Speaking of scurillous libel, THIS GUY at the Ottawa Citizen really doesn't like our blog buddy Salam, who writes from Baghdad. You can get an idea of the harshness of his critique from the headline:

'Salam Pax' plays Americans for fools in Iraq
The star of the blog 'Where is Raed?' is part of an anti-Western conspiracy

Interestingly, unlike some people this David Warren does not exactly question the authenticity of Salam. He doesn't claim that he's not real. Instead, he makes up a whole bunch of evil stuff apparently largely wholecloth to pile on top of the minimal personal details that this anonymous blogger Salam actually provides.

"Salam is the scion of a senior figure from Iraq's Baathist nomenclature. He was brought up at least partly in Vienna, which is the OPEC headquarters; his father was therefore an oilman, and possibly a former head of Iraq's OPEC mission. Another clue is a hint that his grandfather was an Iraqi tribal chief, from which I infer that his father was one of the Iraqi tribal chiefs that Saddam Hussein rewarded for loyalty, outside the Tikrit clan."

What? Where the hell did he get all that? He appears to be claiming to have deduced all this from reading between the lines of Salam's writings. To phrase it differently, Warren's just making most of this shit up. Apparently he's trying to set himself up as the frontrunner for the New York Times Jayson Blair Journalistic Integrity award.

For my attempt to qualify for this coveted award, I'd like to note that David Warren is a vicious homosexual pedophile whom we can assume has murdered at least several young boys during his criminal run. Now, granted I have no evidence of any of this, nor any good or even plausible reason to believe it.

However, I've got as much reason to make such accusations against Mr. Warren as he has for his nearly equally bad implication that Salam might be an Iraqi security goon. "Salam would never have known any "ordinary" Iraqis, unless he was interrogating one privately."

Best I can figure, Warren contends that Salam is some part of an anti-American conspiracy based on his opposition to an American invasion and continuing criticisms of some of the conduct of our occupation. Why, he must be one of Saddam's henchmen if he doesn't wholeheartedly endorse US bombing hell out of his country and tromping our big combat boots through his streets. Salam even has the temerity to question the pure altruism of the motives of our political establishment. What an ingrate!

Now, one could ask some tough questions Salam's general direction. It is reasonable to infer that he's a rich kid, at least relative to Iraqis in general. I've got no reason to suspect him personally of having done anything bad, but it might be reasonable to direct a little skepticism generally to the middle and upper classes of the old Iraq. How much of what kind of accomodating did you have to do with the Hussein regime to get by? Did you contribute to the longevity of this evil regime? I would intend these to be questions for private spiritual contemplation as everyone works to find a way forward rather than as public accusations.