[IrishHand]

During a commercial of the ND/Illini game, I made the mistake of flipping through FoxNews. This reporter who had spent a lot of time in Baghdad was asked by the studio host whether Hussein was a popular, venerated leader as the Middle Eastern media seems to portray. The reporter responded that everyone he spoke to did in fact support and apparently believe in Hussein. However, he also said that in walking by Hussein's palaces and the high-end car dealerships and furniture stores of the Iraqi elite, one could not help but notice the stark disparity between the average person and the ruling elite. As such, he concluded that the Iraqi people, despite what they'd told him, must surely hate Hussein's ministers, associates and friends, which he kindly labelled "a gang of thungs and crooks" (based presumably on their material wealth - good thing that all our politicians and leaders aren't any better off than the average American). I laughed myself right to the next station.