Top 10 Middle East Issues of 2007
To be sure it's the case with every list. Time magazine tries to get around the constraint by making no less than 50 top 10 lists, which is a bit of overkill, and still manages to make questionable choices. Is the "transition in Pakistan" really the Number 1 news story of the year? Do the Chinese toy recall, Barry Bonds' fraudulent home run record and Harry Potter calling it quits even belong on the top-news list (as opposed to, say, the top business, top sports, top entertainment lists?). Time's top-10 Middle East choices dovetail somewhat with mine, with a few exceptions, especially in the order given. I would not have placed the "surge" in Iraq at the top--certainly not ahead of the continuing genocide in Darfur and Iraq's refugee crisis.
But we could argue list choices and orders for a thousand and one days. It's more fun to just get to the list. Here's mine, the Top 10 Middle East Issues of 2007. Feel free to dispute and debate.
Comments
Can’t disagree with your selections, especially placing the Darfur tragedy, as the world looks away, at the top of the list.
The one thing worthy of inclusion, or at the very least, a (dis)honorable mention, is the Blackwater fiasco, and the complicity of the US State Dept. The whole thing stinks like week-old fish, and goes directly against the goal of winning hearts and minds.
I agree with William about the atrocities of the despicable mercenaries (it seems that at least 25% of them are high on steroid — see Moyer’s commentary). The Surge is working? Not according to the latest Al Jazeera’s piece on the resistance fighters. The Israel-Palestine dialog? Hardly. According to the latest news, the talk is stalled (nothing new here). All in all, we are going down.
Can you think of anything good that happened in 2007? The only thing good that I predict (with extreme uncertainty) is that by the end of next year we will not have the current Bullshitter-in-Chief in the Whitehouse. But the good news will be totally annihilated by the coming of the next Nogood-in-Chief if one of the current top contenders gets elected (more accurately, pre-selected and then put forward for rubber stamping by the voters)
{My first post didn’t go through.]
I agree with William about the atrocities of the despicable mercenaries (it seems that at least 25% of them are high on steroid — see Moyer’s commentary). The Surge is working? Not according to the latest Al Jazeera’s piece on the resistance fighters. The Israel-Palestine dialog? Hardly. According to the latest news, the talk is stalled (nothing new here). All in all, we are going down.
Can you think of anything good that happened in 2007? The only thing good that I predict (with extreme uncertainty) is that by the end of next year we will not have the current Bullshitter-in-Chief in the Whitehouse. But the good news will be totally annihilated by the coming of the next Nogood-in-Chief if one of the current top contenders gets elected (more accurately, pre-selected and then put forward for rubber stamping by the voters)
[The first tow tries failed.]
I agree with William about the atrocities of the despicable mercenaries (it seems that at least 25% of them are high on steroid — see Moyer’s commentary). The Surge is working? Not according to the latest Al Jazeera’s piece on the resistance fighters. The Israel-Palestine dialog? Hardly. According to the latest news, the talk is stalled (nothing new here). All in all, we are going down.
Can you think of anything good that happened in 2007? The only thing good that I predict (with extreme uncertainty) is that by the end of next year we will not have the current Bullshitter-in-Chief in the Whitehouse. But the good news will be totally annihilated by the coming of the next Nogood-in-Chief if one of the current top contenders gets elected (more accurately, pre-selected and then put forward for rubber stamping by the voters)
My comment does not appear here, but I keep being told that it is already posted here.
[The nth try]
I agree with William about the atrocities of the despicable mercenaries (it seems that at least 25% of them are high on steroid — see Moyer’s commentary). The Surge is working? Not according to the latest Al Jazeera’s piece on the resistance fighters. The Israel-Palestine dialog? Hardly. According to the latest news, the talk is stalled (nothing new here). All in all, we are going down.
Can you think of anything good that happened in 2007? The only thing good that I predict (with extreme uncertainty) is that by the end of next year we will not have the current Bullshitter-in-Chief in the Whitehouse. But the good news will be totally annihilated by the coming of the next Nogood-in-Chief if one of the current top contenders gets elected (more accurately, pre-selected and then put forward for rubber stamping by the voters)
[The n+1st try]
I agree with William about the atrocities of the despicable mercenaries (it seems that at least 25% of them are high on steroid — see Moyer’s commentary). The Surge is working? Not according to the latest Al Jazeera’s piece on the resistance fighters. The Israel-Palestine dialog? Hardly. According to the latest news, the talk is stalled (nothing new here). All in all, we are going down.
Can you think of anything good that happened in 2007? The only thing good that I predict (with extreme uncertainty) is that by the end of next year we will not have the current Liar-in-Chief in the Whitehouse. But the good news will be totally annihilated by the coming of the next Nogood-in-Chief if one of the current top contenders gets elected (more accurately, pre-selected and then put forward for rubber stamping by the voters)
Before I looked at your list I thought that Turkey attacking Iraq might be on my list, and there it is at 8. Hard to quibble with anything here, except the arbitrary number 10, when we both know that there are millions of daily tragedies throughout the Middle East brought on by a confluence of ruthless, warring ideologies. And since most of the troubles (certainly not all) have their root somehow in the Palestinian crisis, I would probably pick the non-story of the continued lack of progress and lack of leadership on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict as the most important story of the year. Not much reason for hope until we have some movement there.
Happy New Year everyone. Let’s hope for something better.
I guess you wrote this column too soon, eh?
Chris Cillizza, explaining why it’s ok to write a column about who benefits from the Bhutto assassination.
“And, before the reader criticism comes rolling in, we acknowledge that the assassination of Bhutto is an international tragedy. But, The Fix is a political blog — no apologies for that — and ANY event with this sort of international reach is sure to impact the way in which people think about the candidates and the campaign in this country. So, we write about it — and will continue to do so.”
Whatever Chris. He doesn’t mention that Musharraf benefits tremendously.