----- Original Message ----- From: "Gary Denton" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: "Killer Bs Discussion" <[email protected]> Sent: Wednesday, February 09, 2005 1:43 PM Subject: Re: Live video of Texas Legislature Marine recognition
> > My nephew the Army Ranger is back in Iraq. He was protecting the > vote. He is at Mosul, where they had 10% voter turnout. I was doing a > calculation the other day - it looks like Iraqi voter turnout as > percentage of voting age population was much lower than we might have > heard here. They did not meet the goal of 50%. I guess our so-called > liberal media missed that call. The latest numbers I've seen are around 57%-58%. That's pretty close to the forcast numbers. The Sunni participation was at the low end of expectations, and the Kurds were very high. >When final results are in I suspect we will have helped the Iraqis elect their equivalent of the Taliban. That statement brings up an interesting question. How do we weigh the importance of having a government in a foreign country that matches our viewpoint vs. having a government that represents the viewpoint of the majority of the people in a country? One critical point on this is human rights. Clearly, we would have been right to forceably oppose the Nazi murdering the Jews, even if they had sucessfully stood for reelection (as they probably could have if they they chose to have elections). But, if an elected body accepts Islamic law as a basis for civil law, then I see us not having the ability to overrule that body. This is especially true if the group we wish to protect (women) were about half of the electorate. All we should do, I think, is work to ensure the people have the ability to throw out these rascels and elect a new group of rascels if they don't like how things turn out. My guess is that the compromises needed to form a government will ensure some moderation. The indications are that the government will be less extreme than the one in Iran, which is less extreme than the Taliban. After the election, the strong problems getting Sunni participation is clear; but the desire to vote by the non-Sunni is also clear. In short, about 20% of the population virtually stayed away from the polls, while the other 80% voted at a very high rate (~70%). Dan M. _______________________________________________ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
