Now that the winter break is here, I’ve been browsing among the archives of my favorite radio show, This American Life. Yesterday, I enjoyed listening to a segment of the show from 18 November 2005.

Act Two. Johnny Get Your Mouse. Lots of soldiers in Iraq are writing about their experiences online. Producer Amy O’Leary has read through dozens of them and talks about what the soldiers are writing. Then, we hear from three bloggers, reading their own journals, telling their stories from Iraq about the fighting, the locals, and why you subscribe to Details magazine. We hear from Captain Chuck Ziegenfuss, Trueman Muhrer-Irwin, and Colby Buzzell, who has recently compiled a book of his war writing called My War: Killing Time in Iraq.

I liked the candor of the soldier blogs. In one of them, the Marine reports his commander stepping into a discussion, to warn soldiers off any discussion of ethics. He barks, “If you want to do the right thing, go out and rend the Spike Lee movie.” But the real discovery was a segment from 28 October 2005, about a survey that found out that 100,000 Iraqis had probably died over there, most of them the victims of US attacks.

Act One. Truth, Damn Truth, and Statistics. About a year ago, a John Hopkins University study in the British medical journal The Lancet estimated the number of civilian casualties in Iraq. It came up with a number – 100,000 dead – that was higher than any other estimate, and was mostly ignored. This week, Producer Alex Blumberg tells the remarkable story of what it took to find that number, why we should find it credible and why almost no one believed it. (The original Lancet study is online; free registration is required). (36 minutes)

Photo Tyler Hicks

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