If you want to get counted, better not get blown up

WASHINGTON - U.S. officials who say there has been a dramatic drop in sectarian violence in Iraq since President Bush began sending more American troops into Baghdad aren't counting one of the main killers of Iraqi civilians.

Car bombs and other explosive devices have killed thousands of Iraqis in the past three years, but the administration doesn't include them in the casualty counts it has been citing as evidence that the surge of additional U.S. forces is beginning to defuse tensions between Shiite and Sunni Muslims.

And why would that be, you ask? Silly Bunky.

President Bush explained why in a television interview on Tuesday. “If the standard of success is no car bombings or suicide bombings, we have just handed those who commit suicide bombings a huge victory,” he told TV interviewer Charlie Rose.

If they counted bombs the terrorists would win!

Meanwhile Petraeus tells Iraqis...

“I don't think you're ever going to get rid of all the car bombs,” Gen. David Petraeus, the top U.S. commander in Iraq, said this week. “Iraq is going to have to learn as did, say, Northern Ireland, to live with some degree of sensational attacks.”

...get used to it. Everything would be much better if the Iraqis would just quit whining about being killed.

Link: McClatchy Washington Bureau | 04/25/2007 | U.S. officials exclude car bombs in touting drop in Iraq violence