U.S. troop deaths in Iraq fall to lowest monthly level since war started in 2003

THEN...there's the FLIP side;

No mention of the Opinion Research Business [ORB] survey reporting
> 1,033,000 deaths (January 2008,
> http://www.opinion.co.uk/Newsroom_details.aspx?NewsId=88), nor of the 2004
> and 2006 Lancet studies. That the BBC's Baghdad Bureau Chief can believe
> that Iraq Body Count offers an "estimate" of the death toll in Iraq is
> staggering. In fact, it offers a figure based on media reports of violent
> civilian deaths in a country where journalists, who have been targeted and
> killed in large numbers, have been unable to function during the awesome
> violence that has accompanied the occupation (data from morgues and
> government records have been added in recent years).
>
> The IBC website team - which is as qualified to act as a primary source on
> the Iraqi death toll as we are - is "trusted" by the mainstream media
> because it offers an extremely low number, has a superficial veneer of
> academic rigour, and has not been subjected to the unrelenting attacks
> mounted on studies offering higher numbers.
>
> Stephen Soldz, Director of the Center for Research, Evaluation, and
> Program Development at the Boston Graduate School of Psychoanalysis,
> notes:
>
> "We have recently learned that Gilbert Burnham, the lead author of second
> Lancet study, has been sanctioned by Johns Hopkins for deviating from the
> approved IRB protocol and collecting the names of many survey respondents,
> a fact that was implicitly denied in numerous public pronouncements."
> (http://www.zcommunications.org/znet/viewArticle/20890)
>
> This collecting of names potentially placed lives at risk, although it is
> thought that no one was in fact harmed. But Soldz argues that Burnham's
> lapse means Lancet II's estimate can no longer be trusted:
>
> "If one major methodological detail was distorted, we simply cannot know
> whether other aspects of the study were carried out as stated."
>
> It is a bold leap of doubt to take on such an important issue. After all,
> a key finding of Johns Hopkins' internal investigation, unmentioned by
> Soldz, took a different view:
>
> "Inclusion of identifiers did not affect the results of the study."
> (http://www.jhsph.edu/publichealthnews/press_releases/2009/iraq_review.html)
>
> We asked John Tirman, Executive Director of MIT's Center for International
> Studies, for his opinion on March 18:
>
> Hi John
>
> Hope you're well. We exchanged some emails last year. I wonder if you
> agree with Stephen Soldz's comments on the findings of the internal
> investigation by Johns Hopkins into the 2006 Lancet study on mortality in
> Iraq:
>
> "This error, and its possible coverup in subsequent public statements
> means that, in my opinion, we can no longer rely upon the Lancet II
> mortality estimates. If one major methodological detail was distorted, we
> simply cannot know whether other aspects of the study were carried out as
> stated.
>
> "Until and unless there is far greater detail on these methods, I do not
> feel that their estimate of 650,000 post-invasion surplus deaths can be
> trusted." (http://www.zcommunications.org/znet/viewArticle/20890)
>
> Isn't that an irrational response, unless the misbehaviour affected the
> results? There's no indication that it did. Gilbert Burnham was censured
> personally. The study wasn't impugned.
>
> What are your views (for quoting please)?
>
> Best wishes
>
> David