Baghdad to get ‘Disneyland’ style amusement park
- added April 26, 2008
- 31 responses
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- critter
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- Amusement Parks (23)
At the cost of nearly $500 million, a Los Angeles-based company is “developing the Baghdad Zoo and Entertainment Experience, a massive American-style amusement park that will feature a skateboard park, rides, a concert theatre and a museum.” The park “is being designed by the firm that developed Disneyland.” The company’s owner says “the time is ripe” for profit and entertainment to collide in Iraq:
Mr Werner, who has been sold a 50-year lease on the site by the Mayor of Baghdad for an undisclosed sum, says that the time is ripe for the amusement park. “I think people will embrace it. They’ll see it as an opportunity for their children regardless if they’re Shia or Sunni. They’ll say their kids deserve a place to play and they’ll leave it alone.”
“I wouldn’t be doing this if I wasn’t making money” he said. “I also have this wonderful sense that we’re doing the right thing – we’re going to employ thousands of Iraqis. But mostly everything here is for profit.”
A Pentagon official has said that Gen. David Petraeus is a “big supporter” of the project.
via Think Progress
Mr Werner, who has been sold a 50-year lease on the site by the Mayor of Baghdad for an undisclosed sum, says that the time is ripe for the amusement park. “I think people will embrace it. They’ll see it as an opportunity for their children regardless if they’re Shia or Sunni. They’ll say their kids deserve a place to play and they’ll leave it alone.”
“I wouldn’t be doing this if I wasn’t making money” he said. “I also have this wonderful sense that we’re doing the right thing – we’re going to employ thousands of Iraqis. But mostly everything here is for profit.”
A Pentagon official has said that Gen. David Petraeus is a “big supporter” of the project.
via Think Progress
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Your tax dollars at work. How about "Help us out with these IEDs so we can get out of here Land". Baghdad will be a paradise, New Orleans will never be the same, does that make any sense?
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Um doesn't Iraq have more pressing issues right now? Maybe water, electricity, and oh yeah people still blow themselves up there. If this ever gets built its just a tragedy waiting to happen.
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According to this article the $1 million skateboard park will open in July. 200,000 skateboards will be shipped from the US and given away free to Iraqi children.
"We now have reached the nadir of American cultural imperialism- "Baghdad Disney"- presumably the 'happiest place in Iraq" -
As I sit reading the history of Judith Miller's over zealous deceit, this for some terrible reason doesn't shock me. Maybe President Bush and Mickey can go to cut the ribbon at the opening. They make an apt duo.
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They get free skateboards, we can't get health care. Is it just me or could our priorities be a bit off here?
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Let's turn it into Americah! Go USA! Oh well... in seriousness, I guess these things are magical to children wherever they come from.
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- mischabarrett
- 5 months ago
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this is a horrible idea. what better a terrorist target than a place filled with families...
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Not only is this a stupid idea, it is so tacky I can taste it in the back of my throat.
Wasteful. Misses the point entirely. -
Hope this one is a joke.
Next time i'll need a skateboard i'll announce my home and my family are available for being bombed.
Ah, i lost my mother but now i have a skateboard, cool! -
bad taste
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April Fools?
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- bryneyancey
- 5 months ago
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And when this all started I kidded with my husband that before long corporate American influence would have the golden arches over Baghdad with an amusement park. It is evil propaganda at our expense. They can ride Magic Mountain now while being destitute with no food, water, electricity, and in constant danger of being blown up, while people right here in our own country go without healthcare and the basic necessities because this war has taken food out of their mouths. I wonder, will those who go there also have to accept Jesus as well before they can get in? This is truly sickening.
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- JanforGore
- 5 months ago
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I can think of better things a $500 million investment from an American corporation could buy:
Solar and wind energy infrastructure in the state(s) of your choice
A passenger rail system so people can kick their vehicles to the curb
Enough Congressmen to get a useful renewable energy bill passed
The list goes on... -
Amazing!
I don't know what to think..it sounds great but I am not sure.-
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- CarolynGillis
- 5 months ago
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Why did they kill Saddam Hussein? Just to make better business relations. The media touch people feelings about the people of Iraq so they can get support.
We kill Saddam Hussein to make better business. Business that has now made "certain people" billions of dollars.
To find the guilty, one must follow the money. -
Money is the new slave owner!
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Kidding, right?
An amusement park is NOT what the Iraqis need right now and there are so many other things that money could be better used for.
What the hell.-
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- noeliasophia
- 5 months ago
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Following the money is sure a good idea.
But the problem is, what to do once you find where the trail ends?
We need another revolution, these people are hearthless. -
That actually kind of sounds badass
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This planned amusement park goes beyond the ridiculous, for all of the mentioned points listed in the statements above!
Will there also be a plan to issue body armor to employees hired to walk around the park in Mickey Mouse, Goofy and Donald Duck costumes? Might need to hand some out to the families at the park as well! -
So are female children going to be allowed here? or is it only for the future terrorists?
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- iraqtheillegalwar
- 5 months ago
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Didn't a statue of Saddam Hussein stand there once? The happy corporation in place of the dead dictator, really? Is this giving any of you a sick feeling in your stomach? -
...You guys know that the Iraq populous isn't made entirely of terrorists, right?
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This park is a waste our tax dollars and a waste of time for everyone else, the park itself will get blown up, and with children who have no food and water how are they going to afford going to an amusement park ? Also how can anyone say that the time is ripe ? A war is going on and their going to build a park right in the middle of it ? Insane . . .
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- Earth_Peace_Love
- 5 months ago
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absolutely perfect - i'll be organizing the donation of skateboards to Iraqi kids - peace through skateboards - and then i'll sponsor Iraqi kids to come here and shred the streets , and then see if they get arrested - and if they do , i'll raise a media orgy to expose the hypocrisy of labeling skateboarding a crime , for all time .
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it would be cool if a company out of iraq was building it...
i can just see the ceo in L.A. saying
............I DRINK YOUR MILKSHAKE..............-
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- KINGSTON916
- 5 months ago
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zoos rock!
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- thedismembermentplan
- 5 months ago
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"'They’ll see it as an opportunity for their children regardless if they’re Shia or Sunni. They’ll say their kids deserve a place to play and they’ll leave it alone.' "
Seriously? Does he seriously believe that?
This useless "amusement park" idea upsets me more than I could ever put into words.-
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- meowcarrot
- 5 months ago
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let the kids have fun - it's up to their parents to educate them to not buy into american capitalism - in the meantime , i'm very sure Iraqi kids will love any kind of amusement - if the kids don't like the park , then it wasn't meant to be , otherwise , it's a good thing .
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Ok, here is the strategy. We know that we still have some terrorists over there, particularly suicide bombers. The problem is that the suicide bombers are running out of things to bomb and the easiest way to find them is to get them to blow something up. So as a solution we are building a theme park based upon a cartoon mouse and corporate greed that will be an perfect target for them. Before you know it, all of the suicide bombers will have converged upon the disney park and destroyed it, thus removing all of the suicide bombers from the equation in one swoop.
Yes, I'm being sarcastic if anyone happens to think different.-
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- Varex_Sythe
- 5 months ago
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::snicker:::... Though you were being sarcastic, Varex_Sythe, it was still quite humourous. However- my first reaction to the article, admittedly, was an eye roll and a deep sigh. However, even through the hands of The Corporation- there is at least one person who is still interested in being kind. Yes, the Iraqi kids need something other than news flashes, bombings, and constant sleepless nights from living such a tattered life. I think that there might be some logic to this idea of the amusement park- purely because of the fact that it's the kids we need to focus on. Not all Iraqis are terrorists- and not all terrorists are from Iraq. These kids need to have a place where they can, just for a little while, have a place to relax and just be children with what family they have left... Gods forbid... even if it is a corporate 'gift'.
Blessings and Love,
ZenKat
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