Meanwhile, More Troops Die, But For What?

So, while W is busy placating the American people with flowery rhetoric about his "achievements" that only serve to pat his own back, more troops are killed for his "noble" cause.

The U.S. military said the crash was not a result of enemy fire although Taliban insurgents claimed they shot it down.

"The remains of 10 servicemen were found in the aircraft. There were no survivors," said U.S. military spokeswoman Lieutenant Tamara Lawrence.

All 10 were American.

Not to mention, British troops were killed as well:

BAGHDAD, Iraq - A British military helicopter crashed in Basra on Saturday, and Iraqis hurled stones at British troops and set fire to at least one armored vehicle that rushed to the scene. Clashes broke out between British troops and Shiite militias, police and witnesses said.

Police Capt. Mushtaq Khazim said the helicopter was apparently shot down in a residential district the city. He said the four-member crew was killed, but British officials would say only that there were "casualties."

British forces backed by armored vehicles rushed to the area but were met by a hail of stones from the crowd of at least 250 people, who jumped for joy and raised their fists as a plume of thick smoke rose into the air from the crash site.

The crowd also set at least one British armored vehicle on fire, apparently with a rocket-propelled grenade, but the British soldiers inside escaped unhurt, witnesses said. British fired weapons into the air in an effort to disperse the crowd.

Shooting broke out between the British and armed militiamen, and at least two people, including a child, were killed, Khazim said.

Crowds chanted "we are all soldiers of al-Sayed," a reference to radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, an ardent foe of the presence of foreign troops in
Iraq.

The chaotic scene was widely shown on Iraqi state television and on the Al-Jazeera satellite station.

The attack came at a difficult time for the government of Prime Minister
Tony Blair in Britain, where many people oppose the U.S.-led Iraq war.

Does this sound like a people who have their hearts and minds won by the cause of "freedom" and "liberty" that the W, Rove and Co insist they are spreading in Iraq?