January 18, 2006
SAFE TO SAY THEY WON'T BE DISCUSSING BROKEBACK MOUNTAIN:
Baghdad radio lets foes talk things out (James Palmer, January 18, 2006, THE WASHINGTON TIMES)
It is a recent afternoon in Baghdad, and a Sunni and a Shi'ite sheik are chatting in the modest Baghdad studio of Radio Dijla.Posted by Orrin Judd at January 18, 2006 12:00 AM
Moufaq Al-Alani, the program's 63-year-old host, waits patiently for a caller to express his views on terrorism before politely suggesting that parents and teachers teach young people to respect all Iraqis.
Qasem Al-Joubari, the Sunni sheik, says imams should emphasize that killing civilians is never acceptable for a Muslim. His Shi'ite counterpart, Mahdi El-Mohamedoui, says violence reflects poorly on both Islam and Iraq in the eyes of the world.
An engineer, turning and sliding dials on a bulky soundboard, furiously spins his right hand behind a glass partition to signal a commercial break, and a young staffer hurries into the studio with glasses of sweet black tea.
This is talk radio in Iraq.
Comments
Somewhere, the Iraqi Mark Levin or Rush Limbaugh is taking flight.
Posted by: jim hamlen at January 18, 2006 4:01 PMBy taking flight, do you mean leaving the country?
Talk radio would be a perfect medium for Iraq. They, like other Middle Easterners, have built a culture around coffee houses where talk is the chief entertainment.
Sometimes I get so angry and impatient for the terrorism to stop so these poor people can finally relax and live their lives without the fear of violence.
We are winning.
Posted by: Robert Schwartz at January 18, 2006 9:50 PM