WaPo 'Express' Timeline on Iraq War Includes Abu Ghraib, But Excludes Capture, Trial, and Hanging of Saddam

The Washington Post’s free commuter tabloid "Express" earned its name on Tuesday. On page 8, its timeline of "Turning Points: Key Dates in the Iraq War" was so quickly assembled that it left out the capture, trial, and execution of Saddam Hussein. It began by noting the invasion as a "bid to topple" Saddam, but never noted U.S. troops taking Baghdad on April 9, 2003. However, it did emphasize U.N. estimates of Iraqi civilian deaths, and abuse at Abu Ghraib. Here’s the complete actual verbiage:

March 2003: U.S.-led invasion begins with strikes on Baghdad in bid to topple Saddam Hussein.

April 2004: Photos of abuse at Abu Ghraib prison released.

Jan. 2005: Millions vote in first multiparty poll in 50 years.

Jan. 2007: President George W. Bush announces troop "surge." U.N. reports 34,000 civilians died in 2006.

July 2008: As violent deaths decrease, Iraqi P.M. Nouri al-Maliki raises prospect of U.S. troop withdrawal.

June 30, 2009: Deadline for U.S. troops to exit Iraqi cities as part of deal that calls for all troops to leave Iraq by 2011.

When someone evaluates the Iraq War twenty or fifty years from now, will they find that the release of photographs of naked pyramids at Abu Ghraib was a larger "turning point" in the Iraq War than what happened to Saddam Hussein?

Reuters offered a much larger timeline -- that excluded Abu Ghraib.