As most things in life tend to be, things have to hit bottom before conditions finally force people to act. The pressure cooker that was Iraq, which came from distrust and anger after years of pain and suffering, torture and death under Saddam Hussein, had to blow off after the liberation. Ged by lies and bombings by al-Qaeda, Iraq’s Muslim sects started to tear at each other – until al-Qaeda proved to be the enemy of all through its violence and mass killings.:

al-Qaeda wants a very violent, bloody, cleansing world war. They proved that in Iraq with the massive bombing this week of non-Muslim Iraqis. A sick way to try and make up for all the Muslims they have been killing over the past months to try and regain control of the locals and get media attention. But these bombings are all backfiring on al-Qaeda. And this can be seen as a nation gets to rally around 4 children who are fortunate, some may say blessed, to have survived:

The bulldozer moved closer. The children cried louder.

Then someone heard what few expected amid the horror: four small survivors calling out from ruins of buildings that had become tombs for hundreds of others.

“We didn’t hear them calling out for help until moments before a bulldozer would have killed them as it cleared the rubble,” said Saad Muhanad, a municipal council member in the Kahtaniya region of northern Iraq.

The discovery of the children – hungry and thirsty but apparently unharmed after two days trapped beneath a toppled building – was a rare uplifting scene yesterday as teams tallied up the grim figures from the deadliest wave of suicide attacks of the war.

Symbols can be powerful motivators of mass public opinion. I can still remember the all-night vigil America did for the little girl (Jessica I believe) stuck in a drain her backyard in Texas. The Iraqis have been able to rally around their soccer team recently, as it won the Asia cup. But they will find an even tighter bond when they all thank Allah for saving these young lives. Because they all know, given al-Qaeda’s killing ways, there but by the grace of Allah go they and their children.

Maybe in response to this last round of mass destruction, maybe because time is running out, or maybe because the Surge is making the time right, the Iraqi government is making some quiet progress in trying to reconcile their national issues:

raq’s political leaders emerged yesterday from three days of crisis talks with a new alliance that seeks to save the crumbling US-backed government. But the reshaped power bloc included no Sunnis and immediately raised questions about its legitimacy as a unifying force.

It is not enough, but it is a new start back towards the right goal. The fact is progress is being made. al-Qaeda did not, for once, attack Muslims. As I predicted they will need to end their violence against Iraqi Muslims if they have a prayer of stopping the rising tide of animosity towards them in that country. Every tribe must have a blood vendetta against al-Qaeda at the moment given their rampant killing spree. But al-Qaeda will never be welcome in Iraq – they have passed that line a long time ago. Yes, there will be remnants of fantasizing idiots just like the Neo Nazis of today in Europe and America. But they will not be a force, just a farce.

The SurrenderMedia is trying with all its might to protray the Iraq status as still a lost cause. They had set up that theme for months, as Cliff May illustrates:

“The only thing this surge will accomplish is a surge of more death and destruction.” That was the prediction of blogger and anti-war activist Arianna Huffington last December – one month before the Senate unanimously confirmed Gen. David Petraeus as commander in Iraq.
“I believe . . . that this war is lost, and this surge is not accomplishing anything.” That was the judgment of Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid in April – two months before the reinforcements that Petraeus needed to fully implement his new “surge” strategy had arrived in Iraq.

In mid-June, just as troop strength was reaching the level needed to carry out the revised mission, Reid added: “As many had foreseen, the escalation has failed to produce the intended results.”

Airhead Huffinggtion made her latest grand mistaken claim as Anbar was going from insurgent strong hold to model of quiet and peace. Reid was just doing the coordinated message making with the compliant SurrenderMedia – all predicting with confidence we were an impotent country which was at fault for the Iraqi situation. Now everyone but the SurrenderMedia sees the reality: al-Qaeda is at fault and the Surge changed everything in Iraq:

But now those intended results are being seen – as even some critics of the war, to their credit, are acknowledging. “More American troops have brought more peace to more parts of Iraq. I think that’s a fact,” Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) told reporters.

“My sense is that the tactical momentum is there with the troops,” Sen. Jack Reed (D-R.I.) told PBS.

Are things on the ground done shifting in Iraq? I seriously doubt it. The left is praying out loud things do not get any better, proving once and for all they are not Americans, just political opportunists who are trying to squeeze personal victory from American defeat. But they have no control over Iraq – none. al-Qaeda’s killings spree and the salvation of four blessed children are playing more on the minds of Iraqis than remote and shrill voices in DC and NY City.