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Sunday, November 07, 2004
General Election Cattle Call: Iraq
Posted by Tim TagarisThere is another election afoot this January. Only in Iraq they don't need Diebold machines and petition laws to keep undesirables (Sunnis/Anti-Americans) from office. The Washington Post reports on a number of restrictions placed on individuals who would like to seek offices in the upcoming elections.
1) They have to have at least a secondary school diploma and "a good reputation."
2) They cannot have been convicted of "a crime involving moral turpitude."
3) They cannot have made money "in an illegitimate manner at the expense of the homeland and public finance."
Any chance good Sunni Muslims had to get elected is further inhibited by the fact that up to 1/3 of the country won't even be safe enough to vote in elections (Sunni regions mostly). I shall leave the irony of moral trupitude and profiting at the expense of the homeland as restrictions for our President and Vice President to deliberate.
Meanwhile, the Shias are trying to get their "shiat" together and provide a unified front in the upcoming election, The New York Times reports.
The Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani is worried that unless Shiites unite in the upcoming election, their overall position will be weakened. Two prominent Shi'ia stand in the way, and you'll never guess who they are. Let's take a moment to welcome back Pentagon favorite, Ahmad Chalabi & that rascally outlaw Moktada al-Sadr.
Ayatollah al-Sistani (and probably the White House) is nervous that Chalabi's attempt to reach out to al-Sadr and form an anti-American coalition would probably have widespread support in Iraq. If that happens, the Shiia vote could be split (at best?) between Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani's moderate Sciri party and the anti-American party platform that would come from a united Chalabi & al-Sadr.
Someone wake up Chris Bowers, we need another General Election Cattle Call.
Posted at 05:48 AM in General | Technorati
Comments
I think you mean we need to start the Swing Provinces Project, aka the SPP. Where are the battlegrounds?! :)
Posted by: DavidNYC at November 7, 2004 11:33 AM | Permalink | Edit Comment | Delete Comment
Unfortunately, I think the whole country is a "battleground", if you know what I mean.
Posted by: Sam at November 7, 2004 01:39 PM | Permalink | Edit Comment | Delete Comment
RE: the Election (USA)
Now that I���ve worked thru my denial, grief, anger, and depression, I asked myself ���What would Confucius do?��� Basically TURN IT AROUND. This may seem like a defeat, but let���s consider it a VICTORY.
Here���s why. We STOOD UP TO BUSH. Americans united and just said NO. We exposed his lies , we spread the truth to MANY more than would have known it before. We actually DID GREAT. I don���t think we gave him carte blanc , even though he may have plans. No, WE ARE WATCHING YOUR EVERY MOVE, BUSH. He���ll be able to get away with LESS than before. Hopefully, Cheney and the group will get prosecuted for at least one of their illegal activities. WE SAVED KERRY from having to dig us out of George Bush���s mess. We���re in DEEP! Bush put us here, let���s see you get us out, George. Things will get WORSE and WORSE (they are already in Iraq). Bush can���t handle it. Four more years knee deep in your own bushit.
Let���s face it, even if Kerry had gotten elected, we still had a HARD job on our hands getting out of this pit. I thank Kerry for volunteering to do the job.
And we don���t need to HOPE people lose their jobs, and things go bad. We already knew they would, that���s why we were trying to get him out in the first place. I do feel sad for everyone who will be hurt.
Posted by: Jason at November 8, 2004 01:52 PM | Permalink | Edit Comment | Delete Comment
John,
First of all, I am not an elitist. I think ALL people should be judged by their works, not what they inherited, their gender, race or money. I think men and women are equal. How does that make me an elitist?
The reason you don���t understand that religious fundamentalists want to suppress women, is because you are a man. (or possibly a woman who HAS children and stays in her ���place��� at home). I happen to be a woman who has a career and no children. If you were in that position, then you���d feel the full brunt of what I speak of.
First of all, the Bible makes it clear that God is male, then it makes it even clearer that men were created, and then women were ���created for men���. I don���t buy it
I hang out with a lot of Christians (??Don���t ask me how it happened, it just did), so I am very familiar with what they believe. Women are breeding-stock. Their proper place is in the home. They must be chaste. I am most familiar with the Latter Day Saints. Men have the power. Women cannot hold the Priesthood. Every activity in the Church is centered around women having children and staying in the home. Women must wear dresses (skirts) to church. The men say it���s out of ���respect���. I ask you, for who?? God has seen me with nothing on. God would not care what I wear, only what���s in my heart. No, it���s MEN who want the women to wear dresses. There is no more reason a woman should wear a dress than a man. The LDS Church voted against the ERA ���Because it would undermine the woman���s role in the home���. The fact that they voted against it per se doesn���t bother me as much as the reason ( as it did have some flaws).
Let me say this: Just because women CAN have children, doesn���t mean they must; women do not have a ���role��� (neither do men). All people are free to make their own choices. As far as chastity, it is MEN who get women pregnant. If you���re going to punish anyone (remember, in the bible they would ���stone��� the woman), it���s the MAN that should be punished. The burden of chastity should lie equally with men and women.
I wish you had the great opportunity to be a ���woman for a day���. (Does that horrify you?) Then you might understand that I speak the truth.
By the way, I am not a ���feminist��� either. I enjoy being a woman. I just don���t enjoy what it���s like to be a woman in a ���society��� built by men, for men. (Just like the Bible).
Posted by: Kim at November 8, 2004 03:38 PM | Permalink | Edit Comment | Delete Comment
Hmmmm... would Bush qualify to run for office in Iraq using those guidelines?
Posted by: patrick at November 8, 2004 11:05 PM | Permalink | Edit Comment | Delete Comment
Patrick,
I don't think so!
(Unfortunately, I think there is going to be
"ONE Child Left Behind". (only one though))
Wow, talk about high standards?! This should be some election!
Posted by: Jason at November 8, 2004 11:50 PM | Permalink | Edit Comment | Delete Comment
Kim-
How would my being a man preclude me from "understanding" that religious fundamentalists want to suppress women? That statement IS elitist...you are saying that I lack understanding because of MY station in life (even if that station puts me in a majority).
As far as religion goes...this may be another symantical arguement, which I have found myself in a few times...YOUR definition of fundamentalists may be different from mine...in your earlier post it seemed to me you were painting with a broad brush (those Christians who turned out in large numbers to vote for Bush). My mother is an ordained minister (Retired) in a Christian sect. My Grandmother was too. I think you are way out of place to suggest that I don't understand the world we live in, because you don't know my circumstances...growing up in an Urban environment where I was one of a handful of Caucasians in my entire school, being raised in a Christian household, by a single parent mother, who was an ordained minister. That is an admitedly odd set of circumstances, but those are the ones that I was raised in. That may have some impact on my social moderate views as opposed to my religiously conservative views.
Please don't lecture me on my ability or lack of ability to understand things...that is a BS argument that other groups have used (only against people with oppposing views)....remember the old (It's a black thing...if you have to ask you wouldn't understand).
Posted by: John at November 9, 2004 09:01 AM | Permalink | Edit Comment | Delete Comment
I have experienced both fundamentalist churches and non fundamentalist churches. The fundamentalists tend to take the Bible literally. Non-fundamentalists tend to take the Bible more in context. My wife and I felt like square pegs in a fundamentalist church because we had fertility problems and couldn't have biological children. They put people with children on a pedestal. We also felt like women were treated as second class. I my opinion some of the Bible passages they used to restrict women from teaching or speaking in church were taken out of context. She also didn���t like that I could never be an elder because we didn���t have children.
Here are some of the fun mentalists beliefs:
Why they think women can���t be ministers or speak in the church: "As in all the congregations of the saints, women should remain silent in the churches. They are not allowed to speak, but must be in submission, as the Law says. If they want to inquire about something, they should ask their own husbands at home; for it is disgraceful for a woman to speak in the church. Did the word of God originate with you? Or are you the only people it has reached?" (1 Cor. 14:33b-36).
Why women can���t teach adult Sunday school classes: "Let the woman learn in silence with all subjection. But I suffer not a woman to teach, nor to usurp authority over the man, but to be in silence" (1 Timothy 2:11-12).
Why only people with children can be elders in their churches: "One who manages his own household well, keeping his children under control with all dignity" (1 Timothy 3:4-5)
A silly argument came up in our old church about elders. There was a near split because an they wanted to make someone who had one child an elder. Some people didn't like it because children is plural in Timothy. He decided to decline the invitation to keep the church from splitting.
Posted by: DFuller at November 9, 2004 10:06 AM | Permalink | Edit Comment | Delete Comment