Al-Zaidi charged for throwing shoes in presence of Maliki, not for aiming at Bush.»

[babylonsister]

http://thinkprogress.org/2008/12/15/zaidi-charged-maliki/

Al-Zaidi charged for throwing shoes in presence of Maliki, not for aiming at Bush.»

CNN Baghdad correspondent Michael Ware reports that Muntader al-Zaidi — the Iraqi journalist who threw his shoes at President Bush yesterday during a press conference — “is being investigated for possible charges not connected to assaulting President Bush, but for doing it in front of the Iraqi Prime Minister and hurling the shoes in the Prime Minister’s general direction rather than at President Bush’s head.” After CNN host T.J. Holmes clarified that “just because the Iraqi Prime Minister was in the vicinity that might really be what gets him in trouble,” Ware responded, “Yeah brother, this is Iraq.”

Watch it at link~

This morning Ware reported the Maliki’s office explained the charges by arguing that “it’s not easy to say who exactly he threw the shoes at.”

[ananda]

1. Insanity rules there too.

I think Bushinsanity is contagious.

[EFerrari]

5. It's a way for the government to show indirectly that the people back the shoeter.

Not insanity at all. :)

[Rob H.]

2. ...“it’s not easy to say who exactly he threw the shoes at.”

What a bullshit charge this is. If The Chimpleton hadn't dodged, the shoe would've hit him square in the face--not to mention that al-Zaidi was yelling at Bush, not Maliki.

On edit: At least he's not being charged with assaulting Bush, so I guess it's not all bad. :shrug:

[stillcool]

3. This could get ugly...

well..probably an understatement considering it's Iraq.

Dec 06, 2005
Iraq Parliamentary Elections: Allawi Gets The Boot

If you recall, Najaf is the home base of Moktada al-Sadr, now a coalition partner in the main Shi'ite electoral slate, the United Iraqi Alliance. Also, Najaf was the scene of a military standoff in August 2004 between U.S. troops and al-Sadr's militia. As the Prime Minister at the time, Allawi, a secular Shi'ite (and ex-C.I.A. operative) stood solidly behind the U.S. effort.


It may have been because he interrupted a funeral. (In the third shot from the top, you can see a casket being led out the entrance with Allawi's contingent just beyond.) The yellow circles in the next two shots are not thought bubbles. They are evidentiary circles drawn to point out how Allawi and company were run off in a hail of shoes.

I guess Allawi's Ba'athist past doesn't make him the most popular guy in more religious Shi'ite strongholds. Many cultures have unique rituals of social denunciation. In Iraq, as I'm told, the throwing of shoes is the single worst insult that a person can make.
http://bagnewsnotes.typepad.com/bagnews/2005/12/iraq_parliament.html

[liberalmuse]

4. No Iraqi court is going to charge Al-Zaidi for trying to hit Bush...

so they had to go with the trumped up charges that he could have hit Maliki. Malik is not much more than a coward than Bush.