Give me an N! I mean a Q! What's that spell? Oh No!

While some reports on the Iraq election results emphasize that the Shiite clerical party didn't win big enough to rule, they fail to indicate what Robin Wright chooses to stress in her Washington Post report, that the Kurds---not the U.S. favored government slate---came in second, so that the election was dominated by Islamic religious candidates who are close to Iran.

She writes "When the Bush administration decided to invade Iraq two years ago, it envisioned a quick handover to handpicked allies in a secular government that would be the antithesis of Iran's theocracy -- potentially even a foil to Tehran's regional ambitions.

But, in one of the greatest ironies of the U.S. intervention, Iraqis instead went to the polls and elected a government with a strong religious base -- and very close ties to the Islamic republic next door. It is the last thing the administration expected from its costly Iraq policy -- $300 billion and counting, U.S. and regional analysts say. "
Iraq Winners Allied With Iran Are the Opposite of U.S. Vision (washingtonpost.com)