The NY Times' strange blogger story

Yesterday, President Bush cited material from Iraq the Model, a blog by Omar and Mohammed Fadhil who are dentist in Baghdad. The Times acts as if this is some mystery then when they find out who they are they add:

As for the writers’ identity, it remained a mystery — until the White House distributed a transcript of the briefing. In a footnote at the end, the administration disclosed that the bloggers were Omar and Mohammed Fadhil, two brothers who are both dentists and who write an English-language blog, IraqTheModel.com, from Baghdad. The White House said their writings had been cited in mainstream news outlets; on March 5, the Fadhil brothers wrote an opinion piece in The Wall Street Journal titled “Notes from Baghdad.”

Oh, yes, and on Dec. 9, 2004, they met in the Oval Office with Mr. Bush.
Oh, yes, the Times seems to imply that this might effect their credibility. Perhaps if the Time spent more time reading that blog rather than trying to pooh-pooh content that disagrees with its theme of ruin in Iraq, it might know more about what is going on. After all, the media complains about not being able to meet with ordinary Iraqis, and now when some put forth a view they disagree with they try to denigrate them. Oh, yes. indeed.

Apparently the NY Times was not the only one acting weird about the reference to the Iraqi's blog. Little Green Footballs says the nutroots were going, well, nuts.

Iraq the Model responds.

First of all we're proud of it. It's the ultimate ambition for a political blogger to have his or her words heard and better reach the desks of decision-makers.

Second I would like to make clear one point to bloggers like dailykos and some MSM supported blogs who seem so upset for some reason that the voice of some Iraqis is being heard.
I've seen some of them publish stories full of lies and accusations they can't support and I think it's pathetic to throw the "you're a sold-out propaganda" accusation at people just because they don't share the same point of view…This only reflects their lack of knowledge and the bankruptcy of ideas they suffer.

We speak the language of facts, supported by images and statistics and more important, we live here while they don't. We write about the good days as well as the bad days in Iraq's journey to a better future.
You don't even have to search in this blog's archives, just scroll down this page and you'll see both good and bad news—we witness an explosion and we write about it and we see progress and we write about it.
If they can't see that it's their problem, not ours.

...
They invite the doubters to come and visit. My guess is the doubters are to frightened by their own imagination of events in Baghdad to go. But if the doubters were willing to pay my way, I would start making the travel arrangements.

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