Followers of the Iraqi blogosphere were pleased yesterday to find that Ali, our Free Iraqi, decided to discuss the reasons for his separation from the Spirit of America organization. Today, Ali posts a follow-up blog entry on the subject.
I wasn't there on the 1st meeting with Jim Hake and Kerry Dupont but my brothers, some of our friends and a couple of journalists were there, in addition to the people from Ramadi. My friends and my brothers told me that they were shocked with these guys from Ramadi. They attended one meeting where everyone was discussing how to run a public awareness campaign about the Iraqi elections. Their comment (the guys from Ramadi) was, "What are you talking about?? Let the occupation forces leave Iraq first and then we'll talk about elections." After that they did not attend any meeting and spent their time having fun and shopping. They even looked at my brothers with suspicious eyes saying, " why are you staying here in the hotel?! Are you serious about this?!" which scared my brothers and friends, as it seems these people thought that everyone was here to steal American's money and laugh at them after that, but here are some Iraqis who were actually "collaborating with the occupiers".
And this TV station was supposed to bring Iraqis in Anbar something different from what Al Jazeera was offering them! They just created another, even a worse smaller version of Al Jazeera. That's where American money was and still is going mostly.
Read the whole entry.
Ali paints a fairly damning portrait of all your donated money being stuffed into the pockets of a line of shady characters.
I think we need to discuss this. If the money donated to Spirit of America is now funding mini Al-Jazeera radio stations, that's not good, right?
We need answers. NOW.
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