The Blogosphere has been an excellent source of information and in-depth discussion of issues surrounding the English medical journal Lancet’s report that most likey somewhere in the number of 650,000 Iraqis have died as a result of the US invasion and its aftermath. The American radical right has attempted to deny the this report’s accuracy, which means that at least some of its members still have a conscience. But their efforts largely fail under fair-minded scrutiny.

I list below some of the best discussions and sources I have located so far. More will be added as they appear.

From the Washington Monthly:
The Death rates in Iraq
from this site the entire report can be downloaded as a PDF file..

From Obsidian Wings (an excellent academic blog)
The Lancet Study

which linked to the article

Old Death in the New Iraq in the Public Health Blog, Stayin’ Alive
(you may have to scroll down)

which linked to the major Canadian magazine, MacLeans
Iraq’s Missing dead

another very good discussion is at Majikthise
Over half a million additional deaths in Iraq since US invasion
Here Lindsey Beyerstein discusses the arguments against the study. She has also just posted a new examinatin of prominant right wiong arguments against the study, along with additional links evaluatingwhat she properly terms their cowardice. See
Innumerate Cowards Recoil from the facts: 665,000 dead Iraqis.

From Jeff Greenwald’s superb Unclaimed Territory:
Counting Iraqi deaths

From Brad DeLong’s Semi-Daily Journal, a good initial discussion by deLong, an economist at UC Berkeley, followed by an interesting and rich discussion in the comments. This is an example of blogs and open discussion at their best, something no newspaper can do.
Let Slip the Dogs of War
You need to scroll down to Oct. 10, 2006, because his permalink does not seem to work.

Crooked Timber, another one of the best academic blogs, has several good discussions. First see Statistics and the Scale of Societies. Then take a look at two discussions of the origonal, Lancet study that came out in 2004. First, Talking Ribbish About Epidemiology, and then Lancet Roundup and Literature Review.
At this point you will be able to see the many errors in the radical right’s mentality of denial.

I will add more as they come to my attention.

UPDATE: Billmon has an excellent essay Catching Up with Saddam, that does an indepth job of exploring the intricacies of comparing the respective records of Saddam and Bush in killing people. He is willing to lower Lancet’s estimate by quite a bit, and still comes up with some very interesting and troubling findings.

UPDATE II: Mike Dunford at ScienceBlogs has a careful critique of the Lancet study in his essay The Questionable Authority. The discussions that follow are also well worth the effort to read. This is the best critical analysis I have encountered.

UPDATE III: Tim Lambert, also at ScienceBlogs, has another update on much of the current intelligent discussion of the PIPA study reported in the Lancet. See More Lancet.