Iraqi election coverage: Before, during, and after...

Before

Iraq's Non-Election and March 19th  by POAC Co Editor Jack Dalton

Iraq poll won't end U.S. occupation

"This election is an American movie made to convince Iraqis to go to the polls so that the United States will stay in Iraq and control its oil," said Jordanian Mohammed Fakhri, 28, owner of a mobile phone shop. "There will be ... a government with Iraqi stooges serving U.S. and Israeli interests."

The election is likely to propel Iraq's majority Shiites into power for the first time since modern Iraq came into being in 1921, giving them the leading voice in shaping the country's future, which Shiite-dominated Iran hopes will lead to friendly relations between the two nations that fought a brutal war two decades ago.

From Armored Vehicles, U.S. Troops Tell Iraqis to Vote: Only U.S. forces, venturing out of their frequently-mortared bases, make an attempt to get the vote out, putting up posters with general information about the polls, passing out leaflets and broadcasting messages.

.. Iraq's National Assembly poll on January 30 is already set to become but the latest in a series of "turning points" touted by the Bush administration, which in reality turn out to be cul-de-sacs. http://www.motherjones.com/news/dailymojo/2005/01/iraq_elections.html 

.. The popular wisdom in Baghdad is that the 275 assembly members have already been chosen. http://www.motherjones.com/news/update/2005/01/baghdad_journal2.html 

.. President Bush sees Sunday's election in Iraq as a beacon for freedom in the Middle East, but Arab reformers say the poll will set back their cause. http://www.commondreams.org/headlines05/0128-11.htm 

.. Nurturing Iraq's Non-Election To pretend that the U.S. might want true democracy in Iraq – one that actually would be free to follow the will of the people – is to ignore evidence, logic and history. http://www.alternet.org/waroniraq/21113/ 

.. The elections in Iraq will set an example of democracy for the rest of the Middle East... Bush said Friday. (the only example being set is how not to hold an election and if one is held, how to manipulate it to a desired outcome--while at the same time supporting tyrannies in the middle east--Saudi Arabia, Pakistan and a few others; democracy is on the march is it not?) http://tinyurl.com/7yfug 

.. Hundreds of Iraqis streamed into polling places in five U.S. cities Friday, the first day they could vote in their homeland's election. (my friend Doris fled Germany with her parents in 1938, she was 10, why can't she vote in Germany's elections as are those that fled Iraq, a lot of which were just children and have never lived in Iraq, are being allowed to do? If that is an absurd question, so is what is going on with Iraqi ex-pats that have been assimilated into other nations being able to determine the election of a country they are not a part of, do not live in and are not returning to) http://tinyurl.com/3las7 

.. Iraq sets dusk-to-dawn curfew before vote Just ahead of the first free balloting in Iraq in half a century, the nation battened down for the vote, imposing a 7 p.m.-6 a.m. curfew on Friday and closing Baghdad International Airport. Five U.S. soldiers were killed in the capital and insurgents blasted polling stations across the country. (anyone that believes that this election in Iraq is a 'free' election in my opinion is living in a fantasy world--especially when considering the people and organizations invloved, like John Negroponte & National Endowment of Democracy) http://tinyurl.com/5bv8e 

.. Freedom and democracy on the march--so is a rigged 'election' http://tinyurl.com/6bpgb 

.. to vote or not to vote Across Baghdad, Security is Only an Ideal http://tinyurl.com/3ph2m 

.. Making the Iraqi elections resemble any kind of democratic process has been fraught with all kinds of enormous difficulties... http://www.tcf.org/4L/4LMain.asp?SubjectID=4&ArticleID=854 

.. The Iraqi government that emerges from Sunday's election may open its oil business to foreign investment, and international petroleum companies are jockeying to curry favor with the war-torn country http://www.globalpolicy.org/security/oil/2005/0126prize.htm 

.. Predictably, the U.S. news media are full of discussion and debate about this weekend's election in Iraq. Unfortunately, virtually all the commentary misses a simple point: There will be no "election" on Jan. 30 in Iraq, if that term is meant to suggest an even remotely democratic process. http://tinyurl.com/54exe

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During

Dangers of reporting Iraqi Poll: We can't go beyond Baghdad and we can barely move within Baghdad

Against violent backdrop, Iraqis turn out to vote Attacks on polling stations kill 44, including 9 suicide bombers

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After

Voting in Baghdad was linked with receipt of food rations, several voters said after the Sunday poll. http://tinyurl.com/69mgx 

"What this election has done is not actually a demonstration of people who demand democracy, but they want freedom of a different kind, freedom to vote, but also freedom from foreign occupation. And if they are betrayed in this, then we are going to look back and regret the broken promises. http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=05/01/31/1516244 

“I saw a few people go voting but then nothing — just this American armoured vehicle in the street,” he said. “Even those people who wanted to vote were put off by that,” he said from his home in Amariyah, an area of guerrillas and Fallujah refugees which was completely sealed off by Iraqi police — even to accredited journalists. http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,7374-1464029,00.html 

Iraq Elections: What Next? http://tinyurl.com/6bept 

Iraq: Who voted and who didn't and why : The real numbers of this election are difficult to obtain as international monitors were not allowed to observe the proceedings for "security reasons." Even if we use the highly unreliable figures distributed by the Iraqi government and sources close to the US embassy in Baghdad, the results seemed to indicate a mixed bag, no matter what the different parties are trying to spin: http://207.44.245.159/article7920.htm 

The Dollar Campaigns for Allawi By Dahr Jamail BAGHDAD - U.S.-appointed interim Iraqi prime minister Iyad Allawi recently handed out 100- dollar bills to journalists at a press conference. He then gave teachers an unexpected 100-dollar bonus. http://ipsnews.net/new_nota.asp?idnews=27202

After being quoted on an 'estimated' voter turnout of 72% Iraqi election official admits that he made the number up and gives new estimate of 60% which is also just a guess

Bush announces Iraqi election "resounding success".

Iraqi officials admit vote irregularities: Tens of thousands of Iraqis – mainly Sunni Arabs – may have been denied their right to vote on Sunday because of insufficient ballots and polling centres, officials have said.

Elections’ Aftermath: The elections were designed to establish sectarianism in Iraq, not democracy.

This election will change the world. But not in the way the Americans Imagined

Iraqis in Egypt are distressed by their exclusion from Sunday's national vote

"If it had been up to Bush, Iraq would have been a soft dictatorship under Chalabi, or would have had stage-managed elections with an electorate consisting of a handful of pro-American notables."

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