Thankfully, what actually happened…
…was much better than National Lampoon’s joke predictions:
All things considered, I hope the vote goes to Iyad Allawi of the
“Thinly Disguised American Puppet Party” rather than Ahmad Chalabi of
the “Iranian Puppet Party”.
Let’s just see what we can do about making history not repeat itself. As Daily
Kos points out, there was an another election that had an equal
promise:
Officials Cite 83% Turnout Despite Vietcong Terror
by Peter Grose, Special to the New York Times (9/4/1967: p. 2)
WASHINGTON, Sept. 3– United States officials were surprised and
heartened today at the size of turnout in South Vietnam’s presidential
election despite a Vietcong terrorist campaign to disrupt the voting.
According to reports from Saigon, 83 per cent of the 5.85 million
registered voters cast their ballots yesterday. Many of them risked
reprisals threatened by the Vietcong.
The size of the popular vote and the inability of the Vietcong to
destroy the election machinery were the two salient facts in a
preliminary assessment of the nation election based on the incomplete
returns reaching here.
[The article links to the original New York Times pieces.]
Cross your fingers, folks.
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I saw the above photo by going through a Y! slideshow and saved a copy locally, because it's really greaty symbolism (Iraqi woman giving the "peace" or "victory" sign, with purple finger to indicate she voted) of a new democracy. I was going to post it myself, but since you did...
At first I was going to respond and say that there is no parallel whatsoever between '67 and '05. But then I started thinking. While the U.S. got involved for different reasons (in Vietnam, the U.S. didn't overthrow France), the truth was that in both cases, the U.S. was involved in setting up democracy.
I guess the biggest issue is how the Iraqis perceive the militants. If they see them as "freedom fighters" along the Viet Cong model (i.e. overthrow the French and Americans and establish Vietnam for the Vietnamese), then we're (I'm speaking as a US citizen) in trouble. If the Iraqis see the militants as troublemakers/terrorists/whatever, then the situation is more manageable.
Ontario Emperor
My thinking exactly. Emperor. Hence my closing line, "Cross your fingers, folks."