Next villain, please

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Riverbend, the girl blogger on the Tigris, has a bitter (how would you not be bitter in Baghdad?) take on Zarqawi:

“To hell with Zarqawi (or Zayrkawi as Bush calls him). He was an American creation — he came along with them — they don’t need him anymore, apparently. His influence was greatly exaggerated but he was the justification for every single family they killed through military strikes and troops. It was WMD at first, then it was Saddam, then it was Zarqawi. Who will it be now?”

Indeed, whom, or what, will we blame now? Killing Zarqawi was probably the only thing the administration could have done in Iraq that was guaranteed to generate positive spin–and the spin won’t last. Someone, somewhere, must be thinking about how to follow this act between now and November.

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BEFORE YOU CLICK AWAY!

“Lying.” “Disgusting.” “Scum.” “Slime.” “Corrupt.” “Enemy of the people.” Donald Trump has always made clear what he thinks of journalists. And it’s plain now that his administration intends to do everything it can to stop journalists from reporting things they don’t like—which is most things that are true.

No one gets to tell Mother Jones what to publish or not publish, because no one owns our fiercely independent newsroom. But that also means we need to directly raise the resources it takes to keep our journalism alive. There’s only one way for that to happen, and it’s readers like you stepping up. Please help with a donation today if you can—even a few bucks will make a real difference. A monthly gift would be incredible.

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