From the New York Times:
bq. The alliance of Interior Minister Jawad al-Bolani held the largest rally in Baghdad to date, with hundreds filling a large outdoor soccer stadium on Saturday. But it was not exactly a show of overwhelming public support. Many in the crowd were police officers employed by Mr. Bolani’s ministry. One officer, speaking on the condition of anonymity, said his battalion had been ordered to attend. The event was as notable for security as it was for political theater. Iraq Army helicopters circled low overhead, American Apaches higher in the sky. Streets were closed in all directions, snipers lined rooftops and each candidate had his own security detail, forming a phalanx around Mr. Bolani’s tent, a sea of machine guns and stony stairs. At the end of the rally, doves were released as a symbol of peace. Unfortunately, they were set free just as fireworks burst in the sky, catching many birds in the cross-fire.
{ 32 comments }
Henry 03.02.10 at 12:30 pm
Mars Attacks!
Delicious Pundit 03.02.10 at 1:49 pm
It doesn’t matter what job you put him in, Doug Feith still can’t do anything right.
Hidari 03.02.10 at 2:55 pm
I know it’s a wonderful metaphor for what’s going on in Iraq right now, but could I just point out that the article linked to is blatantly and flagrantly racist.
‘There are no laws governing how political parties raise and spend money, and while the Americans might have brought democracy to this country, campaigning here is done in a distinctly Iraqi way.
For all the outraged speeches, newly created Facebook pages and advertisements on the Arabic satellite channels, Iraqi politics remains an intensely local and personal affair, so much so that Gen. David H. Petraeus, the head of the United States Central Command, has offered a special name for it: Iraqracy. ‘
Darkies, eh? The White Man gives them democracy for wholly moral, non oil related reasons, and then they go and fuck it all up. Luckily, the White Man also has great minds like David H. Petraeus on His side, to provide sneering, patronising commentary on the situation he is mainly to blame for.
ajay 03.02.10 at 3:32 pm
Sorry, Hidari, are you saying that Iraqi campaigning isn’t as the article described is? Or that it is, but it’s racist to point it out?
Hidari 03.02.10 at 3:42 pm
Ajay
are you actually and seriously suggesting that the phrase ‘Americans might have brought democracy to this country’ (and please note the ‘might’ is for rhetorical purposes only, as the rest of the article makes clear) bears the slightest relation to the truth?
Zamfir 03.02.10 at 3:42 pm
ajay, those are not in conflict with each other. Take the politics of , focus on its darker sides, and you could easily write a nasty, condescending piece about it without any lies. It’s all about framing.
mpowell 03.02.10 at 3:44 pm
You know, a political system where politicians try to win elections by trying to buy off their base is a big step up from one where elites buy off the politicians to get even bigger rewards from the state and the base is ignored. I don’t see how any American would be in a position to do any sneering here. Our SCOTUS just decided that not only is our corrupt system of non-democracy okay, it is right and just and cannot be changed by a normal act of Congress.
Donald A. Coffin 03.02.10 at 3:51 pm
I, personally, liked this line:
“…a sea of machine guns and stony stairs…”
It’s a hard and rocky road they walk.
JoB 03.02.10 at 4:00 pm
I’m with mpowell. An election rally where only doves die isn’t too bad. What do people expect from a country having been put close to a civil war: a good American TV show?
PS: and as for doves, nothing as hilarious as the one that was ‘released’ by an Afghan ….. to fall daeth as a doorbell in front of his feet
kid bitzer 03.02.10 at 4:16 pm
we’ll know that true democracy has come to iraq when the rally features giant ice-skating beavers.
ajay 03.02.10 at 4:45 pm
6: so, wait a minute, you’re arguing that Iraqi politics is no worse or more corrupt than anywhere else, and this story represents a racist attempt to prove otherwise by only picking on the negative stuff?
Treilhard 03.02.10 at 4:52 pm
“Some people criticize me for giving people pistols,†[al-Maliki] said during a meeting with security officials broadcast on television. “Honestly, I wish I could give a pistol and a rifle to each one who stood beside the government against the gangs to express our appreciation.â€
We’ll know that true democracy has come to Iraq when every bureaucrat’s gift basket is filled with machine pistols and flash grenades.
ajay 03.02.10 at 5:27 pm
“Honestly, I wish I could give a pistol and a rifle to each one who stood beside the government against the gangs to express our appreciation.â€
Which is odd because, almost invariably, they’ve already got one.
a.y.mous 03.02.10 at 6:10 pm
They are uncouth barbarians. Manners need to be taught. That said, they are good learners. Pick up very fast. These darkies.
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=364×2108732
alex 03.02.10 at 7:18 pm
Basically, all we have here is confirmation of everything said against the ‘guns ‘n’ roses’ model of democratisation [i.e. ‘we bring the guns, you throw the roses’]. Civil society can’t be conjured into existence, especially not by external force, so what is left is same-old same-old. Come back in 100 years, they might have advanced to a Berlusconi/Putin level of authoritarian masquerade, but I expect it’ll take even longer to get to full-on US-style mediatised pork-barrel farce.
Hidari 03.02.10 at 8:01 pm
#11 While no less an august authority that the New York Times has decided that the Iraqi elections are really about free chicken distribution, it is worth mentioning that some Iraqis have come to the bizarre conclusion that the real issue is foreign ownership of oil.
‘Al-Maliki also faces sharp competition in the south from rival Shiite parties, some of which harshly criticized his oil deals. The Sadrist party, loyal to radical cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, Fadhila Party and nationalist Iraqis, accused him of surrendering the nation’s oil wealth to international companies.
Al-Maliki is hoping the promise from Basra’s giant oil fields will be enough to win over voters. But years of neglect weigh heavily on that possibility.
About 60 kilometers (38 miles) northwest of Basra, roaring flames billow from Rumaila, Iraq’s biggest oil field. The flames are the result of the burning of natural gas that is extracted along with the crude — a reminder that Iraq desperately needs foreign help even in capturing and selling the gas instead of burning it off.
Rumaila, with an estimated 17.8 billion-barrel reserve, is considered the workhorse of Iraq’s oil industry, producing about 1.1 million barrels per day. It was snapped up at the oil auction by British giant BP PLC teaming up with the China National Petroleum Corp.’
I hope that the NYT will publish an editorial harshly condemning this and similar stories which imply that the White Man in some way to blame for Iraq’s current travails (yes, even including the omnipresent political corruption).
Henri Vieuxtemps 03.02.10 at 9:08 pm
Iraq Army helicopters circled low overhead, American Apaches higher in the sky.
…and those doves, and fire in the sky…
Is there something apocalyptic about this image?
Natilo Paennim 03.02.10 at 9:50 pm
ajay, are you arguing in good faith? Hidari’s points seem quite clear to me. Let me break it down for you: The US military invaded Iraq. The purpose of the invasion was to secure access to the Iraqi oil reserves for multinational corporations at bargain prices. The stated intention of the US government that the invasion was for other purposes is false. In particular, the claim that the US would impose a democratic system in Iraqi government is false. The reason it is false is because a corrupt, oligarchical system is more beneficial to the multinational corporations. Therefore, the article’s snide tone is being used to obscure these essential facts of the situation by advancing a racist explanation for why democracy has not taken hold in Iraq.
JoB 03.03.10 at 7:48 am
12- nothing that your random right wing Westerner couldn’t have said (and that includes most of the GOP in the US); only they do not have the excuse of being in a society which was blasted to the middle ages in a geopolitical equivalent of Stratego.
ajay 03.03.10 at 9:19 am
Therefore, the article’s snide tone is being used to obscure these essential facts of the situation by advancing a racist explanation for why democracy has not taken hold in Iraq.
And this racist explanation would be…
Sorry, I’m sincerely baffled here. Yes, the article is snide about Iraqi democracy, which seems to depend in large part on gift-giving by candidates. But there’s a difference between being critical and being racist.
Here’s a NYT article about the elections in Nigeria:
http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/y/umaru_yaradua/index.html?scp=1&sq=nigeria%20election&st=cse
“He won the presidency in an election that the opposition called the worst since independence from Britain in 1960 and that international observers deemed not credible. Ballot boxes and stacks of voting cards were stolen as the police looked on.”
Is that, too, a racist statement?
Tim Worstall 03.03.10 at 9:33 am
Hidari: from the same article (it’s the Guardian, not the NYT), a few lines after your quote:
“Like other firms, the BP-CNPC consortium offered production targets in exchange for a per barrel fee in a 20-year contract.”
Ownership of the oil has not changed hands. BP and the like are being offered a fee for their expertise. May be a good idea, may be a bad one, not my point here. Only that no one ” has bought” the oil fields or the oil. Nor sold it. Some engineers have been hired to get it out of the ground.
Hidari 03.03.10 at 10:20 am
‘Ownership of the oil has not changed hands. BP and the like are being offered a fee for their expertise. May be a good idea, may be a bad one, not my point here. Only that no one †has bought†the oil fields or the oil. Nor sold it. Some engineers have been hired to get it out of the ground.’
My point was not about what I think, but what the Iraqis think. To repeat from the article: ‘Al-Maliki also faces sharp competition in the south from rival Shiite parties, some of which harshly criticized his oil deals. The Sadrist party, loyal to radical cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, Fadhila Party and nationalist Iraqis, accused him of surrendering the nation’s oil wealth to international companies‘.
Now that might be true or false or half true or whatever, but it does show the level of Iraqi political debate as being at an entirely different level to that portrayed in the NYT article, which basically states that Arabs will vote for whoever gives them free chickens.
ajay 03.03.10 at 10:47 am
the NYT article, which basically states that Arabs will vote for whoever gives them free chickens
I can’t help thinking that, if giving out free chickens didn’t have any effect on Iraqi voting preferences, then Iraqi politicians running for election probably wouldn’t be giving out free chickens.
alex 03.03.10 at 11:06 am
In America, things are so much more advanced. People actually pay for their own chickens, and even pay to eat rubber ones in the presence of politicians. progress is a wonderful thing.
Z 03.03.10 at 12:43 pm
I can’t help thinking that, if giving out free chickens didn’t have any effect on Iraqi voting preferences, then Iraqi politicians running for election probably wouldn’t be giving out free chickens.
Hidari’s point is not whether chickens are being given-stupid campaigning schemes happen in every country, yet we don’t normally say that Obama won because he’s good at shooting three-pointers-the point is that one crucial issue in Iraq policy, perhaps the crucial one, is how close candidates will be to the interests of foreign oil companies. Any article not mentioning this is at best painfully ignorant, at worst deliberately trying to deceive its readership.
Because organs of power in the US have a vested interest in the victory of candidates closely aligned to them, and because they are quite ready to bend the normal rules of democracy or at least to close their eyes on corruptions and frauds if they like the results, these organs of power also have a vested interest in depicting the Iraqis as incapable of seriously participating in the democratic process, so that if the US has to prevent the victorious party from gaining power, or if the victorious party gains victory only by election fraud, most people in the US will simply shook their head and lament the lack of democratic temper in the Iraq culture. With this context in mind, the NYT article appears really dreadful
That said, racist is perhaps not the best way to describe it: extremely culturally condescending in order to deliberately confuse the issues really at play might be a bit more precise.
ajay 03.03.10 at 1:45 pm
25: I’m a bit confused about what the story is here. Z seems to be saying “The Iraqis are actually having a deeply deliberative and non-corrupt election, and this article represents the US Establishment preparing to rubbish the results”. Hidari, on the other hand, seems to be saying “Iraqi democracy is a hopelessly corrupt sham, and that’s all the fault of the US Establishment”.
Hidari 03.03.10 at 2:44 pm
#26
I don’t like replying on behalf of other people. However: ‘ I’m a bit confused about what the story is here. Z seems to be saying “The Iraqis are actually having a deeply deliberative and non-corrupt election, and this article represents the US Establishment preparing to rubbish the results’.
Z is clearly not saying this at all. You are verging into trollish territory.
ajay 03.03.10 at 4:58 pm
27: I quote — “these organs of power also have a vested interest in depicting the Iraqis as incapable of seriously participating in the democratic process, so that if the US has to prevent the victorious party from gaining power, or if the victorious party gains victory only by election fraud, most people in the US will simply shook their head and lament the lack of democratic temper in the Iraq culture. With this context in mind, the NYT article appears really dreadful”.
Salient 03.03.10 at 5:51 pm
The Iraqis are
actually having a deeply deliberative and non-corrupt electionhaving an election which won’t materially matter, as many poor Iraqis themselves recognize, and this article represents the US Establishmentpreparing to rubbish the resultsattempting to equate poor Iraqi voters with poor (reviled) black welfare recipients in the U.S.* “…if someone else gives me something better, I will vote for him. Because after they win the elections, we will never see them or get anything from them. So I don’t care. I will vote for whoever gives me more.”
* “The news of free chickens spread everywhere,†said one resident, speaking on the condition of anonymity because he did not want to be seen as taking handouts.
(Next thing we know any election results which deviate from assigned expectations will be blamed on Al-Acorn.)
novakant 03.03.10 at 6:54 pm
Well, let’s call it condescension and self-righteousness – these are definitely pervasive and so deeply ingrained, most don’t even notice it anymore. No matter how awful governments around the world might be, it was the US/UK that killed a couple of 100000 innocent people in the past decade, not China, Iran or Russia. Inconvenient little fact, I know.
garymar 03.03.10 at 10:53 pm
DA Coffin @8:
They’re probably standing on top of a ziggurat. But wait — who ever heard of a stone ziggurat? An astute editor would have caught this mistake and emended it to read
Sebastian Dangerfield 03.04.10 at 5:17 pm
ajay: As far as the NYT article regarding elections in Nigeria is concerned, what you’ve pointed to is fairly straight-up factual reporting; the reporter is not speaking of “campaigning in a distinctly Nigerian way” and no-one is quoted characterizing the system as a “Nigacracy.” Distinction enough for you?
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