I've been a bit lazy with reading the news lately, but the Iraqi election will be this weekend. And it's a bit stupid to be mad at Bush going to war in Iraq without talking about how the Iraqis themselves will fare.

I've been taking it forgranted that after the election there will be doom and gloom and war and religious fanaticism, but then I stumble upon this article. What? The leading Shiites say they won't form a religious government? They say they're not going to take revenge on the Sunnis? Iraqis don't want the country to become Iran? The politicians most likely win are...moderate?

What's more, Iraq's clerics apparently have a tradition of not interfering too much in politics. Interesting. I didn't know that.

Of course it's all very fragile and the coalition could fall apart at any minute. But give the Iraqis a little credit. Maybe it's not quite as hopeless as it looks.

I think the doom and gloom comes if, as many people assume, Allawi (sp?) wins the election. He is viewed as an American puppet by many; an Allawi victory might even stir up the Shiites to revolt, especially if the election has any resemblence to the Ukranian or the previous two American elections.

I think it's likely that a candidate supported by al Sistani will win, however. This is the hopeful future for Iraq. Al Sistani has always seemed a reasonable, thoughtful and, most importantly, secular-supporting cleric, and he holds the support of most of the Shiite government. He wouldn't have Iraq be another Iran (he'd probably have moved to Iran already if he liked how they did things, after all) and he's never spoken anything but peace, moderation and reconciliation with the Sunnis. While he, himself, obviously will never hold office, candidates he supports will be likely to both heed his advice and share his beliefs.

I'm assuming, of course, that one of the first actions of the new government will be either to tell the Americans to go the hell away, or to grab the reins of the Iraqi Defense Forces, start actual serious recruitment, and make them the real police force of the nation despite the American presence. Well, okay, they'll probably do the second part with or with Americans in Iraq. They have to; otherwise, Iraq will remain a puppet state.

Of course, if Allawi wins, it will remain a puppet state.

Boy, what use could the U.S. have in making Iraq a puppet state?

Seems that "Free Iraq" might be one of the best oxymorons of our times, right up there with Jumbo Shrimp and Military Intelligence.

Of course, all of this assumes that the Shiites and the Kurds can come to a meeting of the minds about the rather zero sum matter of who will rule the Kurdish areas...which discussion will take place while the Kurds are still (as of last report) running Arabs out of Kirkuk by force. Still, it's a friendly gesture towards the more secular Sunni crowd; who the Shii will need if they want to actually have a functional Iraqi economy any time soon.

Freakyboy, from the man-on-the-street interviews I heard yesterday on NPR's All Things Considered, I don't think that the Iraqi's would view a win from the secular Shiite slate to be a continuation of American oppression. There are two major Shiite political lists, the secular one and the religious one. I don't think a win of one or the other will be about America, but about whether Iraqi Shiites want a secular or a (moderate) religious government.

The problem is going to be the Sunnis. They will not feel represented either by a religious Shiite led government or a government led by secular Shiites seen to be beholden to the Americans.

The only hope is for the government to somehow write a constitution that the Sunnis feel is fair to them. Because, of course, this upcoming election is for a temporary government which will write a constitution that then gets voted, up or down, by the Iraqi people. If this new government finds a way to include the Sunnis in the constitution writing (who will not be significantly represented in the elected constitution-writing body because they are only 20% of the population in the first place and many of them will not be voting), and the security situation does not get worse, then it seems possible to me that the Sunnis could vote for and support the new consitution, which, with procedures catering to them, gives them enough power that continuing their civil war seems counterproductive.

I think it was on the same All Things Considered program that had a story from a reporter who has been following Iraqi politics. He reported on back-room deals between the leading lists, and get this; the Kurdish leader will probably be installed as the single leader of this next Iraqi government. That, to me, seems like something that could really help staunch the civil war. Yes, the Sunnis are not happy about Kurdish troops in Mosul and such, but in the wider government having a powerful counterwieght to the Shiites might very well placate Sunnis.

Yes, it seems to have gone off with only slightly above an average day death tolls amoung Iraqis!

Probably good turnout from poop and Kurds, poor turnout from Sunnis.

Of course, they have to transport the ballots to the Green Zone in Baghdad before they count them and all of the turnout estimates at the moment are definitely estimates... but it looks to have been not a bloodbath. :-)

We certainly can't fault the bravery of the voters; even if informed rumor has it that a lot of Shiites were told that if they didn't vote, they wouldn't get their ration cards...it was still a risky thing to do.

Btw; it's worth noting that the US will shortly have spent $20 billion dollars on 14 permanent bases in Iraq; to house 40,000 troops due to stay there forever. The neocons need those bases for military adventurism in Iran, Syria, and Saudi Arabia; and for us to leave would mean abandoning the entire point of us going there (from their perspective; and they drove this invasion process along). Even if we overlook the chance to steal from the Iraqis, and the chance to monkey with their oil production; this is our only chance to remake the middle east into some kind of pro-American, democratic (well, Republican) fantasyland; and you can safely assume that Dubya's comment, that we would leave when asked, was just as big a lie as anything else he's ever said regarding Iraq.