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2004-09-24 Iraq-Jordan

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Posted by Mike Sylwester 2004-09-24 8:53:08 AM|| || Front Page|| [3 views since 2007-05-07] Top

#1 the author is right that a Shia-Kurd election with NO Sunni arab participation would be a huge problem. But thats NOT what Allawi and Rummy have in mind, IMO. Theyre thinking of POSSIBLY an election without Al Anbar province, due to insurgent/terrorist control of Ramadi and Fallujah. Sunni Arabs in Mosul, Samarra, Baquba and Baghdad would still vote. And even this is not the preferred plan - its a plan B, to avoid giving coalition forces a hard deadline for cleaning up Fallujah and Ramadi.

But still, for the NYT to publish someone this optimistic is pretty unusual.

The Iraqis never asked for us to invade This of course is quite an oversimplification - the exiles asked for us to invade, as did the Kurds. The Shiites wanted us to invade way back in 1991, and mistrust us cause we didnt. I suspect a throwaway line like this was needed to get this past the NYT editors.

Posted by Liberalhawk 2004-09-24 8:59:48 AM|| 2004-09-24 8:59:48 AM|| Front Page Top

#2 If you announce that there will be no elections until there can be elections everywhere, even in the provinces causing the violence, you guarantee that there will never be elections. The terrorists will see to that.

Just as if you announce that the US will leave Iraq on "X" date, no matter whether the new government can defend the country or not, you tell the terrorists to hang on or lie low until that date, at which time they'll have free reign.

Sounds like the Kerry option. And we all know how well that worked out for the Vietnamese people.

Hold the elections. If the "insurgent" areas can't vote, so be it. Maybe they'll get the hint and stop the violence against the government troops, and ours. Or maybe they'll continue to live in their hell-holes under the boots of the terrorists.

That's the nice thing about democracy. People have choices.

Posted by Barbara Skolaut 2004-09-24 9:10:16 AM|| 2004-09-24 9:10:16 AM|| Front Page Top

#3 During the Civil War, the US held elections in the areas that weren't embroiled in the fighting. Most (all?) of the Southern states were excluded. Elections went ahead, anyway.

Posted by Zhang Fei 2004-09-24 10:46:04 AM|| [http://timurileng.blogspot.com] 2004-09-24 10:46:04 AM|| Front Page Top

#4 What's wrong with rolling elections? Start with the non-Sunni areas, and add elections in stable Sunni areas as they're ready. This allows the process to move forward and also gives Sunni holdouts a huge disincentive to continued disruption: no elections in Sunni areas = no influence in a parliament dominated by Kurds and Shi'a.

Posted by lex 2004-09-24 10:52:49 AM|| 2004-09-24 10:52:49 AM|| Front Page Top

#5 I smell rats here. I suspect the LAST thing the left want to see in Iraq are elections. That would validate everything that has been done so far. To verify this theory, I would imagine them proposing anything and everything in the near future short of elections: something to "taint" the idea of "free and full elections."
They will complain bitterly that elections shouldn't be held where there isn't total security; or that the elections cannot be completely monitored by the UN; or that somebody has been unfairly "disenfranchised", etc.
In any case, they will vehemently argue *after* the elections that they are not "valid", that they are "tainted". Somebody cheated somebody, so the elected government is NOT LEGITIMATE. And they will argue this as strongly as they argue that Bush "stole the election" from Gore.
To do otherwise is a tacit admission that they were wrong about overthrowing Saddam, *and* that Iraq is a "quagmire", *and* that Arabs can't deal with democracy, *and* a host of other articles of their faith.

Posted by Anonymoose 2004-09-24 11:33:32 AM|| 2004-09-24 11:33:32 AM|| Front Page Top

#6 Anony, the writer's New American Foundation was founded in 1999 and is headed by Ted Halstead, the man who has urged Warren Beatty to run for President. It is the home of aging Trotskyites and fuzzyideological leftists who are praying (nay, meditating) in the hope that America will suffer a disastrous setback in Iraq.

Posted by Anonymous6620 2004-09-24 11:55:22 AM|| 2004-09-24 11:55:22 AM|| Front Page Top

#7 Re: the complaints about the legitimacy of the elections -- ask these "intellectuals" if they would have allowed the Confederates be allowed to vote on the 13th Amendment?

Posted by Edward Yee 2004-09-24 2:14:53 PM|| [http://edwardyee.fanworks.net] 2004-09-24 2:14:53 PM|| Front Page Top

#8 Wasn't Feldman an advisor to the Coalition Authority on their new Constitution?

I seem to recall that Feldman thought the future Iraq would incorporate Islamic principles in its constitution.

Posted by Quana 2004-09-24 10:28:33 PM|| 2004-09-24 10:28:33 PM|| Front Page Top

12:42 Liberalhawk
12:42 Liberalhawk
07:09 Memesis
05:02 Sock Puppet of Doom
04:57 Zenster
03:24 Super Hose
03:13 Super Hose
03:10 Super Hose
01:05 Sock Puppet of Doom
01:04 Zhang Fei
01:02 Memesis
00:57 Mike Sylwester
00:56 .com
00:49 Super Hose
00:45 Mike Sylwester
00:45 .com
00:39 Sock Puppet of Doom
00:35 .com
00:24 Memesis
00:20 Old Patriot
00:15 Zenster
00:14 Bomb-a-rama
00:12 Memesis
23:53 Zhang Fei