Allawi confirms still in running as cracks emerge in Shiite list

[Warren Stupidity]

"BAGHDAD (AFP) - Outgoing Iraqi Prime Minister Iyad Allawi, whose list scored third in the recent elections, affirmed his interest in keeping his job, as a small party bolted the winning Shiite political list."

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/afp/20050304/wl_mideast_afp/iraqpoliticsallawi&cid=1514&ncid=1473

This government appears to be dead before it even gets formed. The shiites are going to accept this bullshit? This is why they have played nice for the last two years?

[pie]

1. I thought they just elected a leader

[Warren Stupidity]

2. no - they elected a parliament

which is supposed to elect a leader. Conveniently the shiite coalition party did not get enough ballots to form a government on their own as the rules set down by the occupation authority require a 2/3 thirds majority to approve the executive offices.

Shiites represent 60% of the Iraqi population. As the 20% sunni population boycotted the election, shiites represented about 75% of the voters. Oddly their shiite coalition party got less than 50% of the vote. Now they are faced with a parliamentary stalemate and the current government looks like it is going to stay put. How is this going to work? I think it is time that the shiites pull the bad mullah out of his closet for a refresher course in the way things really are in iraq.

[FloridaPat]

3. According to Scott Ritter, the US massaged the vote so they would

get that low percentage of the vote.

[Warren Stupidity]

5. ya think?

me too. Exactly what I thought as the 'ballot counting' rolled into its second week.

So the strategy is simply delay delay delay, run the clock out, etc. Sound familiar? So how long will it take for the 'good mullah' sistani to announce that they've been had?

[pie]

7. I am sure most Americans have no idea this is the situation

I, incorrectly, thought the Iraqis voted for Parlament and
Prime Minister in the US rigged election.

[FloridaPat]

8. The week before the election, if you read a lot of the news reports,

you were able to get all the details about this fiasco. I saw one report about it. ONE!

[MadisonProgressive]

19. Most Americans don't hang at DU all day

We'd all be better off if they did.

[Igel]

12. The religious Shi'ite list got

around 48%, Allawi (who got a lot of the Shi'a *secular* vote) got something like 13%. Kurd's raked in around 25%. The rest of the Shi'a and Sunni vote went to the other 115 slate names.

After all the unusuable votes were discarded, the religious Shi'a united list got something like 52% of the seats in the parliament. (The "unusable votes" were those cast for slates that did not get enough votes for even 1 seat in parliament.)

[Warren Stupidity]

14. yes thank you for repeating the official version

however, without trying to be insulting, I don't believe a word of it.

[Igel]

15. You're right. Every Shi'a could only have voted for

a religious leader. After all, that's the stereotype. Far be it from a Shi'a to vote for a non-fundie.

After all, that's what the "United List didn't get 75% of the vote so the results were hacked" assumes. I've known fairly secular Muslims, and most of the Xians I know are secular. I find the assumption to be naive.

[Warren Stupidity]

16. that ain't what I said

I said that the shiite vote was 75% of the total vote, not that I expected that the UIA, which by the way included both religious and secular shia parties, would get 75%. Early 'returns' reported a massive vote for the UIA, well beyond expectations. Final returns, well, they were as you reported.

But you are right. I'll take my tinfoil hat off now. There is no way we would meddle in an election. Unthinkable.

[Kimber Scott]

4. I thought people who took part in the interim government were not

eligible to run? I don't get this. Of course, whoever Bush wants to win will win.

[b...]

6. aarrrrrrrgggggggggghhhhhhhhh, can't these dinks...

...do anything right?

are we just doomed to just watch these people re-write history, and repeat it's mistakes forever and ever?

[The_Casual_Observer]

9. Did I hear "Civil War"?

Just wait until this news sinks in with Sadr & Co. It will be brutal.

[Roland99]

10. Seymour Hersh raised an interesting point last night here at his speech

To paraphrase:


It's been five weeks since the election. Why is there still no agreement on the formation of a government? So that Allawi can be inserted as PM. The U.S. needs a formal request to keep its troops in Iraq and Allawi will be that assurance.



I need to get that audio captured and write up my notes from his speech last night.

[scarletlib]

11. yup, we are manipulating the crap out of this election

I wonder how long Sistani will tolerate this before he allows the Shites to fight back big time? It was only at his insistence that elections were held at all. I think he has been a "stopper" on full blown revolt by the Shites.

[Roland99]

13. That leads into another thing mentioned...civil war is all but guaranteed

Damn I wish I hadn't left my notes at home!!

[LynnTheDem]

17. Must keep CIA-sponsored car-bomber terrorist summary executioner

bush-puppet in Iraq's "liberated democratic freedom" government.

[Disturbed]

18. 1, 7000 Turkish troops in N. Iraq

Seems that will pose some problems. Al Sistani is the power in Iraq. He is a patient man but anyone's patience only lasts so long. The Iraqi elelction was so hyped by the Bush Junta and the Junta Media that most Amerikans think that Iraq is now a Democracy and things have been settled. Democracy is at hand in the ME. Yeah, right!

[LynnTheDem]

20. If bush keeps this shit up in Iraq, and Sistani decides enuf is enuf and

calls for Jihad, we will probably lose every single one of those 150,000 Iraqmired US troops. Not that bushCartel or the rethugs give a damn.

Turkey and the PKK should be starting to rumble any day now. The PKK will discover that contrary to promises (again) bush will not side with them.

The Shia are now realizing they've been had over the so-called "free elections" and that bushCartel are still pushing their terrorist puppet for PM.

The Iraqis been through all of this before; al Sistani well remembers the Jihad called on the UK when Britain tried to occupy Iraq with their puppet regime. He knows how it's done.

[VegasWolf]

21. Doh!! Allawi is telling them that they will get their asses blown up

if they don't vote for him. How many weeks has this been? the
new PM position should have been decided by now. Boosh
won't let ANYTHING happen to Halliburton's oil interests.

[hector459]

22. No election is valid under occupation. sorry to burst the bubble.

Iraq has not had a legitimate election and the rest of the world should not accept it. Look for a real civil war to break out in Iraq. We have screwed things up miserably.