From
http://www.azzaman.com/english/ (link was too long)
http://tinyurl.com/yapynoThere is no electricity in Baghdad and the city of nearly 6 million people spends its nights in total darkness.
The Ministry of Electricity says the total outage is the result of sabotage in which power lines feeding Baghdad were knocked out.
Nearly four years after the U.S. invasion, the country still has less electricity than under the former leader Saddam Hussein who was executed last month.
A source at the ministry said two high-voltage power lines feeding Baghdad were sabotaged. He said technicians were working to have them repaired.
But even under normal circumstances the national grid is off for nearly 20 hours a day in Baghdad. ---------------------
http://www.buzzflash.com/articles/alerts/155Baghdad Suffered Total Power Outage During Bush Speech.
American troops may not only be responsible for actually carrying out the Bush "surge" plan. As reported in an AP story today, "Soldiers found themselves explaining the new U.S. strategy to Iraqis, many of whom said they hadn't seen Bush's speech on television because they had no electricity."
Of course, they didn't miss much of interest because nowhere in Bush's 20 minute rambling did he even mention words like electricity, power, energy, or restore.
It is not only Baghdad that is plunged into darkness," Azzaman added. "The national grid is so rickety that no province in the country now enjoys non-interrupted" power. Even under regular conditions, Baghdad only receives about 4 hours of electricity each day.
Rep. Dennis Kucinich recently noted that "after the first Gulf War, Iraqis reestablished electricity within three months, despite sanctions. Four years into the US occupation there is no water, nor reliable electricity in Baghdad." Azzaman also pointed out that the nation had more electricity under Saddam than the current regime.