Handover date to remain: Bremer (Amer. people understand?)

[Whoa_Nelly]

U.S. administrator L. Paul Bremer said Thursday that changes are possible in the formula for establishing a new Iraqi government but the date for the U.S.-led coalition to hand over power remains firm.

<snip>
Bremer spoke ahead of an expected announcement by U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan whether he believes legislative elections are possible by the June 30 handover of power. Annan is expected to say that elections are important but they cannot be held by the end of June, despite demands by the country's influential Shiite Muslim clergy.

Bremer also said he expected President George W. Bush to win re-election in November and that there would be no change in American policy in Iraq.

"The American people understand the importance of what we've done here," he said.

more...
http://www.chinapost.com.tw/detail.asp?ID=46116&GRP=A


I bolded the above to point out the following article of what so many of the American people don't know.

Below is an article by Dahr Jamail, a freelance journalist in Iraq. A story well worth reading and sharing. We at DU understand much, but so many people in the US just don't see the ruin brought on Iraq by Bush.

Dirty Water, Bad Blood
Dahr Jamail, February 18, 2004

<snip>
Hilla, right near Babylon, has a water treatment plant and distribution center that is managed by Salmam Hassan Kadel, who is also the Chief Engineer. The wastewater project here, like in Najaf and Diwaniya, is specifically named on Bechtel’s contract as one that they are responsible for rehabilitating.

<snip>
Just outside of Hilla I speak with several men of a small village. It’s the usual story-no running water, maybe 2-4 hours of electricity per day to run their feeble pumps to pull in contaminated water for them to use.

<snip>
At another small village between Hilla and Najaf, 1500 people are drinking water from a dirty stream which slowly trickles near the homes. Everyone has dysentery, many with kidney stones, a huge number with cholera. One of the men, holding a sick child, tells me, “It was much better before the invasion. We had 24 hours running water then. Now we are drinking this garbage because it is all we have.”

<snip>
Dysentary, cholera, nausea, diarrhea, kidney stones…scores of people are suffering from some water-born illness here. According to locals, eight children from the village have been killed when attempting to cross the busy highway to a nearby factory in order to retrieve clean water.

more...
http://www.guerrillanews.com/human_rights/doc3833.html