The bottom of my shoe to you

In this part of the world showing someone the bottom of your shoes is an insult. You have to be careful how you sit in public. If you cross your legs you should not show you shoe sole to anyone. So when the Iraqi journalist threw the shoe at Bush is was sort of a big insult in a middle eastern way. It has also made the shoe thrower a hero and celebrity in the Muslim world.

The people of Iraq are going to be voting on the new security agreement at the end of January. So hopefully that will go through. There is already talk of troops staying in the cities past the agreed on date of June 30th. They say its to advise and train the Iraqi police. I don't think the people above are going to like that very much and could possibly vote down the security agreement now known as SOFA in January. There are political changes on the horizon for Iraq and the next few months will tell if the new government can handle it.

Human-trafficking at Camp Victory

These are worker from different places in Asia. They came because they paid someone who promised them work and they have no return ticket. They are called TCNs and that stands for Third Country nationals. These are the people that man the Chow hall and clean the bathrooms. The army doesn't man the chow hall here. There is regular army working in the chow hall but they mostly manage it. This picture is of some TCNs who came to work and found that there was no work available. They were staying by the Baghdad airport in a army warehouse. You see these guys on base and they are mostly very nice to everyone. They don't wear IDs they don't eat in the mess hall. I wonder if they even have passports. They come because they can't make money in their country so they come to the Middle East to do the work that no one wants to do. Click-on this link go to the News Story. The company that hired them is called KBR and they are a spin off company of Halliburton which is Dick Cheney's Company. There are many deals made under the table in Iraq. They call them drug deals here, although they don't have anything to do with drugs.

Muqtada Sadr

This is Muqtada Sadr he is a anti-American cleric in Iraq. He is suspected in last weeks Rocket attacks in the Green zone and Camp Liberty. He violently opposes the US Iraq security agreement. He has his own militia and was the reason for the violence last spring. He is in Iran for religious instruction to become a senior cleric. He is in Iran because he is backed by Iran. The rockets launched were Iranian made. This link will take you to the LA Times article.