Even the RNC is having trouble finding good news in Iraq.

[MGKrebs]

(I am not happy about this. I desperately want there to be some good news from Iraq. But we don't need to be lied to or "spun". We can't really move forward productively unless we have the truth.)

RNC talking point:

"ABC's Jake Tapper: "With the newfound freedom of speech here, more than 100 television and radio stations have been licensed ..." (Jake Tapper, Op-Ed, "Where Comedy Isn't King," The New York Times, 3/20/06)
Tapper: "This has resulted not only in more news and public affairs programming, but many new entertainment shows." (Jake Tapper, Op-Ed, "Where Comedy Isn't King," The New York Times, 3/20/06)
Tapper: "On radio, every day the Rashid station offers a four-hour show called 'DJ Rashid,' which brings listeners music, comedy and various contests." (Jake Tapper, Op-Ed, "Where Comedy Isn't King," The New York Times, 3/20/06)

http://www.gop.com/News/Read.aspx?ID=6196

More from the same article the RNC cites:

"We had been on the set for less than an hour when Mustafa got a phone call that clearly upset him. Grabbing Abed-Jasim by the arm, Mustafa took him aside and told him that gunmen had assassinated Hamid, the entertainment-division chief, outside his Baghdad home just minutes earlier.
The director told the cast and crew. Shock and grief turned to terror. Everyone on the set immediately became restless, anxious. Eyes moist with tears began darting about the street. Iraqi TV is widely perceived as being pro-Shiite and pro-government; the Sunni-leaning Baghdad TV had just had one of its anchors shot and killed a few days before. Not that any of the violence in today's Iraq needs a reason.
Mustafa told the crew to break down; within minutes everyone had jumped into cars and minivans and fled. My crew and I weren't far behind. Iraqi TV put a black band of mourning on the top left corner of its screen and spent much of the rest of the day covering Hamid's funeral.
It is American journalists' duty to try to look at the broader picture in Iraq - telling the stories about those brave souls who seek to restore normalcy and laughter into the daily routine here. But there is no denying that the horrific violence will often make that task impossible.
(Jake Tapper is a correspondent for ABC News.)

http://www.iht.com/articles/2006/03/20/opinion/edtapper.php

[LynnTheDem]

1. Too bad the director of that Iraqi comedy show was murdered in Iraq, huh.

Sorta fucks up that bit of "good news", don't it.

[MichiganVote]

2. There is no good news in a place where there is death

[LynnTheDem]

3. Head of entertainment division for Iraq assassinated.

During the ABC News visit, Mustafa received some terrible news. He grabbed the show's director to tell him: Their boss, Amjad Hameed — the head of the entertainment division for Iraqi TV, the man who had arranged for the shoot — just minutes before had been assassinated, shot by gunmen on his way to work. Both he and his driver were killed.

http://abcnews.go.com/International/IraqCoverage/story?id=1718738&page=1

[HysteryDiagnosis]

4. News from Basra

No news is good news.... shrub forgot to cover this aspect of the plight of women in Iraq since he opened Pandora's box.

Oh and not that this woman was a gynaecologist... I'm sure she achieved that while wearing a Burqa... NOT.

http://www.peacewomen.org/news/Iraq/newsarchive03/Basra.html
Basra's Women Have Mixed Feelings About the New Era

In expressing such radical views, Sabrine remains something of a minority in a country that in recent years has seen an increasing shift towards the more traditional cultural values which promote the rights of men over women, and where the majority believes that a woman's place is in the home.

Ultimately, a woman's fate in Iraq depends largely on the economic background from which she hails. Thirty-five-year-old Natik Dikran, for example, comes from a middle-class background, qualified as a gynaecologist six years ago, and says that in her opinion women have so far had little to complain about.

She can report few cases of domestic violence in her daily work, even fewer of rape, and although abortion is not allowed in Iraq except in cases where it can be proved that birth will endanger the mother's life, contraceptive pills are freely available to all without prescription.

She admits she would never have been able to specialise as a surgeon - women are too emotional, so the theory goes - and would not have the courage to cut into flesh or tolerate the sight of blood, but she encountered no obstacles to becoming a physician, and points to the number of female doctors in Iraq as proof of that.

Other women have not been so lucky.