Apparently the purchase of Knight-Ridder by McClatchy has not kept the K-R knights from reporting, so far at least. Our friends at Cursor recently linked to a Tom Lasseter article that’s a good example.

“The American policy has failed both in terms of politics and security, but the big problem is that they will not confess or admit that,” said Mahmoud Othman, a Kurdish member of parliament. “They are telling the American public that the situation in Iraq will be improved, they want to encourage positive public opinion (in the U.S.), but the Iraqi citizens are seeing something different. They know the real situation.”

Okay, that’s a Kurdish viewpoint, but what about the Shia, who stood to benefit most from the US invasion?

Shiite Muslim parliament member Jalaladin al Saghir had a similar view.

“All the American policies have failed because the American analysis of the situation is wrong; it is not related to reality,” Saghir said. “The slaughtered Iraqi man on the street conveys the best explanation” for what’s happening in Iraq.

Well, they would say that. Limited viewpoint and all. Too close to the action for an objective evaluation. But the US military knows what’s really going on. Boots on the ground, and all that.

“As an intelligence officer … I have had the chance to move around Baghdad on mounted and dismounted patrols and see the city and violence from the ground,” wrote one American military officer in Iraq. “I think that the greatest problem that we deal (besides the insurgents and militia) with is that our leadership has no real comprehension of the ground truth. I wish that I could offer a solution, but I can’t. When I have briefed General Officers, I have given them my perspective and assessment of the situation. Many have been surprised at what I have to say, but I suspect that in the end nothing will or has changed.”

Nothing will change, because what happens to Iraqis is not relevant to American policy. Our government keeps playing Pollyanna while Iraqis keep dying.

While various military operations have at times improved security in parts of the country, the bloodshed has mounted with each U.S.-declared step of progress, according to figures that the Brookings Institution research center compiled from news and government reports.

When L. Paul Bremer, then the top U.S. representative in Iraq, appointed an Iraqi Governing Council in July 2003, insurgent attacks averaged 16 daily. When Saddam Hussein was captured that December, the average was 19. When Bremer signed the hand-over of sovereignty in June 2004, it was 45 attacks daily. When Iraq held its elections for a transitional government in January 2005, it was 61. When Iraqis voted last December for a permanent government, it was 75. When U.S. forces killed terrorist mastermind Abu Musab al Zarqawi in June, it was up to 90.

Attacks have increased in lethality as well as number: There was one multiple-fatality bombing in July 2003. Last month, there were at least 51.

And while the number of U.S. troops killed by hostile fire has declined this year, the number of Iraqis killed has soared.

In January, the month after Iraq’s widely heralded national elections for a permanent government, at least 710 civilians were killed, according to a report by the United Nations that cited Iraqi Ministry of Health figures. (The report made it clear that the actual number for January was much higher.) Five months later, 3,149 Iraqis were killed in June.