Anthony Shadid: in the footsteps of Thomas Friedman?

"A friend once called it the culture of the “kundara,” the word here for shoe. “When anyone is against you, when anyone has differences with me, I will put a kundara in his mouth, I will shove a kundara down his throat, I will hit him with a kundara,” he said in 2006, long before the spectacle of President Bush’s visit to Baghdad. “We live in a kundara culture,” he said. The roots of political violence run deep in Iraq, long a turbulent frontier between Romans and Persians, Ottomans and Safavids and, now, Americans and Iranians." Such simplistic cliches and wild generalizations about Iraqi people and their history. I mean, when I see a reference to the speech of Al-Hajjaj, I really squirm and I know what is coming. Colin Powell's presentation on his plan for the invasion of Iraq in 1990 was more violent and wild than the speech of Al-Hajjaj, by far. And the silly reference to "kundarah" what does that mean? I can speak about a gun culture here in the US, where crime is far more frequent than in Iraq? And did European history have less violence than Iraqi history? I mean, we speak of the 100 years war, for potato's sake. And the worst part about the whole article, it draws an offensive and insulting portrait of the Iraqi people and attributes violent impulses to them and yet, there is not a single word about the violence that has been imposed on Iraq by the US since 1991. I mean, Bush has caused inflicted more violence and harm on Iraq than Hajjaj. (thanks Sinan)