Debate over service in Iraq turns bitter

[ProSense]

Debate over service in Iraq turns bitter

By MATTHEW LEE, Associated Press Writer 39 minutes ago

WASHINGTON - A bitter dispute over forced assignments to Iraq has erupted inside the State Department with diplomats taking decidedly undiplomatic potshots at one another.

The latest public salvo came Tuesday with a harshly critical post on the department's official blog in which a foreign service officer in Iraq skewered those who spoke out against the prospect of ordered tours of duty at the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad and outlying provinces.

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The internal bickering had remained largely out of the public view until Tuesday when the editors of the department's two-month-old blog, Dipnote, decided to publish Matel's comments.

Heath Kearn, who runs the digital outreach section in the State Department's Bureau of Public Affairs, said her office had asked Matel to write about his Iraq experience for the blog but had not solicited anything from him about the controversy. She said opposing views would not be barred from the discussion.


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[AuntPatsy]

1. I have no doubt that quite amount of the inside bickering has been hidden

from public view, nice to see some coming to light both pro and con.

[kurth]

2. Fucking whiners

It's in the job description, along with the lifetime pension and benefits.

[NanceGreggs]

3. This issue could be easily solved ...

Send all the PNAC boys to Iraq as 'diplomats'. I'm sure the Iraqi people would LOVE to get up-close-and-personal with the architects of their 'liberation'.

If they wind up being suffocated by all of the sweets and flowers they'll undoubtedly be greeted with, at least they will have died happy.