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Matthew Bogdanos is furious with the Wa Po review of his book, Thieves of Baghdad

So says Page Six in the NY Post.

Quoting Page Six:

WASHINGTON Post "culture critic" Philip Kennicott should think twice before visiting New York.

The smug book reviewer did an unprovoked hatchet job the other day on Manhattan Assistant DA-turned-war-hero Matthew Bogdanos' otherwise well-received (and decidedly apolitical) new memoir, "Thieves of Baghdad." Needless to say, the highly decorated two-tour Special Forces vet isn't happy.

"I thought it was a joke when I first read it," an emotional Bogdanos told PAGE SIX.

"A friend e-mailed it to me and I actually thought he'd cut and pasted in the words. Unbelievably, this schmuck was actually serious."

Bogdanos, who was called to active duty one day after his apartment was destroyed on 9/11, is credited with exposing the trade in stolen antiquities after the fall of Baghdad (for which he received the 2005 National Medal for the Humanities). He says Kennicott uses him as a scapegoat for everything the critic loathes about the White House.

"You can't tell [from the book] who I voted for in the last election," Bogdanos fumes. "You can't tell what my position is on the Iraq war - and that was entirely intentional. The point of my book is that you can't politicize our cultural heritage."

Kennicott's positions are much easier to decipher. "Those who are already enamored of military culture and still believe in the Iraq War will probably nod in agreement with [Bogdanos]," his review sneered.

"Those who question that war - and question war in general - may find Bogdanos a repellent figure, symptomatic of a new hubris in certain military and political circles."

"Repellent? A new hubris?" the author rages. "If Kennicott ever left his cave, he'd know that nobody in this country hates war more than the people who actually get shot at. You think I wanted to be there? I missed the birth of my fourth child, for crissake."

Bogdanos, who prosecuted Sean "P. Diddy" Combs at his weapons-possession trial in 1999, also said, "In 2 1/2 years, I recovered over 5,000 ancient artifacts from eight countries. What has that man [Kennicott] ever done for 'culture?' "
Read entire article at NY Post