Dahr Jamail: Credibility Deficit Disorder

Dahr Jamail is struggling to get back on track after his pet IVAW's Winter Soldier Investigation failed to produce the longed for evidence of "the Stygian depths of depravity and evil that US service personnel have sunk…" that Jamail's fans have been longing for since he touted Jesse MacBeth as the real deal.

Jamail has another co-authored piece (with Ali al-Fadhily) at IPS entitled IRAQ: Fever Named After Blackwater.

With his usual standard of fact checking demonstrated so aptly with his MacBeth promotion (see Jesse MacBeth to Winter Soldier: Exposing Dahr Jamail), Jamail and his partner write of a form of malaria:

" What Iraqis now call Blackwater fever is really a well-known medical condition, and while it has nothing to do with Blackwater Worldwide, Iraqis in al-Anbar province have decided to make the connection between the disease and the lethal U.S.-based company which has been responsible for the death of countless Iraqis. "
Jules Crittenden calls Jamail on it, pointing out that falciparum malaria has been called Blackwater Fever since the 19th century! Crittenden also points out that a ten second Google search by the intrepid independent reporter would have shown the term being used as such in 1991.

Glenn Reynolds of Instapundit picks up the story as does Bruce Kesler of Democracy Project.

Hat tips to Bruce & Dan.

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If you need to get the bad taste out after that, though, read Robin Boyd's The Heart of a Marine.

And remember, if you can possibly make it, there is the BNCOC graduation ceremony at Walter Reed tomorrow morning. These wounded soldiers who undertook that training while recovering from their injuries are an inspiration, and deserve to be honored.