Still in London: There is an article in today's Independent by Robert Fisk, the best foreign correspondent working in the Middle East. He talks about US domination of Iraq. Does anybody really think, aside from voters in Oklahoma and possibly Kansas, that Iraqis now control Iraq? Does anybody really think that the US really "transferred" authority, the appointment of the puppet prime minister/car bomber notwithstanding? There are now some 146,000 US troops in Iraq (not to mention the 38 Macedonian soldiers) and Iraq is supposed to be free? Fisk talks about US domination of the Saddam's trial, down to the control of the camera in the courtroom, and Iraq is supposed to be in Iraqi hands? If Iraqis control Iraq, Saddam would not have been kept alive. The trial show is certainly intended for the electoral campaign of that most ill-informed men (women are not allowed to occupy the office as of yet) to ever occupy the White House. I will write to you about an interview with one of the leaders of the Sunni resistance movements in Fallujah published in Ash-Shira` magazine. It was odd that the leader heaps scorns on Iran and implicitly on Shi`ism while heaping praise on Muqtada As-Sadr. He denies cooperation between Sunni organizations and Ba`thist fighters and leaders, but admits taking money from Saddam's Ba`thists. By all accounts, Muqtada As-Sadr's role may be expanding: he seems to be one of the few leaders who can rely on Sunni and Shi`ite support, especially in the fundamentalist camps. Secular and moderate Shi`ites will not look forward to living in Muqtada's republic. My impression after talking to people who have contacts in Iraq and who have close ties to Ayatollah Sistani is that Sistani may be closer to As-Sadr than what is being reported in US press. America has the biggest embassy in Baghdad, and that is supposed to signal the triumph of freedom ("let freedom reign" declared Bush in his typically silly and vapid slogans--would you not to watch Bush answer the simply question: "Define freedom?"), and tanks around the embassy compound are also freedom signifiers, to use Lacan's language. Nobody signifies freedom better than Bush, but in reverse.