Republicans showed up at the State of the Union address waving purple fingers, symbolizing the Iraqi equivalent of the "I voted" tag. Initial indications were of a high turnout, pleasing everyone but of course the Bushheads had to indulge in partisan gloating.
And now? ... not so much.
The official turnout figures were supposed to become available today, but they won't. That may be because indications now are that the turnout was much lower that ballyhooed in Baghdad before, according to the Associated Press. The New York Times reported on a district in Mosul where it appears to have been around 10%. The first figures that made headlines were 70% and then 60%.
Meanwhile, the first returns counted suggest that the secular Shiite slate with the current US-installed Allawi at its head is losing badly to the slate of Shiite clerics loyal to Sistani, raising the possibility that the U.S. toppled a secular dictator and 200 billion dollars later, may get a fundamentalist Islamic state, with close ties to Iran, that next door neighbor and charter member of the Axis of Evil.
"Sharif Ali bin Hussein, head of the Constitutional Monarchy Party, likened the vote outcome to a "Sistani tsunami" that would shake the nation.
"Americans are in for a shock," he said, adding that one day they would realize, "We've got 150,000 troops here protecting a country that's extremely friendly to Iran, and training their troops."""""
So where was Diebold when they needed them this time?
UPDATE: The other shoe has fallen already: the New York Times reports that Shiite clerics are calling for a constitution that enshrines Islam as the state religion, and religious law as the law of the land.
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