Bloodless Coup

Not to be snarky here, but how exactly does most Sunnis choosing not to vote in their election make Iraq less a democracry when they have the right to do so? If people are forced to vote (as is the case in many dictatorial regimes), aren't political freedoms in fact decreased?

Good grief Mo - are we going to have to invade Australia and force freedom upon them? I ask b/c Australia is one of the countries that has compulsory voting, and I think by any measure they are a democracy.

Though in theory I agree with you - I don't think you should be be forced to vote, nor do I approve of compulsory national service or the draft (though if any of those things were to be required showing up at the polls makes the most sense to me as a requirement as one can always cast a blank ballot and that's far less costly than the other two practices).

As to Iraq, maybe I should have questioned it being a "functioning representative" democracy, not simply a democracy.

Yes, Bro, I know about Australia, and I'm not sure how good an idea it is to include in the political process people with no interest in it. If they wouldn't otherwise vote, the idea that they would take the time to become informed seems absurd. How does including in the political process the uninformed make a democracy into a functioning democracy? It is not the responsibility of the Shiites, the US, or the UN to get Sunnis to the polls, and the choice many of them made not to vote was still a choice, a political liberty which did not exist before in Iraq, in any functioning way.

True enough as far as it goes - but when a big chunk of your country chooses to opt out of the governmental system, something would seem amiss, unstable, or at least probably pretty far from ideal - and quite possibly dangerous for the continued functioning of the state in question. This would seem doubly true when it's the former elite that is opting out.

And of course you are overlooking the problems associated with the simple ability of Sunnis to vote back in January.

In the broader scheme of things both those points are key to my original point. The progress that's been made is marginal and fragile so it might be worth paying more attention to the place since we are spending untold billions there every month, and Americans are dying there on a regular basis. Not that I don't love American Idol or Jackson trial coverage (well, OK, I don't), but there are matters of much more significance going on so let's pay attention and not just sit back and say a we've won after a couple of fragile victories.

[And whether or not voters are informed or not has nothing to do with the topic at hand.]

Bro, if I'm getting your point, you're arguing that democracy isn't a democracy or a functioning democracy or even an ideal democracy when most of a country's citizens don't choose to vote. My response was that compelling people to vote doesn't make a country any more democratic or more functioning or even more ideal because of problems like the uninformed voting. It seems like a political system has at least three primary options: forbidding meaningful elections; compelling people to vote in elections; and allowing people to vote or not as their conscience guides them. We agree I think that the first of these options is not democratic. The question at hand is exactly whether there can be a meaningful democracy (the word functioning might never be agreed upon except by those in the majority party--that is, many liberals and democrats would argues as to whether the Bush administration is a functioning democracy--so let's be genuinely vague here unless you care to describe in measurable terms what characterizes a functioning democracy) when the vast majority of a quarter of a country does not vote. I would argue that now we have instead of a country whose population didn't have but a solitary voice, instead now a minority of a country that is choosing not to exercise its voice. Is it dangerous for them to vote? Sure it is. It was dangerous for African Americans to vote in the American South. And let's not forget it was dangerous for the Shiites and the Kurds to vote. But now the political system itself is on the side of their political liberties, and that's a vast improvement, more than a marginal step in the right direction, unless you think ammendments granting voting rights in this country were just marginal steps in the right direction. I would agree that this progress is fragile and that's why our support is important for the continued liberty of the Iraqi people.

Morris - My point had little to do with what you are writing about, and nothing to do with compulsory voting. All I was saying was that the Bush wave of democratization has thus far had limited, though certainly not meaningless, substantive significance (a point you disagree with) and that the gains that have been made are fragile (a point you agree with).

As to Iraq being a functioning democracy - it clearly is not in any meaningful sense of the word beyond being a place that holds elections and allows for the winners to put their friends and allies in government jobs. Many people hope that it will become one - but it's very far from being that at present. There are a host of measures that can be used to measure "functioning" - and the current government would fail on a lot of those even if the country 1) didn't lack a constitution 2) feature major internal territorial disputes 3) house over 100,000 foreign troops and 4) feature a bloody civil war (or "insurgency" if you prefer).

As to your comparisons - In most places it was not dangerous for the Kurds to vote (in fact it was so safe that in some areas they voted numerous times). And surely we don't want to use the Jim Crow South as something to compare Iraq to - though if you insist upon it, yes, few blacks voted there then, and I think it's fair to debate whether or not the area was at that time a functioning representative democracy. By some measures it was, but by other measures, not so much.

As to the political system being on the side of their political liberties - one can argue about how many Iraqis think that's currently the case (some believe that, some don't), but let's save that argument until they have a proposed constitution and we have a better sense what liberties they may actually formally possess (what they will possess in practice is of course another matter entirely).

Bro,
I think that a place that holds elections and allows for the winners to put their friends and allies in government jobs describes most democracies. If you'll recall the US started out without a Constitution, until one was written, and the US started out housing many foreign troops who were fighting with us against England. Also, the US started out with a bloody insurgency (we were the insurgents against the English and the Native Americans were our own bloody insurgents), and the US continued to have territorial disputes along the border with Native Americans, Mexico, and anyone else who stood between us and the Pacific Ocean, as well as territorial disputes regarding slave and free states that persisted until our Civil War. So all of your criticisms actually suggest that Iraq is along the same path to democracy that our own counrty followed.

And your standard that it wasn't dangerous for Kurds to vote just because their polling stations weren't blown up is monday morning quarterbacking, defining a dangerous situation by a positive outcome which has little to do with fear as it's perceived. My point in comparing Iraq to reconstruction America is to show that Iraq is taking necessary steps toward democracy and political liberties. Our own nation took about two centuries to legally recognize the rights of all of our citizens regardless of race, sex, religion, or physical handicap, yet you seem to expect the Iraqis to take these steps within a couple of years. If your such a fan of rigid definitions of success and high expectations, I don't see why you're not a bigger fan of NCLB.

The No Child Left Behind Act is a hideous unfunded mandate that in practice LOWERS standards in certain places and takes away the ability of states to run cool new programs and be the engines of innovation that are the best things about a federal system of government. That it's a big government blunt instrument that the Republicans aren't willing to pay for and can't possibly live up to the promises it makes. In essence it's exactly the kind of thing that George W. Bush adores with a blinding passion - and an excellent example of the kind of Republicanism that I find mendacious and close to abhorrent.

As to your first sentence - well duh. Of course democracies do that. But to be a functioning government they also should presumbly, you know, be running a government - and the steps toward that goal are marginal, at best.

As to your comparisons of Iraq to early American history - I think they are wildly off the mark. True, the French were here briefly (thanks France!) but they didn't start building bases and making plans to stay in the way that we are. And to compare the insurgency there to what there was here - the situations aren't remotely analogous.

Though even if you're right - the idea that we should spend so many lives, so many billions of dollars, so much political capital, and lock our military into an area that isn't half the threat that other areas are so that in 200 years Iraqis can have a system that looks sort of like ours - I find that appalling beyond words, and deeply harmful to the health and security of our own nation. But I guess that's just a values difference between you and me.

Armand,
You forget that before NCLB students weren't being given the same test nationwide, so it's impossible to say that NCLB lowers standard when no appropriate test for determining standards was given nationwide before NCLB. Not only does it take a couple months away from the ability of states to run cool, new programs (I guess I just don't remember any like that while I was in school), it also takes away the ability of teachers to simply babysit children and pass them on to the next grade for the rest of their lives, regardless of whether the kids learn how to read and stuff. I do agree that we should fund NCLB fully. My suggestion is to take that money away from the UN, at least until corrupt Kofi leaves.

And where, exactly should our troops stay if not in bases we built. I, too, enjoy the irony of our troops living in Saddam's palaces, but there are only so many of those, and sticking a tent in central Baghdad to avoid offending the Sunnis, or France, or whoever it is you don't want us to offend doesn't offer a lot of protection for our troops. And as to your idea that France never built forts or planned to stay, let's remember Fort Duquesne was exactly where Pittsburg is today, Fort Niagara in New York and outposts they held in Ticonderoga and Crown Point until the British took over those forst in the French and Indian War. They didn't leave America or refrain from building forts; their forts were taken from them.

It's obvious that not only do many American soldiers disagree with you about the value of their service to democracy in Iraq, so do thousands of Iraqis willing to risk their lives in security forces that are as dangerous as any job that can be had in this world.

Morris - Of course you can compare pre and post NCLB standards. Federal standards like NCLB might not have been in place before, but state standards were. And there are plenty of governors who believe that NCLB lowered standards. That you like NCLB doesn't shock me given your love for federal government power.

I really don't see what Fort Duquesne has to do with anything. I was talking about the American revolution (or, actually, you were) and Fort Duquesne predated that. I don't see how the fact that forts changed hands between the colonies of the British and French monarchies hundreds of years ago adds much to this thread. I mean if you want to go down that road, feel free. But I was talking about actions taken in supposedly sovereign new "democracies".