The new flag of Iraq has been chosen by the people in a country-wide referendum, following a weeks-long process where ordinary citizens could submit their designs alongside the creations of award-winning artists and —…
Well, no. Actually, the 25-member governing council just kind of imposed it.
Now, somewhere in Baghdad, the graphic artist who turned the council’s design-by-committee process into the final artwork is lying in a dark room with cold compresses on his or her forehead. (Wild guess: let’s run with “his.”)
He must still be hearing the voices: “Make the crescent bigger! It needs to punch through!” “There must be four stripes! No, three!” “Can you make it more, I don’t know, edgy?“
And he’s probably trying to shake the uneasy feeling that what he’s created is the logo for Ikea’s next Midnight Madness Sale.
But I hope he’s feeling at least a little satisfaction over the job he did. He had the good sense to leave off the Halliburton logo and resisted the last-minute suggestion from Paul Bremer to include Re-elect Bush-Cheney 2004 in big letters across the bottom. (Bremer’s earlier suggestion of Mission Accomplished was frantically nixed back in Washington.)
