Chimes of Freedom

The WaPo's latest on Operation It's Not So Shiny Now:

At 11 a.m. in the Iraqi capital, the popping of automatic-weapons fire broke out from one end of a Tigris River bridge to another. Pedestrians jaded by gunfire walked for cover. It was Baghdad's equivalent of a car horn -- guards shooting into the air to clear the way for some dignitary.

Across the Tigris, gray smoke billowed over the city from a bomb. Under the bridge, ski-masked Shiite Muslim commandos cruised through checkpoints in pickups mounted with machine guns.

Nearby, a man stood in the middle of the street holding a gun to the head of another man in a car. Other drivers steered around them. No one stopped to help, or looked that carefully. After more than two years of war, Baghdad's people have learned to choose their battles, and this one didn't qualify.

On the city's streets, the daily reality involves death, random violence and routine deprivations for people who are beyond anger...

The Americans' statements are always untrue," said Ali Abed, 50, a taxi driver standing in a 1 1/2 -mile-long line for gas. "We are fed up.

"They destroyed the country, and now they say they want to leave," Abed said. "Let them go to hell, not to their home."

Many Iraqis complain about the continuing hardships here. Because of power outages that the Iraqi government blames on insurgent attacks, electrical power is turned on in Baghdad 30 minutes at a time, four times a day. "Electricity is like medicine in Iraq now," a much-repeated joke on Iraq's al-Sharqiya TV declared this week. "You get it every six hours."

The lack of electricity means no air conditioning, making sleep difficult in the summer heat, when daytime temperatures exceed 120 degrees, said Nouri Muhsen Kadhim, an engineer at an electrical supply store, who added that water shortages forced him to shower only every other day.

U.S. military operations to combat the insurgency mean roadblocks that tie up traffic for hours, Kadhim said. "God save us from the terrorists' attacks too," he said. "Aren't we human beings, with a right to live like others?

"When I was a kid, some teacher told me that we are lucky to live in Iraq, that we have two rivers and we are floating over an ocean of oil," Kadhim added. "I just want to see him now and ask him, 'Where is all that?' "

Bad as it is, comparatively few Iraqis say they want back the days before the 2003 U.S.-led invasion that ousted President Saddam Hussein. But the summer of attacks and shortages leaves them short on hope about what will happen when the Americans leave.

"The Americans want to glue together all the parts they broke, to shape it back as a real, new country. But you cannot bring back what you broke as it was before -- everyone will be able to see the break marks," said Jamal Hindawi, 42, at his Baghdad paint shop. "They just want to leave, even if everything will come apart after they go."