Comments on: Chalabi Moves to Disqualify 6 Elected MPs, Demote Allawi’s Party to Runner-Up

By: MonsieurGonzo

MonsieurGonzo — Tue, 30 Mar 2010 16:41:06 +0000

ref : “Al-Maliki is said to have been among a big party of Iraqi officials in Tehran the day before yesterday. They went there, ‘al-Hayat’ said, because there was too much danger of being listened in on in Iraq. Presumably what is actually being asserted here is that the US has sophisticated signals intelligence and has widely tapped phones, so that in Baghdad any attempt at coalition-formation would be immediately picked up by US intelligence. Since the US is widely thought to be backing Allawi's secular Iraqiya list, it would be undesirable from al-Maliki's point of view for them to overhear his negotiations with other lists. Thus, they went off to Iran.” and “Vice President Tariq al-Hashimi, a Sunni, is expressing anxiety and concern over the meetings in Tehran, denouncing them as naked interference by a neighbor in Iraq's internal affairs.” Thanks for bringing this = the continued, controversial rôles of IRAN and the U.S. in the general election and "coalition-building process" of IRAQ to our attention, Juan.

By: Arun

Arun — Tue, 30 Mar 2010 14:38:29 +0000

Any comments on this news-item (Iran rescues kidnapped diplomat in Pakistan without help from Pakistan)
http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=121994§ionid=351020101

By: Scott Corey

Scott Corey — Tue, 30 Mar 2010 14:09:41 +0000

Bush-Cheney defenders have no credibility in connection with any degree of democracy in Iraq. To them, democracy exists to be perverted. In our country, they succeeded in purging voter lists and swift-boating a decorated veteran.

Despite all the subsequent pain, Iraqis can be proud that they did not put Chalabi (then a pet of the neo-cons) into power when Mr. Cheney's empire was at its height. That defiance of the regime in Washington is the first accomplishment of democracy in Iraq. Any actual progress toward genuine democracy now is predicated on that defeat of fixed and faked democracy then.

By: HARRY V

HARRY V — Tue, 30 Mar 2010 12:12:04 +0000

It is as you have said, the mainstream media acts as if Allawi is already the new Prime Minister – that Iraq will be hostile to Iran and more friendly to Israel. Richard Engel, The reporter for either CNN or NBC was on Rachel Maddow's Friday night show euphorically describing the election of Allawi as the vindication of our invasion and that thus Iraq would be hostile to Iran hence forth. These people are incredibly ignorant about countries they report in. Don't they learn anything when they are in another country or are they so bottled up in the green zone to ever get out and talk to the population about what they really want.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Tue, 30 Mar 2010 07:46:07 +0000

Nitpick: In countries with lots of political parties (most European countries, for instance) it is customary to refer to the party that gets most seats as the winner, even though it gets nowhere near a majority. Similarly, all the parties that get more seats than they held previously can be referred to as winners of the election, and I don't think many people think of that as a mischaracterisation.

Thanks for a great blog anyways!