It’s Monday, so it’s time for Good News From Iraq,

Part 18, from Arhtur. Thank you, Arthur! Here are a few excerpts:

• SOCIETY: The latest public opinion poll paints a cautiously optimistic picture of Iraq
• Then there is this ad on Iraqi TV: “[It] declares January 30th is Iraq’s ‘date with fate and duty.’ It shows masked gunmen confronting an elderly man in an alley. He stands firm and is joined by others who eventually outnumber the militants. As the Iraqi national anthem swells in the background, the ad proclaims, ‘We are not afraid. We are not alone. Our power is in our unity’.”
• ECONOMY: the International Monetary Fund was estimating Iraq’s economic growth for 2004 to surpass 50 percent, and the country continued to enjoy low inflation, a stable currency and strong foreign exchange reserves.
• RECONSTRUCTION: Read about water projects in southern Iraq’s Sweet Water Canal (completed), and Erbil, and a water treatment plant in Baghdad. Insfrastructure building in Sadr City.

And that’s only the beginning. Read it all. While at Arthur’s, read also his Free trade plus

if the security regime is not thus endangered, free movement of people (in both directions) is but the other side the free trade coin, particularly between two nations that share such high degree of political, economic and cultural kinship.

Three cheers for Arhtur!