Down's syndrome suicide bomber story, fact or fiction?

[TexasProgresive]

If dupe please point me to the thread, Thanks

Any body heard this story about a 19 year old Iraqi Shia man with Down’s syndrome being used as a suicide bomber in Baghdad on election day? It’s all over the wingnuts’ blogs. It looks like the original source is an article by Paul McGeough in the Sidney Morning Herald.

I don’t think the story is credible but it is getting some traction. Supposedly it has been reported by Dan Rather and on Faux snooze. The NY Post has a piece but it looks like they used McGeough as their source, the same with World Net Daily.

http://www.smh.com.au/news/After-Saddam/Handicapped-boy-made-into-bomb/2005/02/01/1107228705132.html

[Trajan]

1. Im not sure what the point is ....

how awful the iraqi 'insurgents' are ? ...

Well howdy fuckin do: no kiddin ? ... The insurgents are murderous thugs ... There is nothing to praise about assholes who kill innocent human beings .....

I suppose some might be shocked to hear that liberals dont applaud those who murder innocents ....

Only if they listen to the right wing would they ....

[HarrietBrown]

2. Marc Maron's been talking about it on Morning Sedition the last couple of

days-using it as an example, but qualifying that it may/may not be true.

[WillieWoohah]

3. Omar (pro-US Iraqi blogger) corroborrated it on "Iraq the Model"

http://iraqthemodel.blogspot.com/2005/02/new-techniques-of-resistance.html

"I couldn't believe the news until I met another guy from that neighborhood who knows the family of the victim. The guy was reported missing 5 days prior to elections' day and the family were distributing posters that specified his descriptions and asking anyone who finds him to contact them."

[TexasProgresive]

4. That doesn't jive with McGeough's article.

"On most days, Amar would slip out of his parents' house and wander the streets of the Al-Askan neighbourhood until dusk when, usually, a friend or neighbour would bring him home. On Sunday, when his parents, Ahmed, 42, and Fatima, 40, went to vote with their two daughters, they left him at home as usual."

[WillieWoohah]

5. Interesting... well spotted mate