Little yellow crescent moons.

The blogosphere has been having a bad run of it recently. A number of clever, older bloggers have taken it upon themselves to highlight the missing scale on the underbelly of the beast. I mentioned two articles yesterday, but the conversation has snowballed. Terry Glavin connected me with Oliver Kamm's commentary ("The blogosphere, in short, is a reliable vehicle for the coagulation of opinion and the poisoning of debate.") which connects to the disastrous debate between blogger Guido Fawkes and veteran Guardian editor Michael White. ("It's all commentary.")

Which of course I wouldn't feel so bad about if I hadn't checked into China Confidential this morning and had my stubborn optimism dashed against the rocky shores of 'Fools, knaves, blowhards and nuts', more specifically that last one. I have an immense amount of respect for the Reporter - his content and his rhetoric, seperately - but recently he's begun mutating into something horrible, horrible. Commenting on the recent, peaceful, Moqtada al-Sadr-instigated demonstrations in Iraq.

The Islamist scum chanted: "Get out occupier!" They waved Iraqi flags and banners saying "Down with Bush, Down with America."

By midday their wannabe Iraqi fuhrer--a piece of human filth that should have been exterminated years ago--had not made an appearance at the rally.

And later, reviewing developments of the Iranian nuclear program.

Iranian monster-in-chief Mahmoud Ahmadinejad made the announcement with
pomp and ceremony at the heart of the regime's nuclear program, the uranium enrichment facility at Natanz.

Question: Why is he still alive?

Another question: Why are the Shiite and Sunni Islamist scum of Iraq still alive?

I mean, seriously, how can you condemn the holocaust and incite racial hatred in the same article? There was a day when China Confidential was about China. Those were fiery days, bold days, interesting days. But there's a certain lack of maturity being displayed here that I don't feel I need to elaborate on.

Maybe there's something to what Oliver Kamm was saying. "The great innovation of web-based commentary is that readers may select minutely the material they are exposed to. The corollary is that they may filter out views they find uncongenial." I mean, it's not like there's a lack of news concerning Asian involvement in the Middle East. It's the kind of news that keeps us out of the hyena pen.

Take for instance monday's visit by Iraqi PM Nouri al-Maliki to Japanese PM Shinzo Abe's residence, and the reassurances from Japan that support for the Iraqi reconstruction will continue.

Maliki said Iraq is making a new start for the future, having overcome many problems already. He indicated the country hoped for further support from Japan.

Japan's contribution to the reconstruction of Iraq has been both financial assistance and Self-Defense Forces activities.

Ground SDF troops were based in Samawah in southern Iraq for two years.

In addition, Japan has extended yen loans of up to $3.5 billion (417 billion yen) and grants of more than $1.5 billion. The financial assistance has gone toward improving infrastructure, such as electric power facilities, officials said.

In Monday's meeting, Abe also told Maliki that Japan will offer yen loans to rebuild water supply systems in Basra, southern Iraq. (Asahi Shimbun)

Now there's an uplifting story. Cheer up Reporter. It's not all yellow-stars and car-bombs and knocking off Philistines.

Quit being such a damn Fuhrer.