Actually, Thury, I'm a programmer, and I guess it shows. Lawyers' jobs involve arguing with people; programmers' jobs involve arguing with computers, which are _much_ picker about facts!

Anyway, do you have any links to articles about all of Iraq's Internet access being cut off? I haven't been able to find much info one way or the other. The excerpt you posted below said "only [certain people] receive email at all, and Iraqi authorities are now blocking access to the system". Given the context, I assumed "system" referred to the Iraqi ISP's email servers, not Internet access as a whole.

Incidentally, there's what appears to be a pretty good up-to-date summary of Salam Pax's blog from the Philadelphia Inquirer, at http://www.siliconvalley.com/mld/siliconvalley/5490233.htm and another on Wired News at http://www.wired.com/news/culture/0,1284,58206,00.html

Neither story mentions Internet access from Iraq being cut off, which of course doesn't prove anything one way or the other, but suggests the March 14 article you keep mentioning might not still be correct.