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If the Election Goes as Planned

By Jeralyn, Section War In Iraq
Posted on Sat Jan 29, 2005 at 03:53:40 PM EST
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Salon reporter Jill Carroll is in Baghdad, and reports on the fear of Iraqis. She also provides a succinct description of how things are supposed to proceed in the election:

David Enders provides this election primer as he reports from Baghdad for Mother Jones: There are 7,471 candidates from 111 parties for 275 slots in the national assembly and most of them have declined to provide their names to the public. Over 50 parties recently have dropped out due to the violence, but they remain on the ballot. There's another election for local councils.

If all goes as expected to plan, the Shi'ites, backed by the U.S., will win handily. It's leader, Allawi, has been dominating the airwaves to the exclusion of many other candidates. The minority Sunnis resent the U.S. occupation and support for the Shi'ites and are expected to stay home and forego voting.

More from the Salon article:

There are 75 parties and nine coalitions standing - in all, 7,471 candidates for the 275 seats - and all will be elected by proportional representation. Any candidate who receives 1/275th of the vote will get a seat. A party with 20 per cent of the vote would get 20 per cent of the seats, its 55 top-scoring candidates going to parliament. The parliament's job is to propose a constitution which will then be put before a referendum - another dangerous poll that is supposed to be held before 15 October and then - wait for it - there will be elections by 15 December to choose a new government.

Update: A Vote for Chaos (Cato Institute)

< Iraqis Divided Over Elections | The Expat Vote >

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    • If the Election Goes as Planned | 5 comments (5 topical)
    Re: If the Election Goes as Planned (none / 0) (#1)
    by Sailor on Sat Jan 29, 2005 at 06:17:54 PM EST
    People can't vote, even if they do their votes won't be counted, and aliens who never lived in the country and still don't can vote with impunity. Yep, that's democracy, Bush style.

    Re: If the Election Goes as Planned (none / 0) (#2)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Sat Jan 29, 2005 at 06:28:17 PM EST
    Oh, this is going to be a-lot of fun! lets us all hope that this comes out ok, and no little kids get killed. By the way sailor right.

    Re: If the Election Goes as Planned (none / 0) (#3)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Sat Jan 29, 2005 at 06:50:56 PM EST
    OT: If you mentioned you were going to be on Independent Thinking, I missed it. Pleasant surprise to see you on the tube Friday eve. Good show, TL.

    Re: If the Election Goes as Planned (none / 0) (#4)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Sat Jan 29, 2005 at 07:54:10 PM EST
    Jed, thanks very much. No, I didn't mention it here. It turned out to be a good discussion of how Colorado is over-incarcerating non-violent drug offenders. A similar discussion on mandatory minimums is planned for Wednesday on Reggie Rivers show. For non-Coloradans, we're talking about shows on our local PBS station.

    Re: If the Election Goes as Planned (none / 0) (#5)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Sat Jan 29, 2005 at 08:37:42 PM EST
    TL - Did Reggie wind up on PBS? I always enjoyed him.

    If the Election Goes as Planned | 5 comments (5 topical)