A Tremendous Victory

IRAQI's GLEEFULLY DANCING IN THE STREETS:
The following people, as you can plainly see, are enjoying their new freedom and independance in the new democracy the U.S. helped to cultivate. The voting population of Fallujah:


As you can see, this woman has spontaniously combusted because she was SO HAPPY TO VOTE in the Iraqi Elections.


This woman reported un-matched joy at the fact that she now has a democracy. She is hoping that the new found representative government can vote her back into existence.



Vive La Democracy!


Amin, a Fallujah refugee (and obvious Insurgent), was wounded when shrapnel from a grenade thrown into their home by a soldier lodged near his kidney.

 

Well that was totally pointless.


Did the majority of Iraqis support elections? Yes.

Did they risk their lives to vote by the millions? Yes.

Did they actually dance in the streets? Yes they actually did.

Do you have a problem with that?

 

Not really. Grand Ayatollah Ali al Sistani, (the most senior Shia cleric in Iraq) was strongly aginst this election yet then he thought it was better then nothing when the US wouldn't budge on giving fair direct democractic elections.

Is it really democracy? No! There was no census taken to get a accurate voters list, the CPA didn't let some parties on the ballot, the system is overly complex and the people of Iraq didn't get a say on that system. For example I think every 3rd seat has to be a female or something like that, now I am all for women rights but it is not our county and the Iraqi people didn't get a say.

 

How do you manage to get things exactly backwards. Sistani has been pushing for these elections and opposing delays.

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story2&u=/afp/20050116/wl_mideast_afp/iraqvoteshiitesistani

In the words of his spokeman, "Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani stresses the need to hold the elections at the scheduled date"

Give the guy credit for making himself clear. He supported them and Iraqis turned out by the millions to vote. Are you still trying to find a way to pretend this means Iraqis weren't happy with the elections?

For fucks sake the communist party ran in the elections, and you are still complaining? It was "too complicated"? They shouldn't have had 1/3 women? Any other complaints? Millions of Iraqis voted! They cheered! They celebrated! They did not stand around complaining that it was too complicated and 1/3 of the candidates were women!

 

I personally think that sexual quotas are absurd, but the Iraqis can decide whether to scrap them when they craft their new constitution.

 

What exactly did the elections change? They changed everything and they changed nothing. Yes, millions of Iraqis did vote, but Iraqis still live in an occupied country. Nothing really changed at all. Also, i would like to point out something: there is a fine line between "insurgent" and "freedom fighter." The difference, is in fact, connotations. For example, our founding fathers are considered today as patriots, but by the occuping force -the Brits- as traitors. To those who don't know, during the soviet invasion of Afghanistan, we trained Afghani militia as "freedom fighters," now known by the name of Al Quada and as terrorists.

This is a sad situation & I wish I could say that elections magically solved all the problems in Iraq, but realistically, the same problems exist until they are fixed with compassion & lovingkindness.

Peace & Love

 

Our founding fathers didn't routinely terrorize their fellow countrymen. Even the Viet Cong was more restrained than these Iraqi thugs who regularly blow up oil pipelines and power plants, execute humanitarian relief workers, etc. The VC often assassinated political opponents, but they didn't go around killing election workers and voters. The butchers in Iraq have more in common with the Nicaraguan Contras or the Peruvian Shining Path.

 

BTW, who sponsered the Contras? The United States with Ronald Reagan as President during the illegal Iran-Contra affair.

Iraqi citizens are caught in the cross fire between insurgents and the US backed Iraqi police force, US, & Britans. To break it down, they are stuck in the fight between insurgents who try to kill the occupiers and the occupiers who are trying to kill the insurgents. It is sad that anyone must suffer due to hatred. The Iraqis are the victims; let's remember them as such.

Huck Finn, you misunderstood my point. There are two sides to every story. Many people have branded the resistance as "insurgents" and "terrorists" but perhaps to fellow Iraqis, they are considered as "freedom fighters" and "patriots." Just a thought to consider... Keep an open mind!

 

Stories at http://www.commondreams.org are fair & enlightening. I recommend it for progressive minded people.

 

No Sistani was pushing for elections in general not these elections. In fact Sistani refused to sign the interim constitution till about last March when the US was clear it would no allow free elections in Iraq the way Sistani wanted (as in direct elections where Iraqis would be able to vote directly for their leader).

 

Yes, I know. Reagan also cynically described them as the moral equivalent of our founding fathers, as you've done with the Iraqi terrorists.

What "patriotic" motives could they have for executing true Iraqi heroes like Margaret Hassan?

 

Reread my post. Then look up the defintion of connotation. That's my point. I did not morally compare them to our founding fathers. I have not passed moral judgement on either group.

What patriotic motives did the French have for decapitating Louis XVI?

Personally, I do not believe in patriotism. "Patriotism is the willingness to kill and be killed for trivial reasons" Bertrand Russell. Appeals to national pride is one way to manipulate the masses, as was used by the Axis powers & is a cornerstone of a fascist state. We are all people and each life is a precious gift that should not be wasted on something as trivial as place of birth. We have no control over our birth, so why be proud of it?

Let's stop the suffering...

Peace & Love

 

Now are you going to turn around and tell me you're not comparing Margaret Hassan with Louis XVI?

 

I'm simply asking a question for you to consider. Nothing more or less.


Ignorance is one of the causes of suffering...

Peace & Love

 

You have not provided ANY evidence. Did you even read the damn link?
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story2&u=/afp/20050116/wl_mideast_afp/iraqvoteshiitesistani

DIWANIYA, Iraq (AFP) - [size=-1]Iraq (news - web sites)'s top Shiite cleric, Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani, reiterated his support for the Unified Iraqi Alliance list which is widely expected to dominate the January 30 general elections, one of his aides revealed. [/size]

[size=-1]"Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani stresses the need to hold the elections at the scheduled date and confirms his support for list 169," Sheikh Najah al-Abbudi said Sunday.
[/size]

 

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Point (others please ignore)

Well of course I don’t feel less of you my friend, I can understand why you don’t like debating with me. I mean every time we discuss anything you end up having to agree that my view makes a lot more sense than your own, and I can see that would be damaging to your ego (although I would argue that it improves your understanding of the world).

If you wish to carry on posting in this sadly lacklustre way and continue to shy away from debate that is up to you, I just think it sad that someone with your potential mental skills is unwilling to actually exercise them. Why is it that right wingers talk so much about working hard and being ‘all you can’ but more often as not are the ones that are lazy and unwilling to expand themselves?

Yours in sadness

Balbus.

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We are told to celebrate to rejoice.

But what are we rejoicing what is being celebrated?

Remember we were told to celebrate an invasion that everyone now agrees was based on the almost criminal manipulation of evidence or down right lies.

I remember being told by right wingers to celebrate the looting that took place as the US army (which was too small to police the country) stood ineffectually by and watched. (Including 350 tonnes of high explosives)

Then we were told to celebrate the appointment of the Iraqi Interim government, which most Iraqis despised.

We are continually meant to rejoice at a reconstruction that many admit is just not taking place or where it is, is preceding at a snails pace and costing far more than it should.

We were told to celebrate the handing over of sovereignty, which because of security was only announced to the Iraqi people after the event and took place in a bunker within the Green Zone.

We were then told to celebrate the re-taking for ‘democracy’ of Falluja. Which is likely to have made 300,000 people hate Americans and destroyed or damaged 70% of the city.

Now we are told to celebrate the elections, and I think we should, but as always that happiness should be tempered by reality.

And this is what I find so suspect in the Bush supporter’s call to celebration, it seems to wish to block out any thought of reality. And nearly every mistake, every fuck up that that administration has made is to me related to their inability to understand the realities of Iraq. To me these same policy makers that have fucked up all this time wish to try and wipe that history clean with the celebration of this one election.

Celebrate mindlessly if you wish to I would rather realise that while celebration is due, by no means is the work over.

To me a first good step would be to remove all the policy makes that have fucked up so royally in Iraq so far and replace them with people that have a more realistic assessment of the Iraq situation. People that believe in getting a job done well and delivering first rate solutions rather than people that continually wish us to be celebrating the second or even third best.

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PS


The thing that gets me is that many here that are following the Bush policy fuck ups lead in telling us to celebrate mindlessly actually think that those same idiots haven’t done anywhere near a good or even bleow avarage job in Iraq. It seems to me that the only reason they to continue to support them is out of political bias.


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http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A15449-2004Mar22

 

Psy Fox

If I remember correctly Bremner early in the occupation said elections could not be held until an electoral roll was done (dismissing the use of the ration cards) and the security situation was improved.

As it was the security situation only got worse and they used the ration cards because they didn’t have the time or the ability to draw up an new electoral list.

So i wonder if the elections could have gone ahead earlier?

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Balbus (others please ignore)

If you want to tell me something without having to ask other people to ignore it, try using the messaging system. Otherwise it looks like you don't really want it ignored.

PS: If you're going to declare yourself victorious, why don't you throw yourself a victory party and invite yourself to have champagne with yourself. Could be fun.
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Ask the Iraqis what they are celebrating and rejoicing, I'm to busy mindlessly celebrating myself.

Have you decided when your period of election mourning is going to end?

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Psy Fox, there is something desperate about your attempts to discredit the election. We're supposed to believe that Sistani was against it, so it was illegitimate. Except that he was for it. Somehow you find that irrelevant because he used to be against it? So? He complained the Kurds had too much say. So we should have shortchanged the Kurds? Except then they wouldn't have been happy with it either.

So it kind of sounds like we had to do some horse trading and make compromises. Whaddaya know, that's what we did. We found a middle ground everyone could support. So Sistani and the Kurds supported it, we went ahead, participation was very high, and the Iraqi people are pleased with the result. THAT MEANS IT WAS LEGITIMATE. You petty complaints mean nothing.

You can't get around it. Sistani supported the elections. It is that simple. He didn't support them but call them illegitimate. He supported them, end of story. Get another excuse.