NEWS: The Real Iraqi Election Fallout

POLITICS: The Real Iraqi Election Fallout

Republicans were almost bursting with pleasure at how the invasion and occupation of Iraq had been such a burgeoning success with the Iraqi election now complete, so much so that many of them chose to dye their fingers purple during Bush's state of the union address (today's Republicans still lacking that knack for subtlety) as an "in your face" message to the Democrats. Right wing pundits and conservative politicians have incessantly harped on this "historic triumph for democracy" that had occurred and how the Iraqi vote now overrode any pesky concerns leading up to the election, like the now-defunct attempt to find WMDs or the flimsy justifications that Hussein had violated UN resolutions that justified a US conquest. The trouble, is now that the election is really over, what were the results?

Which brings the true test of the commitment of adminstration hawks to democratic principles. Is the election of a government that, while not openly hostile to the US and the West in general, isn't exactly the puppet regime that so many of those in power desired, acceptable? If history is any guide though, once the new Iraqi government starts asking for US troops to leave, Bush may just bring in Katherine Harris to "certify" the election results.

Have you noticed how the mainstream media has barely uttered the words "Iraqi" and "Elections" in the same sentence in the last week or so?

The US govenment is going to do what ever it wants. It's not like they're going to suddently start respecting a democratically elected government in Iraq when they only behave democratically within our own borders when it's convenient.

Edited to add: We all rember the fiasco that was the 2000 elections...

[Edited on Feb 11, 2005 by argon]

It was never about democracy.

It's about the illusion of democracy.

YOU ARE FREE, TO DO AS WE TELL YOU

Remember that the Bush administration didn't want the elections in the first place. They wanted regional caucauses where a select group of people would have chosen the assembly. It was Sistani who demanded and ultimately won direct elections under threat of violence.

I would be surprised if the new government boots the US immediately, Afterall, now they will become targets for the insurgents themselves and will need to be protected by the US occupation forces. I do agree that the vote was an overwhelming rejection of the occupation. It also raises expectations for the improvement of the material conditions in the hearts and minds ofIraqi's, which could be dangerous for the new government if those expactations aren't met.

actually, ive been seeing those words together on cnn all the fucking time, and in the new york times, and in the washington post, and others

The party may be promising that but the assembly would have vote yay or nay on each plank.

and it brings up the question, which is quite sticky, is it ethical to obey a demand to leave if you have good evidence(not bullshit or wishful thinking or self serving projections) that in complying with the demand you would doom the country to chaos?

But the key is the voting this is a victory for Iraqis. I hope they deserve a better goverment than we seem to.

"while not openly hostile to the US and the West in general, isn't exactly the puppet regime"

The whole POINT of creating democracy in Iraq is so the government there will not be openly hostile to the US and the West in general.

Have you ever noticed that countries on our military to-do list are always dictatorships? We are not going to invade Belgium or Turkey or Costa Rica or South Korea.

Americans may bitch and moan about France (and vice versa) but we all know there will not be a war between the US and France. Absolutely nobody wants that. Modern democracies don't fight wars with each other. As Paul Berman put it: "Freedom for others means safety for ourselves. Let us be for the freedom of others." That's what regime-change in Iraq is about. It was never about WMD, nor was it about "puppets."

The neocons, love 'em or hate 'em, are beating Henry Kissinger's realpolitik school to a pulp. That's why Kissinger and his buddies like Lawrence Eagleburger and Brett Scowcroft hate the neocons.

History, as you say, is a good guide to the present. But you also have to understand the different schools of American foreign policy, and you have to know which school is in charge at the moment. The Kissinger school is in the wilderness right now. Why do you think the old leftist Christopher Hitchens, who is the absolute archenemy of Henry Kissinger, has signed on with the neocon foreign policy? There really is a reason for that.

There are different schools of foreign policy on the left, and there are different schools on the right. The division between "doves" and "hawks" conceals far more than it reveals.

I think the real test of how successful the elections were will be to see how many elected officials survive the first term.

Christopher Hitchens, who thinks the Ohio vote was stolen, you mean?

What was the Daily Show's joke about that? Something like so-and-so "has decided not to run for office, citing his desire to live to retirement age."

tee hee! that's quite funny! I have to admit I do not watch that show, but I hear it is quite good.

Yes, that's who I'm talking about.

Did I say he's a partisan Republican? No, of course I didn't and of course he isn't. A LOT of foreign policy hawks aren't partisan Republicans. A lot of foreign policy hawks aren't Republicans at all, and that includes both me and Christopher Hitchens.

Politics isn't binary.

Sorry, I meant to add "results" to that list. And it maybe more like the past 3-4 days.

has it already fallen into the memory hole that the bush administration was against holding the elections in janurary, until they were forced to do so by al-sistani's stubbornness on the issue?

as they say, success has a thousand fathers, while failure is an orphan. if the election is a failure in the long term, it'll be straight off to the orphanage.

edit: oops, i see smithers_jones hasn't forgotten.

[Edited on Feb 11, 2005 by in_a_blue_state]

I notice that Naomi Klien's editorial that this is based on does not mention trivial things, like a breakdown of the actual results, or the date of the results that she is quoting. I do think it worth noting that Allawi's list was also beaten by a large group who acted in concert to endorse Kurdish candidates.

I don't suppose it makes as good a story to say that there was no single majority list, and that any government will have to be a composite one. Or that all this election does is assemble a constitutional convention the product of which will have to be voted on...

I think you may be in for a nasty surprise here. I hope I'm wrong. But that was the root of my unease about the desire to topple Saddam in the first place; it always looked easy to knock him over, but that approach assumed that the act of doing it wouldn't turn popular opinion in Iraq against the occupiers, and that assumption may have contained the seeds of its own destruction.

That's a half truth. The U.S. may not invade democracies, but they've certainly played a role in the fall of at least a couple that didn't "tow the line".

Iraq wasn't a dictatorship, Saddam held elections and he would always win at almost 100% voting for him.

Yeah........ right They all wanted him office thats why the US military has tons of personal photos of them waveing and thanking us. Tell me your not seriously baseing that on Saddam not being a toltoarian leader.....

Kissinger and his cronies played that game during the Cold War. But the Cold War is over and Kissingerism is out.

But, yes, I was referring to invasions here, not the "our bastard" policy.

I'm not sure that division of policies is quite as clear as it first seems, if only because the roots of the current administration are plainly related to Cold War presidencies: Reagan and GHW Bush.
My perception there is certainly not that of an American. But foreign policy is about foreigners, no?

It's their country. It's hard to imagine what they'll make of it through democracy will be worse than what they had with Saddam, or that Iraq under their rule will be a security threat to the US. The only way it could be worse is if the Wahabi nutcases ran the show like they did in Afghanistan and Chechnya. But there's no chance of that happening.

WMD may have been the sales line but (and this isn't a Godwin violation technically nor am I trying to draw a comparison between the Nazis and the current administration) the reason given to annex the sudentland was abuse of ethnic German and the reason given to invade Poland was that the Poles attacked a radio station. But the actual motivation was much different. We needed a good reason after Somalia(which by the way is not fixing itself).


Michael_J_Totten said:
"Politics isn't binary. "

Word. That is a really important idea for Americans to internalise.