Iraq to Convene First National Assembly

[Lux]

By RAWYA RAGEH, Associated Press Writer
BAGHDAD, Iraq - Iraq puts its fragile democracy to the test Wednesday, convening its first freely elected National Assembly in recent history after last-minute bargaining over Sunni Arab candidates to head the parliament..

READ FULL STORY (http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20050316/ap_on_re_mi_ea/iraq) .

[ramis]

Most Iraqis say future looks brighter
By Barbara Slavin, USA TODAY
WASHINGTON — More Iraqis believe their country is headed in the right direction and fewer think it's going wrong than at any time since the U.S. invasion two years ago, according to a new poll.

The poll, by the International Republican Institute (IRI), due to be made public Wednesday, also found that nearly half of Iraqis believe that religion has a special role to play in government.

The survey of 1,967 Iraqis was conducted Feb. 27-March 5, after Iraq held its first free elections in half a century in January. According to the poll, 62% say the country is headed in the right direction and 23% say it is headed in the wrong direction. That is the widest spread recorded in seven polls by the group, says Stuart Krusell, IRI director of operations for Iraq. In September, 45% of Iraqis thought the country was headed in the wrong direction and 42% thought it was headed in the right direction. The IRI is a non-partisan, U.S. taxpayer-funded group that promotes democracy abroad.

Pollsters did not survey three of Iraq's 18 provinces because of security and logistical concerns. Two of those omitted, Anbar and Ninevah, are predominantly Sunni Muslim. A third, Dahuk, is mostly Kurdish. Krusell said that even if those areas had been included and 100% had expressed negative views, the poll would still have shown that most Iraqis believe that the situation in their country is improving.

The poll showed continuing sharp differences among Iraq's ethnic and religious groups, with 33% in Arab Sunni areas believing the country is headed in the right direction, compared with 71% of Kurds and 66% in the Shiite south. The deposed regime of Saddam Hussein favored Arab Sunnis and persecuted Kurds and Shiites.

According to the poll, more than 80% of Iraqis voted Jan. 30 in the Shiite south and the Kurdish north. In Sunni areas, 44% voted.

The newly elected assembly, which meets for the first time today, is to choose a government and write a constitution.

The poll showed that Iraqis are almost evenly split over the role of religion in government, with 48% favoring a "special role" for religion, but 44% saying religion and government should remain separate. A plurality of 47% say religious leaders should have the greatest input in writing the constitution.

Krusell said that is not surprising since Iraq is predominantly Muslim but that "it doesn't translate into support for Sharia," or strict Islamic law. Of those polled, 22% say the constitution should ensure "the Muslim identity of Iraq" but only 4% say Sharia should be the most important element. :happy64:

[ramis]

Britain favours conference to discuss future of Iraq
by Bronwen Maddox



BRITAIN is planning to call an international conference on Iraq this year — provided that Iraqis do finally manage to pick a government.
Before today’s historic first sitting of the newly elected parliament, the main parties have been struggling to share out the top half-dozen positions.



Yesterday there was still deadlock between Shia groups and the Kurds, despite broad agreement on an outline deal.

To keep to the tight timetable set for this year, the assembly is supposed to vote today on whether it accepts the new presidential council and the speaker of the assembly.

Britain’s fondness for the notion of a conference, once an Iraqi government has emerged, appears to spring from the meeting in London on March 1 to discuss the Palestinians’ future. It was a modest success and gave a boost to Mahmoud Abbas, their President. It took so-called donors to task about whether they would deliver the cash they had promised (exposing much Arab reluctance).

An Iraqi conference, it seems, would follow similar lines. It would give the top Iraqi ministers a chance to pitch to neighbours and others. British officials hope this exercise would be something of a team-building exercise, affirming the main players in their roles in front of an audience of extremely interested parties.

But if it takes place, it is unlikely to be in London, officials suggest. A European location is more likely, although no prizes for guessing it will not be Paris.

[ramis]

The Future of Iraq and U.S. Occupation
By Noam Chomsky | January 2005

The following is an except from a presentation by Noam Chomsky on January 26th at a forum sponsored by the Lannan Foundation in Santa Fe, NM to celebrate the 25th anniversary of the International Relations Center (IRC), online at www.irc-online.org. Chomsky is a member of the IRC’s board of directors.

Let’s just imagine what the policies might be of an independent Iraq, independent, sovereign Iraq, let’s say more or less democratic, what are the policies likely to be?

Well there’s going to be a Shiite majority, so they’ll have some significant influence over policy. The first thing they’ll do is reestablish relations with Iran. Now they don’t particularly like Iran, but they don’t want to go to war with them so they’ll move toward what was happening already even under Saddam, that is, restoring some sort of friendly relations with Iran.

That’s the last thing the United States wants. It has worked very hard to try to isolate Iran. The next thing that might happen is that a Shiite-controlled, more or less democratic Iraq might stir up feelings in the Shiite areas of Saudi Arabia, which happen to be right nearby and which happen to be where all the oil is. So you might find what in Washington must be the ultimate nightmare—a Shiite region which controls most of the world’s oil and is independent. Furthermore, it is very likely that an independent, sovereign Iraq would try to take its natural place as a leading state in the Arab world, maybe the leading state. And you know that’s something that goes back to biblical times.

What does that mean? Well it means rearming, first of all. They have to confront the regional enemy. Now the regional enemy, overpowering enemy, is Israel. They’re going to have to rearm to confront Israel—which means probably developing weapons of mass destruction, just as a deterrent. So here’s the picture of what they must be dreaming about in Washington—and probably 10 Downing street in London—that here you might get a substantial Shiite majority rearming, developing weapons of mass destruction, to try to get rid of the U.S. outposts that are there to try to make sure that the U.S. controls most of the oil reserves of the world. Is Washington going to sit there and allow that? That’s kind of next to inconceivable.

What I’ve just read from the business press the last couple of days probably reflects the thinking in Washington and London: “Uh well, okay, we’ll let them have a government, but we’re not going to pay any attention to what they say.” In fact the Pentagon announced at the same time two days ago: we’re keeping 120,000 troops there into at least 2007, even if they call for withdrawal tomorrow.

And the propaganda is very evident right in these articles. You can even write the commentary now: We just have to do it because we have to accomplish our mission of bringing democracy to Iraq. If they have an elected government that doesn’t understand that, well, what can we do with these dumb Arabs, you know? Actually that’s very common because look, after all, the U.S. has overthrown democracy after democracy, because the people don’t understand. They follow the wrong course. So therefore, following the mission of establishing democracy, we’ve got to overthrow their governments.

I think that [conscription] is going to be a last resort. The reason is the Vietnam experience. The Vietnam experience, I think, is the first time in the history of European imperialism that an imperial power tried to fight a colonial war with a citizen’s army. I mean the British didn’t do it, and the French had the Foreign Legion… In colonial wars, civilians are just no good at. [Colonial wars are] too brutal and vicious and murderous. You just can’t take kids off the street and have them fight that kind of war. You need trained killers, like the French Foreign Legion.

In fact you could see it happening in Vietnam. To its credit, the U.S. army fell apart. It took too long, but finally the army essentially fell apart. Soldiers were on drugs, they were fragging officers, not following orders, and so on and the top brass wanted them out. If you look back at the military journals in the late Sixties, they were writing about how we gotta get this army out of here or the army’s going to collapse—much like the head of the Army reserves said two or three days ago. He said this is becoming a broken force.
:confused:

[FAST1]

The Future of Iraq and U.S. Occupation
By Noam Chomsky | January 2005

The following is an except from a presentation by Noam Chomsky on January 26th at a forum sponsored by the Lannan Foundation in Santa Fe, NM to celebrate the 25th anniversary of the International Relations Center (IRC), online at www.irc-online.org. Chomsky is a member of the IRC’s board of directors.

Let’s just imagine what the policies might be of an independent Iraq, independent, sovereign Iraq, let’s say more or less democratic, what are the policies likely to be?

Well there’s going to be a Shiite majority, so they’ll have some significant influence over policy. The first thing they’ll do is reestablish relations with Iran. Now they don’t particularly like Iran, but they don’t want to go to war with them so they’ll move toward what was happening already even under Saddam, that is, restoring some sort of friendly relations with Iran.

That’s the last thing the United States wants. It has worked very hard to try to isolate Iran. The next thing that might happen is that a Shiite-controlled, more or less democratic Iraq might stir up feelings in the Shiite areas of Saudi Arabia, which happen to be right nearby and which happen to be where all the oil is. So you might find what in Washington must be the ultimate nightmare—a Shiite region which controls most of the world’s oil and is independent. Furthermore, it is very likely that an independent, sovereign Iraq would try to take its natural place as a leading state in the Arab world, maybe the leading state. And you know that’s something that goes back to biblical times.

What does that mean? Well it means rearming, first of all. They have to confront the regional enemy. Now the regional enemy, overpowering enemy, is Israel. They’re going to have to rearm to confront Israel—which means probably developing weapons of mass destruction, just as a deterrent. So here’s the picture of what they must be dreaming about in Washington—and probably 10 Downing street in London—that here you might get a substantial Shiite majority rearming, developing weapons of mass destruction, to try to get rid of the U.S. outposts that are there to try to make sure that the U.S. controls most of the oil reserves of the world. Is Washington going to sit there and allow that? That’s kind of next to inconceivable.

What I’ve just read from the business press the last couple of days probably reflects the thinking in Washington and London: “Uh well, okay, we’ll let them have a government, but we’re not going to pay any attention to what they say.” In fact the Pentagon announced at the same time two days ago: we’re keeping 120,000 troops there into at least 2007, even if they call for withdrawal tomorrow.

And the propaganda is very evident right in these articles. You can even write the commentary now: We just have to do it because we have to accomplish our mission of bringing democracy to Iraq. If they have an elected government that doesn’t understand that, well, what can we do with these dumb Arabs, you know? Actually that’s very common because look, after all, the U.S. has overthrown democracy after democracy, because the people don’t understand. They follow the wrong course. So therefore, following the mission of establishing democracy, we’ve got to overthrow their governments.

I think that [conscription] is going to be a last resort. The reason is the Vietnam experience. The Vietnam experience, I think, is the first time in the history of European imperialism that an imperial power tried to fight a colonial war with a citizen’s army. I mean the British didn’t do it, and the French had the Foreign Legion… In colonial wars, civilians are just no good at. [Colonial wars are] too brutal and vicious and murderous. You just can’t take kids off the street and have them fight that kind of war. You need trained killers, like the French Foreign Legion.

In fact you could see it happening in Vietnam. To its credit, the U.S. army fell apart. It took too long, but finally the army essentially fell apart. Soldiers were on drugs, they were fragging officers, not following orders, and so on and the top brass wanted them out. If you look back at the military journals in the late Sixties, they were writing about how we gotta get this army out of here or the army’s going to collapse—much like the head of the Army reserves said two or three days ago. He said this is becoming a broken force.
:confused:


Word of warning about Chomsky.

http://www.antichomsky.blogspot.com./

The Anti-Chomsky Reader
Edited by Peter Collier and David Horowitz
$15.95 $11.95
The essays in this provocative book focus on subjects such as Chomsky's bizarre involvement with Holocaust revisionism, his apologies for Khmer Rouge tyrant Pol Pot, and his claim that America's policies in Latin America in the 1980s were comparable to Nazism.

http://frontpagemagonline.com/onlinestore/

[OldWolf]

Losing the elections was bad I agree. However can't these guys just relax and realize they are now the minority. Anyhow I would be very curious to see what this genius was saying about how the Iraq conflict would go up till now. I would imagine It was something along the lines of thousands of body bags and quagmire and Arabs don't want democracy it just won't work in that part of the world. Before you take or believe predictions from anyone you should understand thier agenda if any. Much like the thread that got so much play recently about the NBK official who said such and such abou the Dinar being re printed. Everyone's got an agenda folks and not all of them are pro US. I must say it is disheartening when it comes from inside the US though.

[Dinaress]

wanta get a real hoot? go read Ann Coulter today. good news for the Middle East is hard to come by these days:


In an editorial last week, The New York Times gave President Bush credit for democracy sweeping through the Middle East or, as the Times put it, "a year of heartening surprises." Yes, the Middle East's current democratization would come as quite a surprise to anyone who puts his hands over his ears and hums during the president's speeches.



http://www.anncoulter.com/

[RET]

wanta get a real hoot? go read Ann Coulter today.

Read it. :D