A lot has been made of the 20,000 recruits to the Al Qaeda cause that the war in Iraq produced, but something strange happened on the way to the Martyr bank.  They chickened out!

It seems that instead of the 20,000 largely touted in the 'unbiased' press, the actual number now being admitted to by the media elite is closer to 3,500.

While stil not news to jump for joy, there is one big problem with a Martyr.  They only get one chance to blow themselves up (cloning not being a sanctioned science in the midevel Muslim world yet).

And so, with World opinion poo-pooing the Iraq war and all the death and destruction it caused, Al-Zarqawi cant take advantage of it, and attack US soft targets according to one of his top aides due to a lack of volunteers.

It seems that the mothers of Iraq would rather have their sons grow up to be Doctors and (god forbid!) lawyers than blow themselves and innocent women and children up.

And why is this?  how could this have come about?  Well, maybe the $25,000 bounty to each suicide bomber that is no longer being paid from the treasury of Iraq might be a big reason.  There is no longer a profit in it.

And then there may be some common sense as when the candidates realize they are not blowing up "Infadels", but their own countrymen and fellow Muslims, it is hard to justify either of Al-Zarqawi's or Osama Bin Laden's claim that it is ordained and ordered by the Koran.

35 hundred is still too many, but many of those never get to blow themselves up as they are caught before hand as their friends and neighbors rat them out.

More hopeful news that most people probably missed as it does not fit the paradigm of how the elite media wants us to see the war on terror progressing.

Too bad that this time, one of their own ratted them out.