September 6, 2009

Blame China

I always knew that China was responsible for all the trouble Iraq.



Seriously, China. Why do you have to be so evil?

9 comments:

Diggs said...

Where is the rest of the article?

the unbeatable kid said...

it's that link in the post.

"all the trouble in Iraq"

Diggs said...

I am not sure I follow your complaint...

Unknown said...

I think the title is on the inflammatory side, but I actually thought the article was informative and simply used one company (that happened to be based in China) as an example of problems ensuing from the privatization of what used to be a nationalized source of revenue for local governments.

Diggs said...

I agree with Vanessa except I would not classify the title as inflammatory.

Unknown said...

Well okay Diggs, maybe it's not quite an inflammatory title. I think it's a little misleading though because it makes it sound as if China is the only country making oil deals, which certainly isn't the case. I would hope most people know that, but then again I'm constantly shocked to learn what people don't know. I think the phrasing of the title was sloppy and I see where unbeatable is coming from. A better title would have been "Privatization of Oil Is New Source of Strife Among Iraqis". That's an actual description of what the article was about.

Diggs said...

Actually the overwhelming majority of the article, which is what a "title" should represent, is about this particular oil field. So if you were looking for a broader discussion on the privatization of natural resources in Iraq you should read a different article.

Unknown said...

Okay Diggs, I agree that the article is not a comprehensive discussion of oil privatization and so my title suggestion would be a misleading one. Here's another one: "Private Oil Deal Is New Source of Strife Among Iraqis". And you're right, a title should represent the main point or theme of an article. The fact that the oil deal was with a Chinese company was not the "source of strife". The fact that it was a private oil deal was because that's why the province was concerned about how the costs and benefits would play out. The "source of strife" would be the same if it was a Chinese, American, Russian, or any other oil company.

Diggs said...

I guess we will just have to disagree on the title. I merely read the title as a description of the article that follows, and a decent article at that. The title plays out in my mind as: China has an oil deal and it is a source of strife among Iraqis. So back to my original point - what is unbeatable's problem with the article? And why do I get the feeling that we wouldn't have heard a peep out of him if you had the same set of facts put forth but replaced Exxon with the Chinese company?