'Al Qaeda in Iraq is Defeated'

There is a new phenomenon that has broken the mainstream media's monopoly on overseas news reporting. A number of bloggers who are supported by readers' donations now go overseas to report. The best known is Michael Yon, who reports on what appears to be some of the best news of the past generation. Strange how mainstream journalists managed to miss this:

"Al Qaeda in Iraq is defeated," according to Sheik Omar Jabouri, spokesman for the Iraqi Islamic Party and a member of the widespread and influential Jabouri Tribe. Speaking through an interpreter at a 31 October meeting at the Iraqi Islamic Party headquarters in downtown Baghdad, Sheik Omar said that al Qaeda had been “defeated mentally, and therefore is defeated physically,” referring to how clear it has become that the terrorist group’s tactics have backfired. Operatives who could once disappear back into the crowd after committing an increasingly atrocious attack no longer find safe haven among the Iraqis who live in the southern part of Baghdad. They are being hunted down and killed. Or, if they are lucky, captured by Americans.

Here is a fascinating audio clip on the same topic.

Here is more of Michael Yon's current reporting, a vignette from the turnaround caused by the surge, as locals no longer feel terrified to extirpate the bad guys:

Iraqis Use Google Earth to Report on Militants

Calls come to LTC Patrick Frank (through his interpreter) every day and into the night, with information from locals about the whereabouts of wanted Madhi Army members. Many local people are clearly fed up with the violence.

Some even send e-mails with Google Earth maps showing exactly where suspects are, and they are doing it in real time.