub, center and anchor of the Middle East and it is no longer controlled by a dictator, tyrannical regime or Empire.

Now it is time for us to understand Iraqis as the best of our Nation learn of them and bring their understanding back to us. And tell us how The Great Peace is understood in a far off land.

Glorious.

Makes you wonder if there is anything idiots like "mcgehee" won't find fault with.

http://www.mcgehee.cc/ might help understand what we are dealing with here.

Awesome. Simply awesome. From the Yon piece:

Speaking in both Arabic and English, Bishop Warduni thanked those American soldiers sitting in the pews for their sacrifices. Again and again, throughout the service, he thanked the Americans.

Greeted as liberators? Yeah, I think so.

BTW, McGehee is a good egg who apparently experienced a brain fart. No need for blue on blue.

Don't even have to look at the link, Larry... McGehee is obviously still trying to figure out what the meaning of "is" is.

That key word you jumped was "by."

D'oh!

Don't even have to look at the link, Larry...

And I'm left wondering if Larry even did.

McGehee, cut Larry some slack. He's always hated chocolate chip cookie dough ice cream.

The fiend!